Date: Friday 2 September 2022
Trajectory: Las Lomitas – Fortín Soledad – Las Lomitas
Distance covered: 330 km
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An exceptional day’s birding today. After breakfast in the hotel we drove slowly to Fortín Soledad. Little traffic except a couple of cattle trucks.
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We birded our way slowly along a dirt road for some 70 kms until we reached the township of Fortín Soledad …
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… where we met Chilo at his restaurant and tour centre.
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First lunch, where we met a number of birders and photographers. The company was great …
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… and so was the food
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After lunch Chilo took us out on a punted canoe for four hours in the Bañado la Estrella, the second largest wetlands in Argentina.
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With low waters there was an exceptional number of birds to see, but our specific interest was to help Chilo in a count of Jabiru nests.
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Chilo punted us through some twenty kilometres of shallow water and we saw every variety of bird – this is really a stunning site to visit, especially at this time of the year with low water. The weather was good too, and we were spared the hot sun Formosa can provide.
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It was a wonderful experience, with so many birds and absolute silence (the punting was noiseless).
Bird of the day is the roseate spoonbill, of which we saw many.
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Tomorrow we head still further west.
That trip in the wetlands looks absolutely magical.