A Cape Town pelagic

I got up early and joined a group taking a pelagic seabirding trip.  We were driven to Hout Bay where we boarded a surprisingly small boat with two monster 250 hp engines at the back.  Steve, the skipper took us rapidly out to the continental shelf edge.  Bruce Dyer was our guide, and very good he was too.  His careful identification of the adult and sub-adult albatrosses was exemplary.  We passed a group of breaching humpback whales, which was pretty spectacular.  The first albatrosses we saw were Shy Albatross, which was a new species for me.  However, the species I really wanted to see were Atlantic and Indian Yellow-nosed Albatross.  We saw a number of these, which made for good practice in how to separate these.  We found a trawler eventually, and it was mobbed with seabirds and also Cape Sea-lions, which were following the trawler too. That is, until a pod of Killer Whales tried to take one out.  I don’t think they succeeded.  

Leaving Hout Bay. Bruce Dyer, our guide, is on the left

A Shy Albatross

Great Shearwater - notice the pale panel at the greater coverts

Atlantic Yellow-nosed Albatross - note the grey head

Cape Gannet

Sub-adult Black-browed Albatross

Pintado/Cape Petrel

Part of the seabird flock at a trawler

Dusky Dolphin

Cape Sea-lion fleeing Orcas

More of the seabird flock

Indian Yellow-nosed Albatross

Stunning coastal scenery just north of Hout Bay

Settling in at Cape Town

Saturday 24^th

I had planned on going to Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens today, but opted instead to do some shopping and catching up with work.

View from the apartment balcony

Kerstin arrived mid-afternoon with Ilka Win so we watched the first half of the South Africa v’s New Zealand Rugby World Cup semi-final in the apartment, then went to find a bar where they were showing the match.  Well we found a bar and I soon realised that we were the only whites.  Not that there was any trouble.  I was encouraged to see black South Africans cheering on the Springboks – this isn’t always the case.

Kerstin and I went for a meal at a local restaurant called Eastern Food Bazaar.  It was a series of counters serving different kinds of middle easterns and Indian food.  It was incredibly cheap, not just because of the current strength of Sterling.

SA 2015 - AMS to Cape Town

I got to the airport in plenty of time for my flight at 10.00 which departed on time.  I was a bit grumpy at first because they moved my seat to the back of the aircraft . Bit they changed the seats for several people because they put on a bigger plane, so I got a whole row to myself.  Who cares if I'm a bit later getting off the aircraft.

The flight over North Africa has been incredible. The bleakness, and lack of signs of natural life seems harsh, though no doubt if you were to stop anywhere in the desert, a local would suddenly appear and try to sell you something. Gradually, as we reached northern Nigeria and the Sahel, you could see field structure appear. 

The Chott el-Gharsa in Tunisia

Nothingness of the Libyan desert

Nothingness gives way to low
intensity farming in Nigerian Sahel

I had a chat with Jared Wilson (Marine Scotland) during the flight who is going to the same conference. We arrived some 10 1/2 hours later in Cape Town - all a bit gruelling, but it could have been worse. I saw LEIF NILSSON and his wife and Steve Votier at passport control.  My pre-booked shuttle into town wasn't waiting for me. I gave them 15 minutes, but considering I hadn't pre-paid, I didn't feel too concerned about using one of the local shuttle companies.  That was an advert on behalf of Way 2 Go (not!).

I shared with a local medic and a woman from New York. The latter was being dropped off in Long Street right in the heart of all the bars.  Probably safe enough, but not likely to get too much sleep.

My apartment, which I will be sharing with Kerstin Kober when she arrives, is in Lower Long street and is nice and spacious with what should be good views over the harbour.

Sleep! Unpacking can wait until tomorrow.

South Africa 2015 - Day 1 ABZ to AMS

I'm resuming my blog for this trip to Cape Town, initially to participate in the World Seabird Conference next week followed by a spot of birding in the Karoo and Bushmanland with Mark Tasker.

My first leg has gone OK.  I'm flying from Aberdeen via Amsterdam to Cape Town and stopping overnight at a Golden Tulip hotel at Sloterdijk which is midway between the airport and the city centre.  A younger Andy would have gone into the city to party, but I'm content with an early night having eaten a not unpleasant pizza at the airport. I'm using a fantastic app on my phone called Citymapper which guides you around public transport in even familiar cities. If it covers Cape Town as well as it does Amsterdam and London, then I'll be a very happy bunny.

It was all a bit of a push to get things done before I left and one of the things that got squeezed out was adequate preparation time for the trip. I've left lots of things behind. 

Top of the list is any travel plugs of any type.  Thankfully my room at the Golden Tulip has a UK socket so this will keeper going until I can buy an adapter at the airport.

My other mini disaster is that I failed to spot that my suitcase  was checked through to Cape Town complete with wash bag and overnight stuff.  You normally get asked if you want this to happen so I had a moan at the KLM service desk about that  (it would have been a minimum 1 hour wait for my bag to be retrieved) and they gave me an overnight wash bag which includes a t-shirt. I'm easily bought.

I'm quite impressed with the hotel. It's not in the city centre, but given the high standard of public transport, it would make a good base for an Amsterdam / Netherlands trip at a reasonable price.

Whale watching from Marissa - 25th November

We woke early to a stunning sunrise and mirror calm sea - this would make whale spotting from the boat much easier. We were taking a whale-watching trip with other Baurs clients on a boat from the Paradise Beach Club in Mirissa, and hoping to see any whale, but particularly the world's largest creature, the blue whale. This is one of the better places in the world to see this species, but it can often take several trips before you get lucky. We had one shot at this.

Sunrise at Paradise Beach Club

We left the crowded harbour on our boat and dodged our way out to sea past fishing boats. they are essentially large hollowed out tree-trunks with a stabilising float and no space to sit down.

Fishing boat off Mirissa

And another one

 It took less than an hour to reach the shelf break and ours and another couple of boats started to look around for signs of any whales or other marine mammals. We passed a green turtle, and a group of unidentified dolphins that none of us could get any ID features on. Then one of the boats peeled off to two smallish whales in the distance. As we approached, we could see a tall fin and lots of 'blowing' surely not, but they were killer whales. Not exactly top of the list of what I expected to see. 

Male killer whale - note how rounded the tip of the dorsal fin is

Male and female killer whales

They seemed to be feeding on something, was it a square of blubber floating in the sea? I have since seen a photo showing the male with what looks like part of a green turtle's shell beside it floating in the water. I was a bit disturbed by how many boats had gathered around these orcas - there were seven whale-watching boats clustered around these two animals. If they tried to move away, a boat always seemed to be in the way. Thankfully, we eventually moved away, as did a couple of others, to at least give these animals a bit of peace.

Great views for the punters

We soon spotted a group of blue whales, and among them a Bryde's whale. It was obviously a big whale, had a distinct, upright, slightly decurved dorsal fin and a prominent blow-hole, but like a minke whale, didn't appear to blow. It lacked the obvious white jaw of a fin whale. It seemed not to have the powerful rolling action of fin whales I have seen, instead having a much flatter surfacing action showing the dorsal at the same time as the blowhole. I can't say I could see the three ridges on the snout, but there is a hint of this on one of my photos.

Bryde's whale with blowhole showing at the same time as the dorsal fin

Bryde's whale - is that three ridges showing on the snout (just behind the blowholes in this photo)?

We spent a bit of time with the Bryde's, but we knew there were blue whales around and we wanted to get a bit closer to them. There must have been a three, or more likely four. They were clearly very large, with a tall bushy blow and light bluey-grey skin colour. I got the sense of the size of these animals not so much looking at the back, but mostly from the thickness of the tail stock which it showed as it went through an elaborate fluking display before a deep dive. We spent a bit of time with a lone animal and an enormous mother and her calf. In the photos, there are clear signs of remoras (suckerfish) hanging off the tail flukes of two of the animals we saw.

Blue whale fluking and remora just visible in the middle of the rear edge

Huge female at back with calf in front

Adult female blue whale - with these white markings on the tail flukes, this individual should be identifiable

A huge chunk of tail missing - again a feature for individual recognition

 We had done amazingly well on this trip, and to add to the trip, we passed a small group of spinner dolphins on our way home. They weren't up to much, although I since been told that they spin to dislodge remoras.

After a lunch back at the hotel and a rest, Pradeep and Kalinga kindly took us to Galle which has an old colonial fort next to the historic cricket ground. There was lots to see here, with ancient buildings, possibly the most attractive lighthouses I have ever seen. And boys playing cricket on every patch of ground.

Galle lighthouse

"Anyone for cricket?"