We headed north to Wailua and turned west on Kuamoo Road. A stop at Opaeka'a Falls produced my first White-tailed Tropicbirds. This impressive bird was another one of my "most-wanted" birds.
A little farther up the road, we set out to hike the Kuamoo-Nounou Trail in search of Greater Necklaced Laughingthrush. Luckily, after a short walk to the bridge over the stream, we heard several of them calling. Eventually, we got great looks at them, but the low light caused all of my photos to be blurry. Here's the least-blurred one.
Mission accomplished, we headed north to Kilauea Point National Wildlife Refuge. When we got there, we found the gate closed due to construction of the road to the lighthouse. We had traveled over 4400 miles but weren't able to go the last quarter-mile to the point. So, we had to check out the birds from a fence on a bluff near the gate. This was the first of many unfortunate things that would somewhat plague the trip.
It was irritating to see up to 30 Red-tailed Tropicbirds flying right over the parking lot that we would have been in had the refuge been open. Ugghhh!
Over time, some of the birds came close enough for some photos. A dark background was required to capture the striking orange-red tail streamers.
A Red-footed Booby colony was below us.
Great looks were had as the birds pulled branches from the nearby trees for their nests.
Great Frigatebirds and Laysan Albatrosses cruised back and forth.
A White-tailed Tropicbird also spent some time overhead.
We left the point and continued west to the Hanalei National Wildlife Refuge where we easily found Hawaiian Duck, also known as Koloa.
Also present were Hawaiian Coots and the Hawaiian representative of both Common Gallinule and Black-necked Stilt.
We grabbed lunch in Hanalei and then drove all the way to the end of Highway 560. Along the way, I checked out the Maniniholo Dry Cave at Ha'ena Beach Park.
We returned to Kilauea Point. A few Hawaiian Geese, also known as Nene (NAY-nay), were just beyond the fence.
Later in the afternoon, Jason spotted a Kermadec Petrel zooming by the lighthouse. The bird then made numerous passes overhead, occasionally screaming at and chasing the boobies. The excitement intensified when a second Kermadec joined the first one and they zipped by over and over.
Late in the day, the numbers of Wedge-tailed Shearwaters increased as they returned to their nesting burrows.
When a heavy rain shower enveloped the point, we started the long, clockwise drive around to the west side of the island and up the mountain to Koke'e State Park. One of the Koke'e cabins would be our base for the next two nights.
No comments:
Post a Comment