Mirfield/Pugneys Twitching Thayers Gull

Well, today did not quite go to plan. I ended up getting quite a late train to Mirfield for the thayers gull hoping that it would be chilling on the rooftops. Alas there were no gulls at all on any of the roof tops and none of the gulls going over appeared to be thayers in nature. I had though I would miss the bird at Mirfield but that I would get it at the roost, so by half 12 I decided 1 and a half hours of watching not very much was probably an indication that I should move on.
  I decided to head to Pugneys to revisit the blyths pipit and then head over to the gull watch. Just under 2 hours later I finally arrived at Pugneys having had a nightmare with the public transport. Dusk was already falling so I decided not to go to the blyths as I figured that it would have settled for the night and headed straight to the gull roost.
  There was quite a crowd gathered, at least 50 and certainly more birders all in a line awaiting the gull roost. Sadly it disappointed. The thayers did not come in, and most gulls did not come in until late, so much so that the light was almost gone by the time the gulls started to drop in. So no thayers and no blyths.
  Given how unfortunate I had been with birds and public transport I was bracing myself for a pretty rotten evening. However, all got much better when an Iceland Gull dropped in to the roost late on. I could not find it for the life of me in my scope, but fortunately another gentleman nearby allowed me to look through his Swaro and I got a very nice view of the bird, clearly and Iceland Gull and another lifer for me, probably my last this year. It was way too distant for me to attempt a photo and since I could not locate the gull it waould have been difficult anyway. However, I found on twitter a picture of the bird from someone else, so this can serve as some kind of record shot for this lifer.

-Iceland Gull (Not my photo)

So in the end it was not a total disaster and I spent less than a tenna on the buses and trains, so that made it much better, even if I did have to run for a train in the end. I am well pleased to have ticked off Iceland Gull, pretty reasonable compensation for the Thayers. Although now it is being discussed as possibly being a herring gull, so I may have missed nothing at all...

Species List:

Mirfield: Grey Wagtail, Long-Tailed Tit, Goosander, Blue Tit, Canada Goose, Starling, Graylag Goose, Mute Swan, Mallard, Coot, Moorhen, Black-Headed Gull, Carrion Crow, Feral Pigeon, Woodpigeon, Common Gull, Herring Gull, Greater Black-Backed Gull, Lesser Black-Backed Gull, Magpie, Cormorant, Mistle Thrush, Pied Wagtail, Blackbird, 

Pugneys CP: Tufted Duck, Mallard, Shoveler, Goldeneye, Pochard, Mute Swan, Canada Goose, Cormorant, Pied Wagtail, Graylag Goose, Iceland Gull, Black Headed Gull, Lesser Black-Backed Gull, Greater Black-Backed Gull, Herring Gull, Common Gull, Song Thrush, Blackbird, Woodpigeon,