The day started extremely badly when we were stopped in the dark by two policemen in a large 4x4 on the main road south out of Playa del Carmen. They invented a speeding ticket and said they would have to take my driving licence to Cancun. We could see where this was heading.... Using the translation service on his telephone I enquired as to whether there would be a way of settling this immediately. Some silly amount of pesos came back as the answer, so we rooted around and pulled together whatever it was that we had but that was in no way close to the total demanded. This seemed to satisfy them however, and they took it, said the ticket was cancelled, and get back on the road. On this last point they were most insistent, they clearly didn't want any further interaction with us or to be seen having stopped our car. Fine fine, off we went. But we were pissed off, poorer, and a little unnerved by the experience. I suppose we were an easy target and this is a regular play by these two particular cops, but it left a bad taste in the mouth. They had cleaned us out, so we no longer had any money to even buy water. We resolved not to drive in the dark again if we could help it.
We nonetheless arrived at our destination before dawn, the Camino Akumal a Uxuxubi which leads to a popular cenote. We simply picked a random spot close to the eBird pin and started birding - the theory was the same as always in the Yucatan, get yourself into the jungle as this is where the best birds are. Roads and tracks that cut through the forest to attractions or Mayan sites are the easist way to accomplish this.
We birded from pre-dawn to around half past seven once it was light, recording 33 species. Laughing Falcon and Collared Forest-Falcon were heard and seen along just a few hundred metres of the road, as well as four Pygmy Ferruginous Owl, two Gartered Trogon, a Black-headed Trogon and three Lesson's Motmot. Bright-rumped Attila was a good find and a new bird, and five Yucatan Jay and six noisy Brown Jay flew over. You can see the full list of birds seen via the link above, but suffice it to say it was superb.
We stocked up on money once back on the main road, and then drove west out of Tulum to Coba which has some impressive ruins and two large lagoons. We first spent some time looking at the lagoon, finding our first Limpkin and Great Blue Heron, but the real target here was Ruddy Crake. We expected to find it in the reeds of the main lagoon but actually it was in a muddy strip filled with litter on the opposite side of the road between the Cocodrilo and Xaibe restaurants. There were also two Jacana here and a pair of Yellow-winged Tanager in a bare tree on the far side.
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| Grey-headed Tanager |
We paid the small entrance fee for the ruins and walked in. The done thing here is to take a bicycle tour in a guided tricycle but this wouldn't be very good for birding! As with most Mayan ruins it was both fascinating as well as very birdy even at 11am. The long straight entrance track was probably the best bit, the forest each side of the wide road being very active. Tawny-winged and Ivory-billed Woodcreeper were good finds, and there were loads of Swainson's Thrush hopping around the understorey. There were two Gartered Trogon and two Black-headed Trogon, plus a Keel-billed Toucan. They're the kind of exotic neotropical birds that feel rare but in fact are really common. In some of the damper areas we found Northern Waterthrush, and a Louisiana Waterthrush was seen on one of the pyramids. Tanagers were represented by Rose-throated, Summer and Grey-headed. Near one of the pyramids an Ocellated Turkey was sat in the shade - I had not thought we would see this species here, indeed this was one of the species that had caused us to drive all the way down to Calakmul last time. It was the only one we saw though, whereas further south there had been large numbers. Anyway, I can thoroughly recommend Coba. It was not busy at all, and we found loads of birds.
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| Black-headed Trogon |
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| Swainson's Thrush |
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| Ocellated Turkey |
By now it was the heat of the day and activity had declined noticeably as we left the site and returned to our oven-like car. We had a quick spot of lunch next to the water and then headed northwest towards Valladolid and Tizimin. After Tizimin it is a straight road to Rio Lagartos, and with Hurricane Milton having gone through only a couple of days previously we were a little worried as to what it would be like. As it happened it was absolutely fine, but actual news had been hard to come by so we just didn't know. We made one stop on the way up at a wetland area but didn't really give it the time it deserved as we wanted to get to the coast, and so added it to the itinerary on our way back.
Just before you reach Rio Lagartos there is a crossroads, with roads heading east and west along the southern sides of the inland lagoons. To the west is the Camino San Felipo, to the east the Ejido San Salvador. We decided to go east to where the road bends up to Los Coloradas and by continuing straight you are on an unpaved track to a ranch. Here we started adding water birds to our trip list, with Tricoloured Heron, Green Heron, Spotted Sandpiper and American Flamingo. Further along the main road we came across Belted Kingfisher, our first Black-bellied Whistling Duck, and a Peregrine shot across the sky.
As dusk fell we relocated to the Camino San Felipe as this was the direction of accomodation. This was nothing short of sensational. As it got darker thousands of waterfowl came overhead, heading for the lagoons to roost for the night. There were in the region of 1500 Blue-winged Teal, 250 Cattle Egret, hundreds of Great-tailed Grackle and more Black-bellied Whistling Duck. A family of Russet-naped Wood-Rail ran across the road, two adults and four chicks. Of note this was my 1001st species of the year. As it got darker two Lesser Nighthawk came out to hunt for insects over the marsh on the south side of the road. There was a bit of traffic, people heading back to Rio Lagartos and to San Felipe, and after one of these cars passed we heard a thump. Looking in the road we saw the prone shape of a bird and it was with great sadness that we picked up an injured Boat-billed Heron, its eyes still open. Its neck was broken, there was nothing we could do, and its eyes dimmed before us as we lait it in the grass. Such a shame, a fantastic bird.
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| Boat-billed Heron |
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| Russet-naped Wood-Rail |
Once fully dark we drove the short distance west to San Felipe, and quickly found our hotel on the water's edge. Of Hurricane Milton there was barely any sign whatsover. A few downed palm fronds and a few large puddles. We had a great dinner of fresh lobster and a couple of beers before retiring for the night, it had been a great day and we felt that having reached the coast (which had really been the point of this trip all along) we were really getting into gear.
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