2012 Tour Narrative
After gathering at Ho Chi Minh City’s Tan Son Nhat International Airport we set off for Cat Tien National Park, a four hour drive to the north. Cat Tien National Park contains the largest remaining area of lowland tropical forest in southern Vietnam and an incredible diversity of birds and mammals. Diversity was apparent right away and we got our trip list off to a flying start here. Cat Tien is home to many widespread South-East Asian species as well as a number of more local specialities including the stunning Siamese Fireback and the even fancier and rarer Green Peafowl – both of which were seen on several occasions during the first couple of days here. Orange-breasted Trogons glowed in the forest greenery, while woodpeckers ranged from the small and cute Heart-spotted, through flashy Flamebacks to the outrageously extrovert Great Slaty, and the scarce and rarely seen Pale-headed. We enjoyed a number of sightings of Bar-bellied Pittas and their close cousins the colourful broadbills included Dusky, Black-and-red and Banded.
From Cat Tien National Park we continued north to the former French colonial hill resort of Dalat where we encountered a wealth of birds many of which are special to the Dalat Plateau. The Ta Nung Valley was especially productive and we returned here a number of times enjoying close views of the enigmatic Grey-crowned Crocias (only rediscovered in the 1990s after going missing for nearly sixty years and the appropriately-chosen logo species for Richard’s company Vietnam Birding). Other species seen at Ta Nung included the very distinctive local subspecies of Rufous-backed and Black-headed sibias, Blue-winged Siva and Black-throated Sunbird. The montane coniferous forests yielded all the hoped-for species including Slender-billed Orioles, Red (or perhaps Vietnamese?) Crossbill, and lovely Vietnamese Greenfinches. An early morning hike up the trail towards the peak of Mount Lang Bian produced nice views of the rarely seen local annamensis subspecies of Silver Pheasant, Yellow-billed Nuthatch, Vietnamese Cutia and another Dalat Plateau speciality, Black-crowned Fulvetta. Dalat was particularly good for raptors on this year’s tour with wonderful views of a Jerdon’s Baza, Rufous-bellied Eagle and no less than three Oriental Hobby sigthtings.
This year we included a new site in the Central Highlands province of Kontum, close to where the Chestnut-eared Laughingthrush was discovered in the late 1990s. This year’s tour was the first by a birding tour company to this location and superb point blank views of a singing Chestnut-eared Laughingthrush were had by all. This species has still only been seen by perhaps less than 50 people since it was discovered. Other species that can be tricky to see elsewhere in Vietnam can be seen much more easily here and we had excellent views of a flock of Black-hooded Laugingthrushes, Grey-headed Parrotbill, Stripe-breasted Woodpecker and more Yellow-billed Nuthatches.
Following this very successful day we continued north to Danang in coastal Central Vietnam for the night, stopping off at the Lo Xo Pass on the Ho Chi Minh Highway en route to look for another recently described bird, Black-crowned Barwing. Within ten minutes of arriving at Lo Xo we had found our target along with a large restless flock of White-cheeked Laughingthrushes. Other birds seen at Lo Xo Pass included White-winged Magpie and a pair of Plumbeous Water-redstarts on a nearby river.
After a very pleasant night in Danang we continued northwards to Bach Ma National Park via the fishing village of Lang Co where we found several Light-vented Bulbuls, one of the few places where this species can be found in Vietnam. Due to ongoing road construction work we were unable to access the summit at the time of our visit but the lowlands around the park headquarters proved to be productive with several groups of Masked Laughingthrush and a close encounter with the endemic Annam Partridge.
Our final birding location in Central Vietnam was at Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park, famous around the world for its huge underground limestone caves and to birders for the near-endemic limestone specialist, the Sooty Babbler. We were lucky enough to find a group of six of these rather sinister looking babblers creeping around on vines at eye-level along the roadside. Other sightings at Phong Nha-Ke Bang included the Black-headed gayeti subspecies of Sultan Tit and a magnificent Brown Fish-owl. In addition to some great birds we also had wonderful views of two very scarce primates, the Ha Tinh Langur and the beautiful Red-shanked Douc Langur at Phong Nha.
Leaving Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park we drove south to Hue where we took the short flight north to Hanoi, Vietnam’s capital city. On arrival we transferred directly to the hill resort of Tam Dao, an hour’s drive to the north. Tam Dao, is a popular summer resort where Hanoians can escape from the sweltering streets of the capital. However during the winter months it is something of a ghost town and is often shrouded in mist. The weather during our visit this year was no exception but during breaks in the cloud and wind we were able to explore the various habitats around the town and caught up with many of the Tam Dao specialities including Grey Laughinghthrush, Chestnut Bulbul and Schaeffer’s Fulvetta.
From Tam Dao we headed west to another hill resort called Ba Vi. Despite the misty and cold weather the birding was good. We found wintering Japanese and Black-breasted thrushes, noisy gangs of Red-billed Blue Magpies in the pines around the park accommodation block and Silver-breasted Broadbill and White-tailed Robin along the steps to the pagoda at the summit.
A late afternoon visit to Hanoi Botanical Gardens produced a very confiding female Fujian Niltava and the following morning we headed south to our final destination, Cuc Phuong National Park, stopping along the way to visit the wetlands at Van Long Nature Reserve. Here we took sampans through the flooded rice fields to search for another extremely rare primate – Delacour’s Langur, thought to number fewer than 250 and so our encounter with fifteen or so of these beautiful monkeys probably represented more than 5% of the world population. From our sampans we also encountered a nice selection of waterbirds including five species of heron, many White-browed Crakes, White-throated and Common Kingfishers, several large flocks of Garganey, a single Ferruginous Pochard and a pair of elegant Pheasant-tailed Jacanas.
And so to our final destination Cuc Phuong National Park where again the weather was not the best with mostly cold, misty conditions. However we still found some excellent birds during our time here including a very confiding pair of Limestone Wren-babblers, a few less confiding White’s Thrushes, gorgeous Sultan Tits, and a couple of Blue-rumped Pittas that played hide-and-seek with us in the bamboo thickets. Richard Craik
Updated: March 2012