We decided on a reasonably early start, so after a cup of tea and a last visit to the 'patch' we began the journey back towards Reykjavik. A huge flock of at least 500 snow buntings were perched on some house roofs and dropping into a garden where some grain had been put out for them. They were singing from the roof tops and zipping past us into the garden. The overnight snowfall made driving tricky and just before the layby overlooking Kolgrafjordur, moving over to let a lorry go by, the car slid off the road and down the bank. We had frequent offers of help from passers by, one who offered to tell the police in Grundarfjordur, and a call the emergency services had us pulled out and on our way in about an hour.
We drove back across the pass where the snowstorms of the past couple of days had covered the landscape in a blanket of white and turned left towards Laugervartn. The roads were reasonbly clear but the views were more expanses of snow. More snow started falling as we drove into Laugarvatn and we parked up in the car park of the visitors centre, walked across and sheltered under the roof to scan across the bit of lake that was ice free. Dotted across the lake were 22 Barrow's Goldeneye plus a few Mallard.
The drive back to Reykjavik and navigated our way to the harbour, hoping for the Glaucous-winged gull. we drove round as before but didn't see anything very hopful. A German birder came towards us and passed on the fact that there was a Brunich's Guillemot in the harbour so we parked up and walked over to the harbour wall. After a bit of scanning we found it feeding just outside the harbour and over the next few dives it covered quite large areas. We returned to the quayside and tossed some bread in themhope of attracting some gulls but they didn't really respond. However, the Eider flock scrambled for the bread and then an odd gull was spotted which looked a possible Glaucous-winged gull. We spent some time photographing it as well as a couple of Black Guillemots and some of the other gulls before it flew off.
It was getting quite dark so we decided to head for the Bed aand Breakfast Hotel, near the airport. The expected level 4 aurora activity had been downgraded to a level 1so we turned in but decided to get up reasonably early, have breakfast and then try for the King Eiders in Holguvik harbour. The harbour gates were closed and there were signs saying no entrty but we had a chat with the friendly guard, who explained that this was a 'Nato' port and there was a foreign ship in port so we couldn't go through the gates, however, if we parked round the side and walked through the tall containers we could walk round to the quay side. There were thousands of Fulmars and Eiders so we scanned through and eventually found a King Eider near the far bank. Among the Fulmars were at least 2 blue morphs, one of which came very close to the harbour wall. Time went fast and we had to leave for the airport and our flight home. After sorting out the complicated return of the car we dropped off our bags and made our way to the departure lounge before our flight home.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
We drove back across the pass where the snowstorms of the past couple of days had covered the landscape in a blanket of white and turned left towards Laugervartn. The roads were reasonbly clear but the views were more expanses of snow. More snow started falling as we drove into Laugarvatn and we parked up in the car park of the visitors centre, walked across and sheltered under the roof to scan across the bit of lake that was ice free. Dotted across the lake were 22 Barrow's Goldeneye plus a few Mallard.
The drive back to Reykjavik and navigated our way to the harbour, hoping for the Glaucous-winged gull. we drove round as before but didn't see anything very hopful. A German birder came towards us and passed on the fact that there was a Brunich's Guillemot in the harbour so we parked up and walked over to the harbour wall. After a bit of scanning we found it feeding just outside the harbour and over the next few dives it covered quite large areas. We returned to the quayside and tossed some bread in themhope of attracting some gulls but they didn't really respond. However, the Eider flock scrambled for the bread and then an odd gull was spotted which looked a possible Glaucous-winged gull. We spent some time photographing it as well as a couple of Black Guillemots and some of the other gulls before it flew off.
It was getting quite dark so we decided to head for the Bed aand Breakfast Hotel, near the airport. The expected level 4 aurora activity had been downgraded to a level 1so we turned in but decided to get up reasonably early, have breakfast and then try for the King Eiders in Holguvik harbour. The harbour gates were closed and there were signs saying no entrty but we had a chat with the friendly guard, who explained that this was a 'Nato' port and there was a foreign ship in port so we couldn't go through the gates, however, if we parked round the side and walked through the tall containers we could walk round to the quay side. There were thousands of Fulmars and Eiders so we scanned through and eventually found a King Eider near the far bank. Among the Fulmars were at least 2 blue morphs, one of which came very close to the harbour wall. Time went fast and we had to leave for the airport and our flight home. After sorting out the complicated return of the car we dropped off our bags and made our way to the departure lounge before our flight home.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
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