artiejay

Just returned from a 7-day all too short trip to northwest Ecuador with my wife and daughter. Our primary goals were hiking and photography and found both to be challenging with some steep trails and bad weather that made photography difficult at best.


We planned our trip to coincide with my daughters spring break from college and because our visit came during the green season we expected rain and well - we got it - lots of it! One afternoon it started raining about 3pm and continued on until about 10am the next day. It rained as hard as I have ever experienced and as a result massive landslides between the lodge(in Mindo) and Nanangalito closed the roads for days. The bad weather caused us to miss a lot of outings we had planned but we worked with what we were given and still had a great time. We really hopeto make a return trip - just not during the rainy season.


Between a first and last nights stay at hotel Su Merced in Puembo we stayed at Satchatamia lodge which lies about a 5 minute drive from the small town of Mindo. Satchatamia is known for it's abundance of hummingbirds and the feeders around the lodge were very busy places as hundreds of hummers vied for a spot at the feeding stations. During our stay we hired Marcello Arias, a local birding guide who was amazing in his skill to spot, call, and identify the birds we found. We visited the Mindo cloudforest, Bellavista lodge, and several other areas surrounding the Mindo area but sadly could never make it to Paz de las Aves to see the Cock of the Rock and the Ant Pittas due to the land slides. Despite the bad weather we still tallied 26 hummingbird species and countless other bird species during our stay- I can only imagine how much more we would have seen if the weather would have cooperated. We found the photography to be very challenging with all the rain, mist, and poor lighting under the thick canopy and missed sooo many shots, but there is always next year!


I highly recommend hotel Su Merced for those who have to stay overnight near the airport (15 mins. away) and Satchatamia lodge in Mindo - both places had a great staff, accommodations, and both made us feel right at home.


I really want to thank mlgb for her spot on recommendations on lodging, guides, and restaurants - great info. that helped a bunch so mucho gracias!


Pictures can be seen at :https://picasaweb.google.com/1077454...M-Clf7og_uNlwE

Nelson

Well you got some great photos. The diffused lighting is not all bad. You made the most of the situation for sure.

A hummer landed on your daughter's finger at the feeder?! How cool is that!

Thanks for sharing.

mlgb

Those lovely photos! A shame you could not make it to the antpitta show, but you saw many birds that we missed. You did quite well with Marcelas, glad he worked out. We had only one half day of the heavy rain. But it looks like some of those birds (and frogs) are very happy with it.

Barbets!! Grass green tanager! Plate Billed Mountain Toucan!! Two fruiteaters! And the club winged manakin. Also some very creeepy bugs.

Thank you for sharing those (as you know my sad tale).

I hope you liked Su Merced, it was a nice splurge for me.

Where was the cuy restaurant, that looks good!

artiejay

Nelson - Thank You! My daughter got a big kick out of having the hummers land on her at the feeders - they were completely fearless.


mlgb - Marcelo was really good - at the Mindo cloud forest he called in the Choco Trogon and the Collared Trogon at the same time - he would whistle to the left at one, then to the right for the other - after about 10 minutes he had both right above us - it was so cool!

We got the Cuy right near the Mitad del Mundo monument at Joy's place - which I guess would be San Antonio de Pichincha. The equator line actually runs right through her restaurant and not where the monument lies several hundred feet away. My daughter and I enjoyed the cuy very much - it was crunchy goodness! My wife, a vegetarian, was not amused one bit.

xelas

Great little trip report! And for 7 days, a fantastic number of excellent photos. Added Ecuador to my to-go list (just not in February). Tripod or handheld?

artiejay

Xelas - All were hand held or hand held with a monopod braced against my chest. The biggest issue was having to shoot at very hi ISO - alot were shot at greater than 3000 ISO which produces alot of background noise as you see in a number of the pictures. I presently don't have a editing program that can eliminate much of the noise - but I need it!

You should look at the Mindo area as it has been proclaimed to be one of the top birding sites in the world - if we would have had more time we would have added a trip to the Amazon basin. We ran into a group that were hard core birders who did southern Ecuador, the Amazon basin and were finishing up in Mindo - they had over 500 species when we left even with the bad weather. As I remember you have previously been to Monteverde and I believe the hummingbird gallery - the feeders at Satchatamia had 2-3 times more hummers than that! I have a shot that has 8 different species at 1 feeder - Booted Rackettail, Violet Sylph, Purple Bibbed Whitetip, Fawn Breasted Brilliant, Brown Inca, Bronzy Hermit, Rufous Tailed, and Velvet Purple Coronet- all in 1 shot!

Nelson

My wife and I have added Mindo to our list because of your photos!

You did a great job hand holding those. What 35mm equivalent focal length lens did you use to get those shots?

<i> > I presently don't have a editing program that can eliminate much of the noise</i>
I use Lightroom and would highly recommend it. Bit of a learning curve to use the program, but worth it.

Thanks again for sharing.

mlgb

Another good set of feeders on the east slope is an easy day trip via bus from Quito=Guango Lodge . It is right on the main highway.They have abundant Sword billed and tourmaline sun angel. The birding excursions stay there but daytrippers are allowed too.

There are some special excursions you can make from Mindo, in addition to Paz de Aves there are community projects for long wattled umbrellabird and also an oilbird cave toward the coast.

I posted some more info on my trip report (click my name for the link).

We went the last week of September which is just the start of the rains.

mlgb

Rtj, I forgot to ask what you did for transportation?

artiejay

Nelson - Wow! - your photography is amazing- I checked out your website and was very impressed.I was using a Canon 100-400L series on a 7D and my wife who shot all the insect pictures was using a Canon SX40 Powershot that I picked up at a flea market for $100 dollars- it takes great pics!

I think you will have a field day in Mindo - as mlgb said there are a lot of other places nearby that we missed out on because of the biblical floods we had. Bellavista Lodge which is about a 25 minute drive up in the mountains from Mindo was spectacular - so many different species that just came one after another. I don't know if it was the altitude or what (8000ft) but my head was spinning!

mlgb - Su Merced arranged our driver for us- a wonderful,friendly fellow named Washington. He did our airport transfers ($15) and took us to Mindo and back ($100 each way). From Satchatamia we took taxis to Mindo($5) and Bellavista lodge ($40 round trip) We were really afraid Washington would not be able to get through for our return trip because of the landslides but he somehow got through and picked us up. In the 30 minutes it took us to load up and check out more slides occurred and we only made it about 5 miles down the road before coming to a screeching halt - for 2 long hours before it was cleared.

Nelson

artijay, Thanks for your comment on my photos, much appreciated, especially coming from a photo enthusiast!

That 100-400L looks like a superb lens, just looked at it on B&H, and it is in good hands in your case. I recently traded in my DSLR for an Olympus micro 4/3, but now I need to buy a long lens.

Thanks again for the additional info from you and mlgb. I'll file away some links for future reference, and research the right times to go there. I'd also be interested in doing a trek in the Ecuador mountains. This is all at least a year or two out, just thoughts right now.

Good luck on your next adventure.

mlgb

Have fun Nelson. I bought one of the first Olympus Micro 4/3, it's a great travel camera.

snorkelluvn

wow, thanks for sharing those outstanding photos. I have lens envy. A good lens sure makes a difference. I have a Nikon DSLR 3100. I am still kinda a novice with my camera, so I sheepishly ask whether that 100-400L would work on mine? any recommended sites for good prices on this?

artiejay

Thank you Snorkell! Sadly no compatibility between Nikon and Canon so it wouldn't work. I have had very good luck buying gear second hand on e-bay, that's not to say I might get burned one day but so far so good. I try to buy from the original owner, ask questions about the amount of use and how it has been stored, and stay away from pawn shop sellers. You are correct in that quality glass makes a huge difference- even more so than the number of megapixels a camera has. I have been very impressed with the Canon SX40HS that I got for my wife for $100- it handled the lo-light conditions very well, even out performing my setup in several instances- much to my chagrin! They have a SX50HS also that looks very nice and is very easy to use.

travellife369

Those photos are really beautiful, I love the flowers particularly When I went to Ecuador, I spent most of my time rafting, tubing, trekking, and mountain biking

artiejay

Ah yes, I remember those days- ziplining, rafting, rapelling down waterfalls - did 'em all. Now that I'm on the dark side of 50 I've had to change my itinerary to less adventurous activities that might not involve an orthopedic surgeon. Mostly just have to worry about rabid hummers going for the jugular these days, sigh- I wonder if they make custom walkers with a tripod attachment?

mlgb

Wait til you're on the "dark side" of 60. Fifty-something is the good old days.

artiejay

Now, now mlgb - I've read your trip reports and I don't think I could keep up! Seriously though some of those trails around Bellavista were painful- the altitude combined with steep, slippery inclines made me feel every minute of my age and when I got up the next morning I was wondering if anyone had seen the truck that obviously ran me over during the night. Goodness just put me out to pasture!

Axel2DP

Those are beautiful pictures artiejay.

Did you have to shoot the majority of them at the 400mm focal length and at the maximum aperture?

What's the average hourly rate of a bird guide in Mindo?

mlgb

We paid $85 ish per DAY for the guide, only. Transportation was extra.