Fuerteventura 20120220-27

I made a weeklong trip mainly for birding with my two children Alexander 20 and Nina 16. It was my third trip to the archipelago since Gran Canaria 1999, Tenerife 2011, and the fifth trip to Macaronesia after Madeira 2005 (two trips) and Kap Verde 2010. We stayed at the good hotel Geranios Suites and Spa in Caleta de Fuste just S of the airport near the sea on the middle of the east coast on Fuerteventura. It was a rather good point with reasonable easy access to most localities on the island.

We travelled with Apollo and also rented a car through that agency. A little new for us was that we had to wait for bus transportation to the rental company Orlando nearby.The main targets for the trip were to see Hourbara Bustard, Canary Islands Stonechat and the endemic subspecies of the island – dacotiae of Common Kestrel, insularum of Stone-curlew, polatzeki of Lesser Short-toed Lark, degener of African Blue Tit, and harterti of Common Linnet. I had no intention to get gracilirostris of Barn Owl or canariensis of Long-eared Owl, and did not make any efforts due to lack of localities. I have in former trips seen ssp. baroli of Little Shearwater, insularum of Common Buzzard, berthelotii of Berthelot's Pipit, orbitalis of Spectacled Warbler, koenigi of Southern Grey Shrike and amantum of Trumpeter Finch, so these endemics would be the last for me to see.

Great emphases were also put on photographing, me for birds and nature, my daughter and son for more touristic objects.

The weather was pretty good the whole week with temporarily overcast just for a few days and no rain or strong wind. We experienced no problems with dust, often a problem on these eastern islands. Temperatures ranged between 15 in the mornings and 23 in the early afternoons. The roads were very good and drivable with an ordinary car in most places. Our rental car once broke down, some problems with the cylinders, luckily in the town of Corralejo, and was replaced reasonably quickly.

I planned the trip with very good advice from my friend Rubén Barone Tosco from Tenerife. Even though he advised us to travel a later year due to the severe draught this year, we manage to see all the species and subspecies planned. We also had very good help in Carke’s and Collins’s A Birdwatcher’s Guide to the Canary Islands and in several trip reports on the Internet. A very good tool for planning the trip was Google Earth where all the localities were put and studied beforehand with coordinates ported to my Navigon GPS-navigator in my Iphone 4, used on the whole trip for navigation in the car. For this purpose I was very solicitous to have internet connection in our hotel room with possibilities to check up localities during the trip and making corrections.

Trip report