2007 Tour Narrative
Once again, our annual winter week in Morocco packed a fortnight’s experiences into seven very different, lively days. Our amazing quality-and-quantity trip list was launched the moment we arrived at Agadir airport by a splendid Lesser Kestrel performing above us as we loaded our minibus. The action continued at the Sous estuary with over a hundred Greater Flamingos and as many Black-winged Stilts, twenty White Storks riding the thermals, and educational comparisons of Ringed and Kentish Plovers, Temminck’s and Little Stints, Black-tailed and Bar-tailed Godwits, and Curlew Sandpiper and Dunlin. Tamri estuary then provided Spoonbill and Ruddy Shelduck (and a green flash as the sun set over the sea), and the beaches in between gave us hundreds of Audouin’s Gulls. A satisfying cross-section of species for our first afternoon!
A raptor also launched us on our second day—a Barbary Falcon perched on our hotel—but the highlights on our first mountain circuit (to Imouzzer) were the delightful boudoir-blue and rusty-red Tristram’s Warbler, Atlas Crossbill, Black Wheatear, Blue Rock Thrush, Moussier’s and Common Redstarts, Barbary Partridge, and all three stripe-headed buntings together (Rock, Cirl, and House). Again, sunset at Tamri—and a perched Kingfisher—brought the day to a close.
Our visit to the port provided the only two Western Olivaceous Warblers of the trip. We spent the rest of that day exploring the wonderful Massa estuary with its Glossy Ibis, Marbled and Ferruginous Ducks, Lanner, and Little Owl. We relaxed over a fine lunch overlooking the sweeping beach of Sidi-Rabat, where Jonah was cast up by the whale, where Uqba ben Nafi rode his horse into the sea to show Allah that there was no land further west for him to conquer for the true faith, and where our hoped-for Bald Ibis flew by on cue. Our day concluded with a desert spectacular of Cream-colored Courser plus Hoopoe Lark and a Dotterel (a rare sighting in this part of the country and our first write-in).
Our next day began with another spectacular: Trumpeter Finch, Desert Wheatear, Thick-billed and Temminck’s Horned Larks followed by White-crowned Black Wheatear and Desert Lark. As we climbed to Tafroute on the great Anti-Atlas circuit, we enjoyed Red-billed Choughs, increasingly close views of nine Bonelli’s Eagles, Golden Eagles, another Barbary Falcon, and most excitingly a Griffon Vulture (another write-in, even for Bryan after over thirty years of visiting the country). But the star of the show was the gasp-inducing scenery, the dramatic hilltop kasbahs, the Berber villages seemingly sculpted out of the red rock, and an absolutely splendid Moroccan lunch in a traditional Berber ceremonial tent (voted best of trip).
Then came our overnight stay in the deep south beyond Goulimime, “gateway to the Sahara.” Here were more desert birds (Long-legged Buzzard, Black-bellied Sandgrouse, Red-rumped Wheatear, Bar-tailed Desert Lark, and more Cream-colored Coursers, Desert and White-crowned Black Wheatears, Thick-billed, Desert, and Hoopoe Larks, and even another Golden Eagle); they kept coming right up to sunset and even beyond, as two Red-necked Nightjars flew around us in our oasis hotel courtyard. The final surprise of the day came as we were stargazing on the roof: the Holmes comet looking like a ghostly jellyfish among the pin-sharp planets and shooting stars.
Our desert opener the following morning was equally exciting, with two Streaked Scrub Warblers (of the taxon theresae, endemic to southwestern Morocco) and yet more Cream-colored Coursers, Lanners, Long-legged Buzzards, Black-bellied Sandgrouse, Trumpeter Finches, and a wealth of larks: Bar-tailed Desert, Thick-billed, and Temminck’s Horned Larks, plus both Short-toed and Lesser Short-toed Larks. This desert clean-sweep left us time to return to the Massa to explore the agricultural area and add Black-shouldered Kite, Laughing Dove, Yellow Wagtail, Brown-throated Sand Martin, 200 Glossy Ibis, another Bonelli’s Eagle, and a couple of Stone Curlews as darkness fell. Grand finales were certainly a daily feature of this trip as much as the exciting openers.
A complete change of pace the next day was provided by our nine-hour pelagic—the ultimate relaxing experience on a calm (at times almost glassy) sea with hundreds of well-spaced seabirds in the bright sunshine (Cory’s, Sooty, Manx, and Balearic Shearwaters; Arctic, Great, and Pomarine Skuas; Common Scoter; Gray Phalarope; and seventy Mediterranean Gulls), plus a Sunfish on demand. Back on land, an end-of-day return visit to the Sous yielded close White Storks and Slender-billed Gull, which brought our trip list to one short of last year’s total.
The final morning, on the sea cliffs north of Tamri, a Peregrine on a sand dune was the equalizer—quickly followed by two Shags (of the race riggenbachi, endemic to Morocco and, with only twenty pairs in the world, considered Endangered) and a Subalpine Warbler (the latest date ever, by one day, for this scarce migrant). In the estuary, our main remaining target bird obliged, a Black-headed Bush Shrike, and then it was on to Tarhazout beach for the final one: Royal Tern, a scarce bird, as most migrate south from their Mauritanian breeding grounds. A right royal finale to our trip list total of 158.
After our final picnic in the Sous estuary, we arrived at the airport to find that check-in had been moved up and the plane was already boarding. Full marks to Agadir airport for opening up all the check-in counters and whisking us all across the tarmac for immediate departure, with none of that tiresome waiting around which is the usual anticlimax to an action-packed week. Not a minute was wasted, and we couldn’t have enjoyed a more satisfactory sequence of experiences in this magnificent and magical country.
Bryan Bland
Updated: January 2008