Meet “My” Cape Parrot Family

Posted on December 21, 2014 by Tara

Most of my glimpses of wild birds, especially parrots is a bird flying at the speed of light over my head or hiding in trees. I never imagined that I would get to spend a few quality HOURS with this beautiful little family of Cape Parrots! They are part of the flock who live & breed in Hogsback and fly down to King William’s Town during the day to forage. Much to my surprise, they don’t make a lot of noise. Since my eyesight is terrible and I rely on sound and then movement to find a bird I would have missed them completely without the help of Rodnick Biljon who is part of the Cape Parrot Project and monitors the activities of the local birds.

Rodnick with my husband, Ina

Typical street with fruit trees that attract the parrots

You can see the fruit that they are eating in this tree.

All the photos taken in this tree are of the same 3 birds. The father (adult male) is the one with the red forehead and red shoulders. The mother (adult female) has a dull grey-ish brown head but she still has the red shoulders. The youngster has an orange-ish forehead and no red on the shoulders. If you are particularly “tuned in” to birds, you can also see he has this wide-eyed, innocent look about him but also an air of “wow, what a cool world”! It’s hard to explain, maybe you just need to see them for yourselves. Even before Rodnick explained the colouration of the adult and juvenile birds, I had picked the youngster out by his behaviour. He was a bit more awkward in moving about the tree while the parents are agile and graceful, they know what they are doing. A couple times he went for a branch, missed and had to scramble to get his balance…………then he looked kind of embarrassed that I had witnessed his blooper!

All 3 birds were eating the berries and at times the two adults would snuggle and preen each other or one of them would preen the baby or feed him, though he was quite capable of feeding himself. They tended to stick together, never more than a meter or so apart. I was so touched by the affection shown between the family members!

I think this is the part where we drove around the area after seeing a few other Cape Parrots fly past. We saw other birds foraging alongside the parrots, everyone seemed to get along just fine.

Now we are back to “my” Cape Parrot family again. I couldn’t believe they were still there!

Here’s the youngster trying to fly from one branch to another a bit awkwardly.

They all spent quite a bit of time preening. Guess they wanted to look their best for the blog! I have seen 1000’s of birds all over the world, some of which are rare and endangered like these Cape Parrots. But that isn’t why I remember these guys and treasure the time I spend with them. It’s because they let me in. They didn’t mind sharing their private lives with me for a few hours and somehow they knew they were safe with me. I do hope they realize that not all humans are as well-meaning as people like Rodnick, Ina & myself. Some people would try to harm them or capture them so I hope they learn to keep a safe distance from humans. I was at times close to 4 meters below them. I hope they stay safe and the youngster grows up to be a happy, healthy parent of the next generation!

Lodge Review: 2 Oaks Guesthouse, King William’s Town, South Africa

Posted on December 20, 2014 by Tara

King William’s Town is not the easiest place in the world to get information on accommodations. There aren’t even many places on Trip Advisor so we were just planning to drive there, drive around town and hope to find something. Luckily, as I was discussing our birding plans on the Cape Parrot Project Facebook page, one of the members recommended this lovely little guesthouse that was run by one of their members – Joanne Stolk.

I immediately felt at home, this could have been a house in my home state of Queensland. 2 Oaks Guesthouse (and the trees it is named after) is located in a quiet neighborhood only a few minutes drove from town which was great as we didn’t have to listen to noise from traffic, only the noise from the Hadeda Ibises which were just about everywhere! There’s a nice little picnic area on the porch where we ended up eating takeaway for dinner and just relaxing.

The garden gets a lot of avian visitors, sometimes even Cape Parrots but they didn’t come while we were there.

The rooms are nice and large and have attached bathrooms. Beds are very comfy and we got a good night’s sleep after our epic journey but still got up early enough to go birding. Jet lag helped, our bodies never did figure out which time zone they were in! I loved the bird artwork on the walls!

A big home-cooked breakfast is served in the main dining room – eggs, bacon, toast, yogurt, juice, coffee, can’t remember what else but we had plenty to eat! They can do other meals as well, rates are on their website. We didn’t know what time we would be getting in after birding so just went for bed & breakfast. They can work the breakfast hours around birding.

A few birds we saw in and around the guesthouse during the 2 days we were there. The property is very safe and has a secure parking area. The rates are very reasonable, especially if your currency happens to be up against the rand! 2 Oaks Guesthouse is a fantastic deal and we really loved staying here. Joanne and her staff are so friendly, you feel like one of the family! And I am always happy to support someone who supports Cape Parrots!

Pointshound Special – 1000 Bonus Airline Miles Any Booking In 2015

Posted on December 19, 2014 by Tara

I love when these specials come up! Pointshound is running a special in which existing members can refer new members and BOTH of us get 1000 bonus when you complete your first hotel stay anytime in 2015!

From 2015 onwards, I will be concentrating more on earning airline miles for hotel bookings. I am just finding hotel programs too limiting and most times they don’t even have properties where I want to stay. I have booked small eco-lodges on Pointshound before and I like being able to choose from a wide variety even in gateway cities rather than being stuck with 1 or 2 choices in a hotel program.

Choose from a wide variety of airline miles and other loyalty programs.

Choose your program!

Promotional offer cannot be combined with any other bonuses or offers. Bonus valid on a new user’s first booking only. New user must sign up using unique referral link by December 31, 2014 and first booking must be made by December 31, 2015.

The Cape Parrots Of King William’s Town, South Africa

Posted on December 18, 2014 by Tara

There is a lot of confusion about the classification of Cape Parrots. In the past, there were 3 subspecies: Poicephalus robustus robusts (Brown-headed Cape Parrots), Poicephalus robustus suahelicus and Poicephalus robustus fuscicollis (Grey-headed Cape Parrots). Cape Parrots have now been reclassified so the Brown-headed Cape Parrots are in their own species now – Poicephalus robustus and the two Grey-headed Cape Parrots are now in their own species divided into Poicephalus fusicollis suahelicus (the Grey-headed Cape Parrots in the Limpopo region) and Poicephalus fusicollis fusicollus (Grey headed/Brown-necked parrots found in West Africa. If all this is confusing, there is a good graph on Thor’s Cape Parrot page.

In this post, I will be blogging about my experience with Poicephalus robustus, the Brown-headed Cape Parrots. The distribution map below is extracted from Birdlife and I have indicated in blue the approximate range of these birds. They breed in the Hogsback area and fly down to King William’s Town most days to forage as fruit trees are plentiful.

Hogsback & King William’s Town

There is a very active, dedicated Facebook group called Cape Parrot Project and the members are happy to advise anyone who is really interested in learning more about these amazing birds.

If you are interested in visiting this area to see the Cape Parrots, you could fly into either Port Elizabeth or East London depending on your other travel plans. I went for Port Elizabeth and rented a car for the trip. You could visit Hogsback or King William’s Town depending on the season and availability of guides. These birds are much less noisy than I had anticipated and I would have had a lot of trouble locating them without the help of Rodnick Biljon from the Cape Parrots group. He monitors them regularly and knows where to find them. I won’t post an exact map of where they are currently found to protect the birds from potential poachers but I suggest contacting Rodnick on Facebook.

Another member of the Cape Parrot group, Joanne Stolk runs a wonderful little guest house called 2 Oaks Guesthouse which I reviewed on a separate post. You can also expect more Cape Parrot photos and other birding opportunities in King William’s Town!

Bowerbirds: The Art Of Seduction

Posted on December 17, 2014 by Tara

Nothing beats a David Attenborough documentary to bring exotic birds up close and personal……………..except of course going there to see them in person! I did this in both West Papua and West Australia, but I can’t shoot video to save my soul so we are lucky Mr Attenborough does these amazing docos!

Australians click on the image to watch online.

Click here to view on Australia’s Channel 10.

If the link above expires or you can’t view Australian based videos, then try this link.

Slow Lounge JNB Transit & Comair Flight: Johannesburg – Port Elizabeth

Posted on December 16, 2014 by Tara

One more flight would end the epic journey from Brisbane to Port Elizabeth in South Africa. Theoretically, I should have been able to tag a domestic JNB-PLZ segment onto our award ticket but there was no availability in either Y or J the day we needed it. Thankfully since I can easily get British Airways Avios via my Chase Ultimate Rewards, this wasn’t a huge problem.

Even with the Avios, we would have been fine in economy as it was only a short hop but this wasn’t available so we booked business. This entitled us to visit the Slow Lounge in the domestic terminal which was pretty nice and had a wide variety of food. Not that we were that hungry after the breakfast on South African Airways!

We left the lounge after a quick bite and checking my emails and wandered through the airport to the gate.

Unfortunately the seats were Euro-style business class – economy seats with a blocked middle seat but they did serve us a good lunch and it was less than 2 hours. Economy would have been fine for this segment if it had been available.

Finally Port Elizabeth came into view and our epic air journey was over! All we needed now was a 3 hour drive to King William’s Town and we could finally see the Cape Parrots!

I only snapped this pic because I liked the bird on the tail fin!

South African Airways: Beijing – Johannesburg, Business Class

Posted on December 15, 2014 by Tara

Since I have already written a guide on how to get to South Africa using frequent flyer miles, I will jump right into the review of the flight. Business class awards are becoming an endangered species and it can be pretty tricky trying to get one on South African Airways since they are one of the best airlines serving JNB, the major gateway airport to this amazing country. This trip was originally going to happen in 2015 but was brought forward to 2014 as I was getting worried about the availability of amazing awards like this and couldn’t afford another devaluation by United.

First look at the plane from the gate in PEK.

Comfortable seats that lie flat!

Seat controls

The seat backs were already loaded with magazines, headphones and a nice amenity kit.

I was REALLY glad we weren’t going to do a 14 hour flight in economy!

The flight attendant took our orders for both dinner and breakfast. It was late and all I really wanted to do was sleep so I asked for a nice liqueur. She recommended Amarula which was absolutely divine and became my addiction for the rest of the trip (when I didn’t have a rental car to worry about).

With seat in the bed position, I slept like a log and was astonished to be woken a couple hours out of JNB with breakfast. Maybe the two layover excursions in Taipei & Beijing helped as I was totally exhausted. Best sleep I ever had on a plane!

These fruit crepes were delicious!

We landed right on time at JNB. The camera showed the plane’s position, it was pretty cool.

Business class got our own bus to immigration which was a breeze. You don’t even have to fill in arrival cards! Why can’t all countries be this smart & efficient?

To say the least, I loved South African Airways! Great service, punctual, comfortable, what more could you want? We still weren’t at our final destination: King William’s Town. One more short flight on British Airways/Comair and we would be there!

Just For Fun: The World’s Most Modern Bird

Posted on December 14, 2014 by Tara

This totally cracked me up, check the Sun Conures at the end!

Modern Lovebirds

Sneak Peekers

Air New Zealand Announces Auckland – Buenos Aires……….So What?

Posted on December 13, 2014 by Tara

I really love traveling to South America because of the wide diversity of birds to be seen there. Any other time I would be thrilled to death that there was a new route to South America from Australia. Currently there is only service from Sydney to Santiago on Qantas and LAN and you need OneWorld miles to book them. Traditionally, I have had an easier time collecting Star Alliance miles on either United or Singapore Krisflyer and theoretically these would be useful to redeem these new flights.

However Air New Zealand is the stingiest of all the Star Alliance carriers in releasing award seats, even in Y class. I haven’t seen even Y class available between Brisbane and Auckland in 3 years! So unless they change their ways, there is little to get excited about. Below you see a typical search on United for partner awards on a popular trans-Pacific route. I suspect the results will be the same on the new AKL-EZE route.

How We Killed 8 Hours In Beijing

Posted on December 12, 2014 by Tara

Here we go, another whirlwind layover, this time in Beijing. We were enroute to Johannesburg from Brisbane and I maximized the routing so we could get a peek at Taipei and Beijing.

We had to pass a temperature test before they let us in due to ebola, but other than that our 72 hour transit visa (only used for 8 hours) went smoothly once we reached the front of the line.

If our layover had been during the day, we would have grabbed a taxi to the Great Wall but since we arrived at dusk, I decided the best options was a quick look at Tienanmen Square. This was easily accomplished using the air train and local subway. Details of public transport are on the airport’s website.

The long lines at PEK left us with no time to check carry on backpacks so we took them with us. It was dark by the time we got there so it was all lit up.

We didn’t stay long, I was worried about possible delays getting back through security so we headed back after a quick walk around. Lines were indeed long so it was good we weren’t late.

Back at the airport, we wandered around the shops. We stopped in at the lounge for drinks but I knew from our previous visit in Sept that the wifi was painfully slow and they don’t warn you about flights being called so we went to the gate shortly afterward. Not the most exciting layover we ever had but at least we were exhausted enough to sleep well on the South African flight to JNB!

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