As mentioned, the motorboat trip from the previous afternoon had been rearranged for this morning, so that meant our morning had already been organised. This was with the company Ventura do Mar, and we set off nice and early at 09:30, out to sea in a motorboat containing just 15 people.
It did not take us
long to encounter a group of animals, but sadly they were ‘only’ Bottlenose
Dolphins. They did a little bit of jumping but not too much, and our views were
limited to mostly fins coming out of the water, even if they were at close
range. We stayed with them for 10 minutes, during which time the animals seemed
very relaxed, before we sped off westward to try to find some different
species. On this westwardly trip I spotted the first Deseratas/Zinos Petrel of
the trip, but sadly I never got a view of the underwings to have any indication
as to which one of the pair it was.
After a rapid trip across
the ocean, we arrived at our second group of animals, a pod of around 20 Atlantic
Spotted Dolphins. This was a species I really wanted to see but it was a little
disappointing that most of the animals seemed to be younger and therefore did
not have the striking spotty patterning. Still, they were very interactive with
the boat, swimming alongside and offering fantastic views for the time we were
able to spend with them. This was our last stop before heading back to port, where
we received the disappointing news that the Magic Dolphin tour that had been
out at the same time had seen a Blainville’s Beaked Whale!
In the afternoon we took the Madeira Cable Car company ride up to the gardens above Funchal. There are apparently two cable car companies in the area, and I made a bit of a ballsup with picking the right one. I should not have booked it in advance. Still we had an enjoyable late afternoon ride up the correct cable car at additional expense and a nice walk in the woods overlooking the city. The birds here were quite numerous, with two different Madeiran Firecrests seen, both looking awful in their post breeding moult, and several Madeira Chaffinches also seen but not quite as well. This was still a subspecies last time I saw it, so it was good to be reconnected. In addition there was a Madeiran Wood White and several Madeiran Wall Lizards, including one that decided to bite me when I tried to touch it…
No comments:
Post a Comment