Go Slow in Ecuador

Our portfolio of ‘Go Slow’ tours continues to prove extremely popular with those of you who like a slower pace to your wildlife holidays. Initially we wondered if the format could work in South America, but the runaway success of our ‘Go Slow’ tour in Colombia allayed all doubts! We are therefore delighted to offer a ‘Go Slow’ tour to Ecuador, aimed at those of you who wish to explore some of Ecuador’s finest birding sites, all from a comfortable base and while keeping hours that don’t leave you exhausted and needing a holiday at the end of the holiday to recover!

After a night in Ecuador’s charming capital, Quito, we head to the western Andean (Pacific) slope via Zuroloma on the flanks of Pichincha Volcano, an excellent site for the incomparable Sword-billed Hummingbird, the bird with the longest bill in relation to its body of any on Earth. Birding our way down the famous old Nono-Mindo road, we arrive at our first base, a new lodge offering spellbinding views across the cloudforest. Each room is well appointed with a private balcony offering far-reaching vistas, while the spectacle of hummingbirds, tanagers and occasional Plate-billed Mountain Toucans coming to the feeding station adjacent to the magnificent restaurant terrace will mean that, at times, it will be hard to focus on the lodge’s delicious meals! A number of north-western Ecuador’s top birding sites are within easy reach, including the upper Tandayapa Valley, Bellavista, Alambi hummingbird garden and Refugio Paz de las Aves where, over the past few years, the proprietor Angel Paz has habituated a number of antpitta species to the extent that they are confident enough to approach closely to take their morning diet of earthworms. With a Cock-of-the-rock lek to be enjoyed and Giant Antpitta ‘Shakira’ being coaxed from the undergrowth by Angel’s soft whistling, this is a South American birding experience not to be missed!

We next move on to an old Naturetrek favourite, Sachatamia Lodge just outside Mindo. This is another extremely well-appointed lodge, with excellent food, bird-rich grounds and a swimming pool. One thing that north-west Ecuador does extremely well is the concept of easy birding at feeding stations. On this tour, there is no slogging up a mountain ridge with a rucksack on your back hoping to bump into a mixed flock of birds (as we would have done 25 years ago). On this tour, we visit sites where the birds come to you. Photographers will be in their element. Species such as Glistening-green Tanager, Moss-backed Tanager and Black-chinned Mountain Tanager now come readily to lodge gardens in a way that we could only have dreamt about a couple of decades ago. All this makes for a 'maximum birds and minimal effort' type of tour; so expect a sensory overload! The icing on the cake might be views of two enigmatic mammals in the form of Tayra and Olinguito, which reliably come to two community-run observation platforms.

Join us pre-tour for an optional Quito/Antisana extension for history and culture, condors and Spectacled Bears, and post-tour down at the remarkable Napo Wildlife Centre in the Amazon.