Yucatan in April (1 Viewer)

[njlarsen]

Dear All
I will have cause for going to Cancun in late April, and have made arrangements to stay for one additional week with the intent of seeing some birds and Mayan ruins. I have the old Howell site guide, so the first question must be, what have changed? Probably a lot!

Secondly, we expect to have access to a car that entire week and we expect to probably find some hotels along the way (we nowadays prefer somewhat decent places, not quite the economy ones we had to use 12 years ago, but not 5-star either). Does that sound reasonable?

Anyone want to mention their top 4-5 sites that should all be doable in a week starting from and ending in Cancun?

thanks
Niels

 

[Maroon Jay]

Hello Niels,
I just finished a tour of the Yucatan. I am now in Belizse. All the details of my trip about hotels, Mayan ruins and birding and other details can be found on my journal at www.mytripjournal.com/findtom4 I will be returning to Cancun in April to fly back to Canada on the 26th. What day will you be there. Perhaps we could meet.
Tom

 

[njlarsen]

Thanks Tom, I will land in Cancun during the 26th, and the following two days will be work, so only get off on the 29th.

Have you seen the Yucatan Parrot anywhere?

Niels

 

[Maroon Jay]

I am leaving on the 26th. Might pass you in the airport going in the opposite direction. Cheers

 

[Hamhed]

Niels -
If you want to stick fairly close to Cancun and not spend too much of your extra week on the road, Rio Lagartos and vicinity and the Coba ruins would be two of my top choices in the northeastern section of the peninsula. In the southeast, there are numerous places that excel but most are past Tulum, which is good for photo ops but not all that good for birds. The Muyil ruins just below Tulum and Vigia Chico road, where one could spend several days, were some of our most productive spots on our visits in '06 and '08. One step further south from the Vigia Chico area were the Chac-choben ruins, another place with good birds and ruins but that may be getting too distant.

Steve

 

[njlarsen]

Thank you Steve,
I do not yet know how far those locations are, but given that we don't have a pre-ordered hotel for the week, we could go some distance, choose a hotel and then bird that area for a couple of days. I know Lene will want to look at several ruins, and she is already talking about Chichen Itza.

thanks
Niels

 

[Hamhed]

Niels - The advice we were given for Chichen Itza was to get there early for a couple of hours of birding before the tourists buses unloaded. That turned out to good advice.
One of the more impressive ruins, if detail carvings and well-preserved friezes are what you want, is Ek Balam. We stayed close to the ruins here:
http://genesisretreat.com/

I think MaroonJay passed through there finding fewer birds than we did. If you want, PM me and I'll send you our bird list from there.

Steve

 

[Peter C.]

I would like to second Steve's recommendation of Ek-Balaam as a site to visit. I was only briefly in the Yucatan, nine years ago (!) but I well remember how impressive those pyramid were, even more so because of how little-known they are.

Unfortunately for us, we were on a “package tour” that wended its way there very slowly via several other hotels. (The tour was included with the one-week stay the hotel we were staying at - the Xpu-ha Palace, just south of Playa del Carmen - not recommended!) This meant we didn’t get there until about 11:00 in the morning - what a waste of a morning! Even still, there were a few birds about at that time… would’ve been a lot better, had it not been in the heat of the day (and considerably easier to climb those stairs!)

If memory serves me correctly, one of the things that I learned pre-trip was that the Mexican authorities have banned tripods from archeological sites - apparently, they don't like to have people taking video of these places, presumably because they want to charge for it. I don't know if this rule is still in effect, but it might be something to keep in mind, if you were thinking of bringing a scope.

 

[Hamhed]

What we ran into on our trips was they got greedy (smart?) instead of protective and started charging if you were carrying tripods and video cameras. They would not differentiate between a tripod for a birding scope or a tripod for a video camera.

Steve

 

[njlarsen]

I don't think the tripod thing is a problem. I will bring the scope but intend it more for wetland birding (or maybe not even bring it). Inside ruins I will be happy just having the camera and binoculars.

Niels

 

[Maroon Jay]

Yes, tripods are banned inside the grounds of the ruins and there is an extra charge for video cameras. Also correct about the crowded ruins. I got a photo of the pyrimid at Chichen Itza at 8 a.m. with no people in it. By 11 a.m. there were thousands of people and that was impossible. Try to be there when they open at 8 a.m. The tourist busses start to arrive around 10 a.m. My most productive place in north Yucatan was Rio Lagartos.

 

[njlarsen]

Thank you again to all of you, who helped me have a successful trip to Yucatan. In all, we were in Mexico for part or all of 12 days, but 3 of those were for different reasons with no time for birding, and 4 others with very limited time. Given that time allotment, I feel I did well with a current estimate of 126 total species and 24 new ones seen/heard. I fully expect that at least the total list and hopefully also the list of new ones might increase when I get to review my photos.

A couple of highlights: Yucatan/Yellow-lored Parrot seen really well, Least Bittern finally seen, and JABIRU!

Niels

 

[njlarsen]

Here, a long time later is a file with bird highlights of that trip.

Enjoy

Niels