Expectations met!

 Not Great Expectations to be honest!! (Don't think I'm in Dickens class as yet 😁😲)  With not much on the Birdguides, in range anyway, I decided to head down to Seaford for an early Seawatch with half an eye on a wander up the cliffs to try for pictures of the Kittiwakes, was very grey and gloomy when I arrived at Splash Point, I wandered around to look at the jumble of boulders in the hope of a Black Redstart, but no luck! On the bright side there were quite a few Kittiwakes knocking about, a Peregrine sat atop the cliffs, to far for pics though, a lot closer was a displaying Rock Pipit which nearly landed on my head!!

Kittiwake

Cormorant

Rock Pipit, just finished it's display, giving me the "pretty good huh!?" look!

So I wandered round to the Basket, the sea was flat calm, scanning could see nothing on it, Expectation number 1, Seawatch would be crap!! Expectation met!!  To be fair I had 4 Red-throated Divers through, in 2 pairs, 4 Common Scoters, 2 singletons and a pair, approximately 8 Gannets and a distant flock of approx 10  Auk sp all going east and a Great Crested Grebe on the sea!! I had hoped for few early Brents or Med Gulls but no luck, give it another couple of weeks they should start going through!!

Different Rock Pipit

Newhaven with Brighton in the background

Red-throated Divers

Common Scoter, female top male below!

At this point, I would like to say stick with it, the pictures get better, let's be honest they can't get much worse😢!

Well I'd given it three quarters of an hour, so decided to have a walk up the cliffs with a view to get some pics of the Kittiwakes. I don't think they are fuller committed as yet as most of em were just sat on the sea, the Fulmars were more cooperative!

Stonechat on the way up to the plateau!

Herring Gull

Fulmar

Herring Gull 2nd CY

Kittiwake

Kittiwakes

Newhaven with Brighton in the background from higher up

So think my expectation of some reasonable pics of the Kittiwakes was more or less met although I think it would be  worthwhile to try again in a couple of weeks, with the Sun out!!

Now what to do, Seaford Head loomed above me like a mini Everest😱, but it was early so I decided to go for it, I'd like to say I skipped up it like a young mountain goat, but that would be lying😂😱!! However I did make it to the top!!! Expectation exceeded!!😂

I decided to walk to Hope Gap, expectations would be Skylarks, Meadow Pipits, Rock Pipits and maybe a Raven!! 

Stonechat (Female)

Stonechat (Male)

Meadow Pipit

Great Black-backed Gull

Jackdaws, lots of these on the Cliffs

Skylark, not much singing but found a few wandering around in the Grass

Brightening up

Belle Tout from Seaford Head

Raven

Thought I'd better go for an ahhh factor!

Jackdaw

Rock Pipit

Strutting it's stuff

Stonechat

Hope Bottom was quiet, the tide was out apart from a Little Egret, a flyby Oystercatcher and about 6 anglers it was mainly Gulls!! The walk back was more of the same, though the Raven showed even better and back on top of Seaford Head a couple of Peregrines were keeping watch from the cliff top!

Oystercatcher

Rabbit

Stonechat

Jackdaws

Lambmegadon, going for cuteness overload

Skylark

Raven

Peregrine

Bit distant on the Cliff, which I didn't want to get near to the edge of!!

The good news was it was now all downhill to the car, although it is blooming slippy on the path, I expected to fall arse over tit!! But I didn't, expectation dashed😁!! I decided to have another crack at the Kittiwakes, however they had decided to bugger off, they had completely disappeared no doubt out to sea feeding!! Though there was a nice showy Skylark on the chalky plateau!

It's a shame Newhaven isn't a city would have kept the Dickens theme going!!

Skylark

Nicely lit Jackdaw

Fulmar

Skylark

So a nice walk,about 3 miles, sometimes it's nice to see what you expect to see, at least some things remain constant in our changing world!!!