Magical Kenya Mega Birding Trip October 25
Tour Lead guide:isaac kilusu
Day 1 Oct 22 Drive from Arusha to Taita hill
We left Arusha town and drove for 4 hours to Holili border, we did the paper work and cross over to Kenya. We took a stop at Taveta town for some shopping and headed to Mwatate the took a right turn to Wundanyi Where we met with Mwandoe our local guide for the Taita hills. We went to the forest and got the two endemics i.e taita white-eye and thrush but not photos. The Taita apalis was heard several times but didn’t show up
Day 2 Taita hills to Watamu
We went back to the forest for the apalis and to get photos of the birds we needed. We had a very successful morning with all the birds in the bag. By 11am we left the hills and took a long drive to Watamu arriving late in the evening
Day 3 Oct 24 Arabuko swamp, Lake jilore
We met samson at the Arabuko main gate and drove with him towards the swamp picking on the way mombasa woodpecker, scaly babbler, golden palm weaver, black bellied starling and yellow bellied greenbul. At the swamp we spend some good time with the Malindi pipit and in the nearby swamp there were several waterbirds. We went to lake Jilore where we had coastal cisticola, grey sunbird, lesser masked and village weavers, red fronted tinkerbird and several waterbirds. We came back for lunch at Watamu and back in the evening we went to Arabuko forest where we added chestnut fronted helmet shrike, crowned hornbill and eastern nicator to our list
Day 4 and 5 Oct 25 and 26 Full day in Arabuko sokoke forest and Sabaki river mouth
The next two days we spend looking for the special birds of the forest which took so much effort to find. We finally saw the Clarke’s weaver at kararacha in big numbers and a pair of sokoke pipits . The sokoke scops owl was seen in the usual site but only a single grey morph bird was arround, we presumed the mate was somewhere incubating since it is their breeding time . The other birds we saw includes forest and pale batis, east coast akalat and plain backed sunbird. At the Sabaki river mouth we saw the obvious European migrants, afew lesser and greater flamingo, sooty gull and some terns
Day 6 oct 27 Malindi to Tsavo East then to Tausa lodge
We started very early and at around 530am we have already left malindi, Our first stop was at Timboni where we birded for vulturine guinea fowl, golden pipit, magpie starling and many more. We stop at Salas gate and there we added parrot billed sparrow. We continued birding our way through the park and we had taita fiscal, pink breasted lark, red winged lark, somali beeeater and somali tit. We Arrived at Aruba dam and added somali courser , chestnut headed sparrow lark and various eagles. The mammal highlights were Tana river gazelle, desert warthog, beisa oryx and large herds of elephants. We exited the Voi gate and drove for 28 km to Tausa lodge for overnight
Day 7 oct 28 Tausa lodge to Nairobi
We had a productive morning in the acacia-commiphora woodland near the Tausa lodge. We registered red-naped bushrike, pale prinia, parrot billed sparrow, tsavo and hunter’s sunbird, somali bunting again, scaly chatterer, spotted flycatcher and bare eyed thrush. We went back to the lodge and packed our belongings and headed to Nairobi arriving late in the evening.
Day 8 oct 29 Nairobi to Castle forest mt Kenya via Sagana
We birded the Hotel troy ground in the morning for amethyst,bronze,variable and northern double collared sunbird,spot-flanked barbet and abbysinian thrush. Our next stop was at Camp malta in Sagana for the endemic Hinde’s babbler which took a great effort to find this time. We stop at Kagio for lunch and then drove to castle forest and started birding at the Thiba river in our way to the camp. We were lucky to see the Endemic kikuyu white-eye and other birds such as grey headed nigrita,yellow whiskered greenbul,black-throated and grey apalis,brown capped weaver,the near endemic hunter’s cisticola and the ever present streaky seedeater
Day 9 oct 30 Full day in Castle forest lodge Mt Kenya
We spent the day exploring the forest for fine banded wood pecker,eastern double collared sunbird, red-fronted parrot,white-browed crombec,brown woodland warbler, chestnut throated and black collared apalis,white bellied tit,blue headed coucal and many more
Day 10 oct 31 Castle forest lodge to Isiolo then to Archer’s post
We drove from the lodge towards Nanyuki picking cape rook on the road and speke’s weaver. We stopped near Timau junction for Boran cisticola which gave us a bit distant views. We went down to Isiolo town then took a right turn for 30 km towards Atulelo on the Wajir road. We stopped at the lava desert for fan tailed raven , Donaldson smith sparrow weaver, red-fronted prinia and the rare endemic williams’s lark
Day 11 Nov 1 Full day in Samburu Nat Reserve
We spend the day birding for acacia country species and special mammals such as reticulated girrafe, grevy’s zebra,gerenuk and Gunther’s did-dik. We tried the somali sparrow at Archer’s post but we dipped.
Day 12 Nov 2 Archer’s post to Lake Baringo via Solio Ranch
The last morning we explored the acacia scrub near the lodge for abbysinian sunbird,yellow vented eremomela and bristle crowned starling. Afterwards we drove to solio ranch on our way to kiawara and added long tailed widow bird and anteater chat to our day list. We met with paul our local guide at kiawara and he took us straight to mackinders eagle owl site that he inspected earlier. We had a short photo session and drive to lake baringo arriving late in the evening where we met with wilson tiren waiting for us,he took us to see northern white-faced scops owl and Jackson’s hornbill. We tried the hemprich’s hornbill site and it responded to call playback but it didn’t show off.
Day 13 Full day in Lake Baringo
We birded at the lake show for like one hour for senegal lapwing, northern masked weaver, beautiful sunbird,slender-tailed nighjar and golden backed weaver. We went up to marigat for white-crested turaco where we had very good sightings. We drove back to the cliffs where we registered hemprich’s hornbill,greyish eagle owl and gambaga flycatcher. We went for lunch and at 4pm we birded for shikra , african pygmy kingfisher, brown tailed chat and many others
Day 14 Baringo-to Kakamega forest
In the early morning we stopped at Marigat for white-billed buffalo weaver and better views of jackson’s hornbill. We drove drove past Kabarnet town and we stopped for chestnut crowned sparrow weaver and stripe breasted pipit before driving straight to Kakamega forest and arrived at 2pm. We had lunch and we walked around the lodge at Rondo retreat and we had dusky tit,joyful greenbul,pale throated greenbul,ludher’s and bocages bushshrike,grey chinned and green throated sunbird,northern yellow flycatcher,buff spotted woodpecker,grey throated barbet and others
Day 15 and 16 Full days in Kakamega rain forest
We had a blast in this forest,the first two mornigs and evennings were amazing. We birded for Jameson’s,chestnut-bellied,brown-throated and yellow-bellied wattle-eye,scaly-breasted and mountain illadopsis, black-faced rufous warbler, yellow-billed , hairy and yellow spotted barbet, african yellow warbler,green hylia,uganda woodland warbler, red-headed bluebill,toro olive,kakamega and ansorge’s greenbul, black-faced prinia, grey winged and blue-shouldered robinchat, blue headed beeeater, equatorial akalat and many more
Day 17 Nov 7 Kisumu Dunga beach
We drove to for two hours upto Kisumu and then to dunga beach and we did a 3 hour boat ride along the lake adding northern brown-throated,slender-billed ,yellow backed and village weavers, Carruther’s cisticola,great swamp warbler and others like papyrus gonolek were only heard. In the evening we went to hippo point and we added black headed gonolek,swamp flycatcher, eastern grey plantain eater,grey-capped warbler , double toothed barbet and better views of great swamp warbler
Day 18 Nov 8 Kendu bay to Lake Naivasha Elsamere lodge
We drove from kendu bay via kericho to Naivasha ariving at the lodge in time for lunch time. After lunch we birded the lodge ground for arrow marked babbler,grey crested helmetshrike,vereax’s eagle owl and white headed barbet
Day 19 Nov 9 Aberdare Np And North Kinangop grasslands
After an early breakfast we headed to aberdare and birded all the way to karuru water falls, the weather was not very good but we managed to get our main targets such as Aberdare cisticola, Jackson’s spurfowl and moorland chat. We drove back to kinangop and met with our local guide for the reserve where we birded for yellow billed duck, endemic Sharpe’s longclaw and others like stout and levaillant’s cisticola . We drove back to Nairobi for overnight stay
Day 20 Nov 10 Full day in Nairobi Np
We started in the early morning from the main gate down to hyaena dam upto the Athi dam and later finished by visiting the kingfisher site. We had numerous sightings of rhinos and other big games. Plenty of birds were also seen
Day 21 Nov 11 Drive to Arusha for drop off