Day 11 of our tour was spent mostly repositioning to our next night's stay at high elevation so we could spend the next day exploring Los Nevados National Park. We arranged to first visit a place called Hotel Tinamu which was kind of on the way and was a great place to pick up a couple of special birds. Even though we left very early, we didn't make it to the Hotel Tinamu until about 10am so the birding activity was a little slow, but still totally worth it. The local guide brought us immediately to a little blind set up to try and see a Little Tinamou and a Scaled Antpitta. He did his best to try and call them in but I think it was too late in the day. I and a few others did see the Antpitta run by briefly but it wasn't ideal and certainly no photos.
Gray-headed Dove - restricted to a small range in Colombia and potentially will be split from the other populations which are in Mexico.
Ruddy Ground Dove
Golden-collared Manakin! It was nice to get really good looks at a Manakin for a change. This one is native to Panama and Colombia.
Scale-crested Pygmy-Tyrant
Green Hermit - finding one of these away from the feeders was nice.
Pending ID
White-collared Swift
The lunch was amazing - the best Chicharrons of the whole trip! Chicharron is fried pork belly or rinds which are ideally crispy on the outside and chewy in the middle. I had some on this trip that were kind of gross, and some that were delicious. I think my cholesterol definitely went up a notch on this trip.
After lunch we started up to the mountains and got out at a stop on the road before heading down a valley for our next hotel destination.
This Paramo habitat was similar to the earlier trip to Sumapaz but I think even higher in elevation. In fact Nevado del Ruiz which was visible from one of the roadside stops tops out at 17,598 feet!
We were only stopping there to take some scenery pics when we had a fly-over flock of parakeets and our Colombian guide got really excited. Rufous-fronted Parakeets are endemic to this high elevation habitat in Colombia and it is estimated there are only 2-4k left. So even thought they dropped down in the distance, we waited a little longer to see if they would fly up and it was a good decision because before long they flew up again and landed right near the roadside!
Rufous-fronted Parakeet!
Our Colombian guide was very animated by these looks and clearly it was a very special sighting because he was taking tons of photos. He later told us that all the locals in his guiding community were sending texts asking him where we saw the birds because they all wanted pics too.
This experience was probably one of the highlights of the trip. It was in this euphoric state that we packed into the van and started heading down a beautiful valley to our next hotel which happened to be Termales del Ruiz, a fantastic spa set in natural thermals coming out of this are of volcanic activity. This turned out to be probably the nicest hotel we stayed in. The setting was absolutely amazing. Here is the website for the hotel if you are interested.
The ride down into the valley as shot from the van window.
The hotel grounds as seen from my room window! Those pools are naturally fed springs from the thermals. The hotel grounds sit just about 10,000 feet elevation.
Not a bad place to set up shop. The valley below led down to Manizales, a city with a population of almost half a million.
One of the thermal waterfalls on the property. I would love to take my family up here and do some hiking. There are loads of trails all around.
Golden-breasted Puffleg! The birding was excellent too!
Shining Sunbeam - these big hummers were everywhere.
Purple-backed Thornbill
What a magical place. The food was terrific and then to end the day, I went and took a soak in the thermal pool under a starry sky all to myself. Ahhhhh.... so nice.
