It had continued to rain overnight and the breeze was still very fresh. Needing to be back at the airport for about 5.30pm we could either bird our way back along the coast the same way that we had come, stopping at the sites that we had missed out or been unable to find. Or we could quickly spin up to Castro Verde, perhaps a couple of hours away in the car, and explore an entirely different habitat of rolling plains and steppe. With 76 species on the list at the end of Saturday and a strong desire to get that up to 100, as well as with my Portugal list in mind, we chose the second option.
But first, having come all this way, we went down to promontory at Cabo de Sao Vicente to look at the sea. It was beautiful down by the lighthouse, bright sunshine making the water aquamarine, alternately clouds turning it dark teal. Sheltering from the wind along the walls of the compound we wondered idly if we could see any Gannets. We could! In fact we could see a lot more than that, hundreds, and there were ducks too with several flocks of Common Scoter going west part the headland and a small party of Wigeon. Shearwaters were what we were really after of course, and although pretty distant we managed to get on some Balearics tracking west. Better than that, a much larger Shearwater a little closer in, with the Gannets and whilst smaller, actually not that far off them in size. It gleamed white below, brown above, and held its wings in a gentle arc, not even flapping once. Of course we couldn't at that range determine whether this was Scopoli's or Cory's, but eBird has the useful option to put down one or the other. This was when a scope would have been really handy! Feeling we likely didn't have much more to gain from the sea we picked our way inland, stopping for a friendly Stonechat and finding a couple of Black Redstart and a Blue Rock Thrush on one of the fortifications nearby.
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| Stonechat |
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| Sardinian Warbler |
Slightly north of the promontory the habitat transitions very rapidly to something akin to steppe. Taking a side road on the way back to Sagres paid dividends almost immediately with coveys of Red-legged Partridge, Corn Buntings everywhere, a farm with Little Owls sheltering in a ruined barn, and a pair of Little Bustard working their way along a grassy ridge.
After breakfast at Vila do Bispo and getting soaked for nothing more than a few Great Tits we regained the main road and made tracks for Castro Verde. We stopped along the way of course, and so it wasn't until midday that we finally made it, which was a poor effort considering we had expected to be there at 10am. This is the way. It was good immediately, and in much better weather. Hoopoe, Red Kite and Booted Eagle were all at our first stop, and Raven, Egyptian Goose and Zitting Cisticola at our second. Although there was no rain our progress was significantly limited by flash flooding with several tracks into good habitat completely flooded by overflowing streams. The trouble is that we only discovered this after driving for reasonable distances and in this way we contrived to waste a lot of what little time we had. On one of these pointless one-way trips we got a Black Kite, and on another a group of Black-bellied Sandgrouse and some Little Bustard. Iberian Shrikes started to appear with increasing frequency, we heard a couple of Quail, and after a long detour to get to a birding spot we blew it big-time by inadvertently flushing three Spanish Imperial Eagles feeding on a dead sheep. So gutting to see these birds flying off, but we had just not known they were there. Somewhere along the way we jammed a male Hen Harrier and Short-toed Eagle - these hills are sensational for Raptors. I'd like to spend much more time here, it reminded me quite a lot of Extramadura.
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| Not helpful! |
We returned to Faro on the N2, possibly a mistake as it was one of windiest and twisty roads I have ever driven, and as such was painfully slow. Much better probably to take the more boring but much quicker A2 to the west. Still, we didn't miss the flight and even managed to add Jay and Flamingo to the list from the airport.
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