Most of 25th February was spent travelling to Tanager Rainforest Lodge outside the city of Punta Gorda close to the border with Guatamala. The 5-hour journey was almost the full length of Belize, but the roads were good and relatively quiet and we arrived in time to do some birding in the grounds before dinner.
Many of the birds were high in the canopy making photography tricky, but some birds were coming down to the feeders, enabling us to get some good shots. The best photos we got were of a Tawny-winged Woodcreeper.
We started our first full day at the lodge with an early-morning birding session around the grounds. The light gradually improved and we managed to capture the rare Mayan Antthrush, which is a very shy bird and only found on the eastern side of Central America.
After breakfast we drove to a site known as ‘The Dump’, which is on the Southern Highway and close to the village of San Marcos. The road is an excellent birding location and a site we visited a couple more times during our stay.
We then moved west a few kilometres and did some birding along Blue Creek Road.
Our next destination was the village of Blue Creek, where we were to have lunch at Yona’s Mayan Grill. We parked outside the restaurant and went birding for a couple of hours through a beautiful wood that runs alongside the river.
This was a most enjoyable session with highlights being Amazon Kingfisher, Collared Trogon and White-whiskered Puffbird.
Once back at the restaurant we enjoyed a relaxing buffet lunch before driving back to the lodge for a rest.
Our evening birding involved time at The Dump and then the Mafredi Rice Fields, with our excellent guides trying to get a torch onto any nearby birds. Our first sighting was of a Common Paraque in a field beside the road that remained stationary despite us being so close. This was followed by a sighting of a Striped Owl on a wire.
Friday 27th February was the final day of our tour and we started our birding by visiting Red Bank village, which is a well-known location for observing Scarlet Macaws soon after dawn. When we arrived at the site there were already quite a few birding groups looking for these colourful birds. We soon saw them flying in and got shots of them in flight and perching.
After a couple of hours at the Scarlet Macaw viewing area we drove the short distance to the Seven Macaw Eco-farm where we had breakfast. The food was very good, but birds kept appearing in the surrounding trees so that our eating was frequently interrupted!
We then drove a few kilometres north to Roseville where we enjoyed walking some trails. There were plenty of birds around and some were quite close, although many were deep in the bushes and undergrowth making photography a little challenging. We particularly enjoyed seeing a male and female Barred Antshrike hunting for insects.
Late in the morning we stopped beside the Lagarto Bank Road just north of Red Bank and in a small clearing we saw the courtship display of the beautiful White-collared Manakin. This was difficult to photograph as the birds flew very quickly across the courtship area and only paused briefly in the surrounding trees.
Following the excitement of the display, we drove to Pearleen’s Coleman’s Restaurant in Big Falls, which was quite close to our lodge. The buffet lunch was very enjoyable after our busy morning of birding.
We then had a break at the lodge before our final birding session of the tour, which was back at The Dump. Many of the birds were quite distant, but as we walked along the road we had good view of a Blue Grosbeak, a bird we had struggled to capture well on other tours. Another close bird was a Louisiana Waterthrush, which winters in Central America before migrating to North America during the spring.
The following day we made our long journey home, starting with a drive to Belize City airport in one of the lodge vehicles, followed by flights to Miami and then on to Heathrow. Everything went well and we got home on 1 March after a most enjoyable tour.