Day 1 Saturday 6th May.
With a weather forecast that looked horrendous all week, our week's holiday in Wales was looking dodgy to say the least😢. The drive up didn't instill much confidence as it hammered it down all the way to the border!!😢 However as we headed into Wales the rain cleared and my first Swifts of the year swooping over Welshpool cheered us up some what.
We were based in Llanelltyd, near Dolgellau in Mid-Wales, in the Shadow of Cader Idris! A beautiful part of the country when the Sun shines!
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| The mighty Cader Idris, despite my well known enthusiasm for mountaineering decided not to climb it this time, mainly due to the weather conditions, this pic was taken on our penultimate day, and this was the only time we saw it!! Covered in cloud the rest of the time! |
With the break in the weather, with the luggage stowed, decided to check out a couple of local hotspots in search of a Dipper. Dipped on the Dipper but nice to stretch our legs after the long drive!
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| Chaffinch |
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| Blackbird |
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| Absolutely loads of Wild Garlick about! |
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| Think this is a Meadow Pipit rather than the hoped for Tree Pipit |
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| Pied Wagtail |
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| Bit of a strange one, Mandarin! |
Margie's pictures below
As said above the forecast was horrendous, though it looked okish on Anglesey, so we decided to head to RSPB South Stack with a view to seeing the Choughs and Puffins, but mainly to escape the rain!! A Wood Sandpiper had been reported from Llyn Trawsfynydd. (Hope you are all having fun trying to pronounce these names by the way!!😂) This was on our route so decided a quick visit to see if we could see it! Basically we failed to find it, this search wasn't helped by my rookie error, as although I'd packed me scope my tripod was safely back in Sussex !!😡What a plonker😂!! A wildlife photographer was present he hadn't seen the Wood Sandpiper, though he showed me gripping pictures of the Osprey and Little Ringed Plovers we had missed by half and hour!!
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| Llyn Trawsfynydd with the Power Station behind, note the cloud over the hills in the background,pic by Margie |
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| Grey Heron |
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| Common Sandpiper |
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| Tufted Duck |
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| Swifts over the lake, plenty of Swallows as well |
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| Tufted Duck |
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| Great Crested Grebe |
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| Swift |
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| Were loads of Gulls about the place as well, this one pictured I tried to string into an Osprey sadly not! |
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| Common Sandpiper |
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| Meadow Pipit |
Margie got some pics of the scenery, (below) this is a good spot, we could hear Curlews calling, although a local said they'd been missing for a couple of years, nice that they have returned, we also had three Cuckoo's calling, but all very distant!
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| Last time we were here a few years ago Margie walked across this bridge, they have welded it closed now health and safety gone mad!!! |
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| The water levels were very low, been a dry winter. |
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| The low water levels revealing some old walls |
We stayed far to long here, coupled with a late start, meant we arrived at South Stack much later than planned, managed to squeeze into the car park, so loads of people😢 and the weather which had been quite bright on the drive up, was throwing a new curveball at us, with banks of fogs coming in off the sea😏!! The birds though played ball, got good if distant views of Puffins on the sea, which meant we didn't have to walk down the hundreds of stairs to view them on the cliffs!! Phew!!😁 Thousands of Guillemots and Razorbills were on the cliff and I got my 1st Shag of the year!😲 Hurrah!!
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| Lesser Black-backed Gull giving us the eye |
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| Puffin on the Sea |
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| Guillemots |
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| Puffin |
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| Guillemot |
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| Guillemot and a couple of Razorbills |
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| Fulmar several of these about! |
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| Gannet, a few of these went past, but couldn't get much else at distance, obviously lack of scope didn't help with the Seawatch nor did the fog!! |
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| Quite a few Guillemots, were hundreds on the cliffs and hundreds more on the sea! |
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| 3 Puffins on the Sea, saw at least 4 possibly 5 individuals, don't think there are that many at this reserve so possibly saw a large % of the population |
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| Guillemot fly through |
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| Razorbill on the sea |
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| Razorbill |
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| Razorbills and flowers |
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| 1st Shag of the year! |
Margie's pictures below capture the conditions!
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| The Lighthouse |
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| Elin's Tower |
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| Quite a few Guillemots |
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| Misty Cliffs |
There was a distinct lack of Chough action, I'd heard a couple fly over in the fog but no luck seeing them in the mist, but we had more success on the cliff path back to the car, kudos to Margie as she doesn't like heights and the path is quite close to the edge, but she bravely traversed it successfully!!
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| Chough |
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| Chough in the mist |
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| Was looking tough to get a pic until this one landed in front of us! |
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| Raven, pair of these dropped in and it's fair to say they weren't popular even the Gulls launched attacks against them! |
The other highlight of South Stack at this time of year are the flowers along the cliff tops, which looked lovely even in the dodgy weather we had! Pictures below by Margie.
Oh for a bit of Sunshine!!!😢
Next stop was a quick trip to Holyhead harbour to have a look for Black Guillemots, we rolled up and there was one in the water, however as I opened the door it flew off!! Denied!! Much scanning and I found another one, very distant and I got my second Shag of the year!
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| Shag |
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| Black Guillemot |
With the RSPB Café packed out I couldn't do my usual conservation work, by eating cake to save the birds so we had lunch in Morrisons. On previous trips to Anglesey we had made many attempts to see Red Squirrels without success, I had heard about the Dingle and with no scope a trip to Cemalyn Bay seemed pointless, plus the idea of walking over loads of shingle had me feet in full rebellion😱!! So we headed to the Dingle with little hope to be honest, we were beginning to think Red Squirrels were mythical beasts! It's a really nice small reserve we followed the boardwalk around, the Bluebells were spectacular, though no sign of any Squirrels😏quelle surprise!!! We reached the feeding area, it looked fairly deserted!! Suddenly Margie says in a very excited whisper "there's one"!!!! Very slowly the Squirrel worked it's way towards and under the boardwalk before disappearing into the undergrowth behind us wow!!!
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| Hiding behind a Bluebell |
So our Squirrel hoodoo well and truly ended!!! We had another scruffier one through, as we waited we were entertained by various birds
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| Chaffinch |
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| Blue Tit |
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| Robin |
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| A view of the river by Margie, it is a very pretty reserve |
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| Bluebells by Margie |
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| The reserve was carpeted in them but difficult to show the full glory of it!! Margie tried her best! |
A guy called Will turned up, who filled up the feeders and assured us the Squirrels would be along shortly to feed! He wasn't wrong and we had gob-smacking views of Red Squirrels.
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| Creeping in |
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| Rooting around |
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| Looking cute in the Bluebells |
Yes quite a few pics, but they are cute and trust me I've been very restrained!!😂 Will was very knowledgeable about the Squirrels and gave us lots of info that I have off course forgotten!! Highly recommend this reserve, seems Will feeds them at around 4 o'clock everyday so that would be the time to go!!As we headed back along the boardwalk we bumped into Hugh, who described himself as the Squirrel whisperer of the Dingle!!! Apparently his feeding station on the higher path gets about 8 squirrels as opposed to Wills that only gets 3 !! Think there was a little friendly competition going on there!! Will reckoned his female had 3 Kitts in the Dray, he knew this by the number of teats she had, told you he was knowledgeable😂, so looking like there maybe even more at his feeding station in the near future!!! On the way out we there were a couple of Buzzards above the reserve, no doubt on the lookout for some naïve Squirrel babies!!😱
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| Common Buzzard |
So not a bad first full day, plenty seen and the weather improved through the day!!
