Lying on the Arabian Sea well within the Tropic of Cancer and approximately 250 miles south of Bombay, India, the restful haven of Goa offers balmy seas, cloudless blue skies, endless white sand beaches fringed with palms, and stunning sunsets coupled with a novel blend of European culture and Indian ambience.
Goa is also a birdwatcher’s paradise with many excellent habitats: wide river estuaries, mangrove swamps, marshes, scrub-covered hillsides, arid fields, rich forest reserves at the foot of the majestic Western Ghats and a spectacular bird-thronged lake at Carambolim. During this relaxed, bird-filled tour we’ll explore most of Goa’s major birding sites and familiarize ourselves with a wide selection of its birds. We’ll encounter many species endemic to peninsular and south India as well as a large number of wintering species from farther north and more widespread Asian birds.
Wonderful birds, exquisite beaches, delicious food and the easygoing Goan lifestyle: it’s almost too good to be true.
Day 1: The tour begins with an overnight flight from London to Goa.
Day 2: Arriving in Goa we’ll immediately drive north to our hotel in Baga, our base for the following two weeks. After a break we’ll offer the option of late afternoon birding close to our hotel. Night in Baga.
Days 3-15: Spending every night at the same hotel, we have great flexibility and our daily birdwatching trips can all be considered optional. Good birding starts within the hotel compound where numerous large trees at the rear attract a variety of birds. From the comfort of a poolside deck chair, cool drink in hand, we can overlook a series of paddy fields and a small marsh, a superb area that on our previous tours has held Cinnamon and Black Bitterns, up to 15 Greater Painted-Snipes, Small Pratincole, Yellow-wattled Lapwing, Pacific Golden-Plover, Pintail Snipe, Watercock, Slaty-breasted Rail, Ruddy-breasted and Baillon’s Crakes, Rosy Starling and a host of pipits including Blyth’s, Richard’s and Paddyfield. It should be possible to see well over 100 species within walking distance of our hotel!
Goa boasts numerous attractive species; bee-eaters and kingfishers are both common and conspicuous, as is Indian Roller. We hope to see one of Goa’s avian specialties: Indian Pitta, a favorite bird seen on all our thirteen previous visits. We’ll explore a wide variety of habitats ranging from grasslands, where we’ll search for larks, pipits and chats, to marshland replete with numerous shorebirds and ducks. Away from the coastal plain we’ll visit several of Goa’s forested reserves and we’ll stay out late at least one evening searching for nightbirds such as Ceylon Frogmouth, Oriental Scops-Owl and Brown Fish-Owl. These same reserves harbor three species of hornbills including the majestic Great Hornbill as well as the endemic Malabar Grey. Other special birds we’ll look for are junglefowl, numerous woodpeckers such as the striking White-bellied and the vociferous Heart-spotted, Asian Fairy Bluebird, Asian Paradise-Flycatcher, Orange-headed Thrush and Goa’s state bird, the stunning Flame-throated Bulbul. Red Spurfowl is a widespread Goan species that we’ve spotted on occasion near the center of the old Portuguese capital, although it is normally skulking and difficult to see. Blyth’s Reed-Warblers and striking Black-rumped Flamebacks are common throughout the state and we’ll surely see them both.
There is no fixed itinerary; instead the leader will use his knowledge of the area to decide how and where each day’s excursions will run. We’ll visit all the main birding habitats in Goa, some of them several times. All the sites are within a comfortable two-hour drive from our hotel and most are much closer. The excursions are fun, with a relaxed pace and the accent on obtaining good views of the birds. Our destinations will include the Baga fields; Fort Aguada (where we’ll look for Indian Peafowl, Sykes’s Warbler and Blue Rock-Thrush); Fort Tiracol for the elusive Jungle Bush-Quail; Candolim Marsh, the Nerul Bridge and the Santa Cruz pools and paddies for shorebirds galore; Dona Paula and Neura for arid grassland species such as Yellow-wattled Lapwing and Ashy-crowned Finch-Lark; Mayem Lake; Tikanem, Chorao and Divar islands for Lesser Adjutants; and Carambolim Lake, Bondla Wildlife Sanctuary, Baghwan Mahavir National Park and Tambdi Surla. We’ll also spend time sightseeing in Old Goa and possibly at the Hindu temple of Mangueshi.
And of course there are Goa’s famous white sand beaches. One in particular, Morjim at the mouth of the Chapora River, is relatively quiet and normally holds thousands of gulls and terns. We will visit this beautiful site at least twice and hope to see up to six species of gulls, including several impressive Great Black-headed Gulls, and perhaps as many as nine or ten tern species, including both Lesser and Great Crested. Both Brahminy Starlings and Barred Buttonquail are occasionally found here, and the river mouth also holds a large gathering of shorebirds, which with luck might include an elusive Crab-Plover. On one day we’ll travel by boat to the backwaters and creeks of one of the State’s larger rivers where we hope to encounter the endemic Goan subspecies of Collared Kingfisher as well as Woolly-necked Stork and the aptly named Mugger Crocodile.
Raptors are particularly well represented in Goa with Black and Brahminy Kites everywhere, and we should also see several spectacular White-bellied Sea-Eagles. We’ll visit a harrier roost that contains good numbers of both Montagu’s and ghostly Pallid Harriers and where Booted Eagle and both Greater and Indian Spotted Eagles are fairly common. We also have a couple of reasonably reliable sites for Black, Rufous-bellied and Crested Hawk-Eagles.
For non-birders Goa offers a great variety of activities and entertainment. This lively, friendly resort has numerous shops, restaurants and bars as well as abundant sunshine, sandy beaches and varied sightseeing opportunities. A variety of optional sightseeing trips are included, one of them out to the former Portuguese capital at Old Goa, which in its fifteenth-century heyday was the largest and richest city in the whole of Asia and whose a population then exceeded that of London! Other excursions will include a backwater river trip in search of crocodiles and the endemic Goan subspecies of Collared Kingfisher and trips to the local craft markets. Nights in Baga.
Day 16: In the early morning we’ll catch an overnight flight to London, where the tour concludes.
Updated: 07 January 2008
Prices
- 2008 price about $4,060
- Single Occupancy Supplement $480
Notes
This tour is limited to 12 participants with one leader.
This tour is organized by our British company, Sunbird.