South Africa 2013 - Pt 4

The Garden Route: Montague to Knysna (Garden of Eden)

We spent 4 days touring parts of the garden route. It was always going to be a whistle stop tour just so we were able to get a small flavour of this part of the Western Cape. Travel from Cape town to Montague where we stayed at the very impressive Vineyard Country house See here. The garden provided me with Peregrine Falcon that ate its prey in the trees at the rear of the land, 3 Spotted Thicknees & Intermediate Egrets over, Levaillants Cisticola, Southern Masked Weaver, Alpine Swifts, while a little further out of town  towards Barrydale we had Black Harrier, plenty of Jackal Buzzards, Pale Chanting Goshawks, Swee Waxbill and Red Faced Mousebirds

 

Our next stop was for 2 nights at the wonderful treetop chalet at Knysna (Garden of Eden) just outside Plettenberg Bay See here. A good list of birds from this location as you would expect from a forest location... Cape Batis, Black Backed Puffback, Red Eyed Dove, Fork Tailed Drongo, Dusky Flycatcher, Swee Waxbill, African Olive Pigeon, Bar throated Apalis, amongst a host of others.....

 and some images

Grey Cuckoo-Shrike

 

 

Amethyst Sunbird

 

Greater Double Collared Sunbird (and the only sighting I had in SA)

 

 

 Knysna Turaco.

 

I sat on the chalet balcony early morning with a coffee waiting for the sun to rise high enough over the canopy to attract the birds out. I knew this stunning species should be in the forest but just hoped to get a glimpse. I heard one got the bins and bingo their it was... distant but in full view. Happy days indeed. While the family got ready I went to the front intending to have a very short walk as I opened the door I was confronted with 4 Knysna Turacos...... it just couldn't get any better.

 

What a stunner, and certainly one of my birds of the entire trip to South Africa

 

 

From here we travel to De Hoop NR the journey gave us great views of

Displaying Blue Cranes

 

Karoo Korhaan

 

Rock Kestrel