Guanajuato Birding Adventure! March 31 – April 7, 2019 – The Experienced Intermediate Birder

Last year, during an annual visit to San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, I met Rodrigo Lopez of Travelian Tours. He was introduced to me by Barry Knapp, a Colorado birder who spends a few winter months in SMA with his artist wife, Kaye. Rodrigo took Barry and I to a pine-oak habitat called Peña Alta for a day of birding. The birding was great (more about Peña Alta in a future post) and we were joined by Aurora Hernandez, a park ranger and local resident who had been trained through a special program promoting local stewardship of national parks. We broke for lunch under a shady awning by a large reservoir. Lunch was prepared by a local family who had been trained to offer delicious food in a hygienic manner in order to suit our delicate Canadian and American stomachs.

Rodrigo and I hit it off. He’s a very warm and considerate person and his guiding and birding skills were top-notch. He told me more about the new programs in the region’s parks and their focus on sustainable birding and local stewardship. We threw some ideas around and, bit by bit, the Guanajuato Birding Adventure was born. Guanajuato is a state and the capital city shares the name. San Miguel de Allende is a town in the state of Guanajuato and it would be the base for our trip. This was to be the first-ever birding trip devoted to Guanajuato.

MARCH 31, 2019
Rodrigo and I, as well as our ever-cheerful driver Manuel, met six incoming birders from Ontario at Mexico City airport. Our group was comprised of six members of the Hamilton Naturalists’ Club (including myself) and one experienced birder from the east end of Toronto. It’s a long drive to SMA; three and a half to four hours depending on traffic. Although all were tired from their early morning flight, we stopped about an hour north of Mexico City at a large lake/reservoir named Zumpango.

It was Sunday afternoon and the berm around the lake was busy with families enjoying picnics, riding horses and burros and even fishing with nets. The water was covered with birds and it was an exciting start to our trip.

I use a Canon PowerShot SX50 HS and I don’t consider myself to be a gifted photographer, by any means. Still, what’s a birding blog without photos? We recorded 28 species at Zumpango and here are a few of them.

Clark’s Grebe – Rodrigo counted 71 of these lovely birds

Initially, I had promoted this trip to newer birders and to birders who hadn’t traveled extensively. I knew that several of our species can be seen in Ontario as you can see from this selection of photos. However, all of our birders recorded a few lifers at Zumpango and we weren’t even in Guanajuato state yet.

Eventually, we arrived in SMA and checked in to our comfortable and welcoming hotel. We walked across the street a while later and enjoyed a delicious dinner at Hecho en Mexico, a popular restaurant decorated with paintings by the late Canadian artist and figure skater, Toller Cranston.

We were a tired group after dinner but all looked forward to an early start the next morning. Our destination was El Charco del Ingenio, a botanical garden and superb birding site just outside of town. Stay tuned!