Saturday, March 1
All good things must come to an end, and this morning we prepared to bid farewell to the Blue Waters Inn. We took longing last looks across the bay at Goat Island and Little Tobago Island and through the scopes watched the very distant Red-billed Tropicbirds flying against the dark green tree on Little Tobago.
I had arranged for a sensible, no-rush departure time – 10 a.m. – so we could have a leisurely breakfast and spend some time just being. It was not easy leaving the Blue Waters Inn, with the lush foliage all around us. We made last-minute jaunts to our favorite nearby places for a few last photographs. When we were all packed and ready to leave, we gathered for a group photo.
Ten o’clock came and went with no sign of our maxitaxi. Around 11 a.m. I asked the staff person in charge to call the taxi company and find out what was going on. She did, and the response was that they would get back to us. Half an hour later they called to say that the driver was a Seventh-Day Adventist and could not drive on Saturday, so he had simply gone about his business, leaving us stranded.
The company straightaway had sent another driver and maxitaxi to get us. This little glitch, coming as it did toward the end of the trip, was a non-problem. Who could complain about having to spend an extra two hours relaxing in a remote, comfortable tropical resort, enjoying a cold beverage in a hideaway where we got to sit in the shade of sea almond trees listening to the soft sound of the surf rolling in, with Ruddy Turnstones only a few feet away? Certainly not us!
Eventually a maxitaxi did arrive and took us back to the Mt. Irvine. Our familiar rooms welcomed us. For a change in venue, I had the driver wait for us to settle in and then drive us to the airport area, to the vendors of local food at Store Bay. Again we relished the chicken, beef, fish, rice, and vegetables prepared with creole spices and served in generous portions. Because it was Saturday, business was booming. We got to see many visitors from Trinidad and to see that the cell phone explosion had reached the islands. After enjoying several kinds of ice cream, including pumpkin-coconut and soursop ice cream, we flagged down a taxi and returned to the Mt. Irvine.
Everyone had enjoyed our afternoon at Grafton Estate on Monday so much that I had arranged for a driver to take us back there for a final afternoon of birding. We arrived well before the 4 p.m. feeding time, so we used the time to explore the trail on the seaward side of the property. Except for species we had seen before, all was quiet. Each time we had gone afield we had had better views of some species. By now we were rather expert not only at finding birds in the dense vegetation but also at identifying them in flight.
At feeding time, again the birds resembled a blizzard. Chachalacas, doves, pigeons, tanagers, Bananaquits, and even Red-crowned Woodpeckers arrived to share the wealth. We stayed until the daylight began to fade, then reluctantly left that most rewarding spot. As with every unscheduled foray, this one had turned out just fine.
Sunday, March 2
On Monday, almost a week ago by now, Adolphus and I had discussed taking the group to Buccoo Marsh, a tiny pond surrounded by aquatic vegetation and mangroves. A large number of first records of birds had been made at Buccoo Marsh. In fact, in the late 1980s I had visited the site with Adolphus and a group of three other birders and had shown him his first Little Egret. That was quite a coup, but what was really sensational was that foraging almost at the egret’s feet was a Wilson’s Phalarope, a kind of bird Adolphus had never heard of, and indeed the first record for either Trinidad or Tobago.
Other species that had been found at Buccoo Marsh included storks from Africa, herons from Africa and Europe, shorebirds from Europe, and usually a decent number of shorebirds and waterbirds. Adolphus had told me that there was little left of Buccoo Marsh because it had been partially drained and that the mudflats were now knee-high in vegetation. With that depressing information I had removed Buccoo Marsh from our list of intended destinations. Now that we had birded throughout Tobago, however, it was agreed that we would take a chance anyway and make a very early departure-day foray to visit this hallowed spot. Our driver arrived on time and whisked us one mile to the entrance, a rustic barbed-wire fence with a handmade gate.
Already there was my old friend Peter Cox, another one of the young expert birders who serve as birding guides for groups. He and his group headed in one direction and we headed in another. As Adolphus had described, where formerly there lay a small pond, now there were rushes and no water. I knew the layout of the place, so I headed through some thorn scrub toward an area of deeper water that I hoped would be open. As we broke out of the scrub and into an open area of grass and rushes we could see a pond not far away that seemed alive with birds. In just a few minutes we had picked out two new birds for the trip, American Coot and Purple Gallinule, as well as Little Blue and Tricolored Herons, Black-crowned Night-Herons, Snowy Egrets, Wattled Jacanas, Common Moorhens, Black-bellied Whistling-Ducks, and Greater Yellowlegs. On my last visit to Buccoo Marsh, on the Big Day I had shucked my shoes and socks and mucked about in the tall aquatic vegetation, looking for rails and crakes. It had actually worked twice that day, with two different Sora rails having flushed for a moment before dropping back into the grass. The one that we found in Buccoo Marsh was the first one our Blue Waters guide, Newton George, had ever seen. Today, however, idiotic as I looked with my walking stick as I made my way through the marsh grass, no birds appeared. The ground was so dry that I didn’t even get my feet wet.
The coot was of particular interest because coots had been reported from Buccoo Marsh during the previous month, identified both as American Coot and Caribbean Coot. Through the scope we could clearly see the relatively small white frontal shield extending a bit upwards from the base of the upper mandible; a Caribbean Coot would have had a much longer frontal shield. Even though it was "just another coot," it was significant because it was the first coot of any species I had ever seen on either Trinidad and Tobago. Naturally, it was the first coot I had ever been able to show a birding group on Tobago.
We still had plenty of time to get back to the hotel, finish packing, take care of our miscellaneous expenses at the front desk, and get to the airport in plenty of time to clear Immigration and Customs and check our luggage. Then it was "hurry up and wait," as we spent the next two hours in a holding area. The variety of small shops that lined the one large room made the wait interesting. It wasn't long before we were called to board our flight back to the frigid North.
I had a window seat next to April and hoped to take some aerial photos of the island as we took off. There at the extreme southwestern tip of the island, the grass was parched and yellow, in sharp contrast to the lush green vegetation we had found to the north. Every time I have flown into or out of Crown Point, our direction has been from west to east, into the prevailing Trade Winds. Today was no different. My window seat afforded me some decent looks, though the left wing of the jet obscured the view in front of us.
As we lifted off I took a few shots through the optically-challenged windows. I saw the familiar villages of Bon Accord and Canaan, with Buccoo Reef off in the distance.
As we quickly gained altitude, we passed over Buccoo Marsh and then over the Mt. Irvine property. Seeing how isolated and pristine the Buccoo Marsh area is, I realized how great the need is to support an organization I had heard of from Peter Cox earlier in the day, as we stood on the edge of the Buccoo Marsh lagoon. If the area is drained, there will be no remaining marshes or swamps in southern Tobago.
Thus ended our Tobago birding trip, on this exciting note. To wrap this narrative up, I’ll just say that all further travel and connections went as planned. We arrived back in Indianapolis at around 8:30 p.m. that night to the sight of the snow that had fallen during our tropical holiday.
Ten o’clock came and went with no sign of our maxitaxi. Around 11 a.m. I asked the staff person in charge to call the taxi company and find out what was going on. She did, and the response was that they would get back to us. Half an hour later they called to say that the driver was a Seventh-Day Adventist and could not drive on Saturday, so he had simply gone about his business, leaving us stranded.
Eventually a maxitaxi did arrive and took us back to the Mt. Irvine. Our familiar rooms welcomed us. For a change in venue, I had the driver wait for us to settle in and then drive us to the airport area, to the vendors of local food at Store Bay. Again we relished the chicken, beef, fish, rice, and vegetables prepared with creole spices and served in generous portions. Because it was Saturday, business was booming. We got to see many visitors from Trinidad and to see that the cell phone explosion had reached the islands. After enjoying several kinds of ice cream, including pumpkin-coconut and soursop ice cream, we flagged down a taxi and returned to the Mt. Irvine.
I had a window seat next to April and hoped to take some aerial photos of the island as we took off. There at the extreme southwestern tip of the island, the grass was parched and yellow, in sharp contrast to the lush green vegetation we had found to the north. Every time I have flown into or out of Crown Point, our direction has been from west to east, into the prevailing Trade Winds. Today was no different. My window seat afforded me some decent looks, though the left wing of the jet obscured the view in front of us.
As we lifted off I took a few shots through the optically-challenged windows. I saw the familiar villages of Bon Accord and Canaan, with Buccoo Reef off in the distance.
As we quickly gained altitude, we passed over Buccoo Marsh and then over the Mt. Irvine property. Seeing how isolated and pristine the Buccoo Marsh area is, I realized how great the need is to support an organization I had heard of from Peter Cox earlier in the day, as we stood on the edge of the Buccoo Marsh lagoon. If the area is drained, there will be no remaining marshes or swamps in southern Tobago.