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Mozambique Birding Adventure
offered by supplier M17130 (view this supplier profile)
Key Information:
Tour Duration: 18
- 21
day(s)
Group Size: 4
- 12
people
Destination(s):
Mozambique
Specialty Categories:
Birdwatching
National Parks
Season: January - December
Airfare Included: No
Tour Customizable: No
Minimum Per Person Price: 4000 US Dollar (USD)
Maximum Per Person Price: 4000 US Dollar (USD)
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We are planning an epic birding trip to Mozambique, with two to three 4x4 vehicles. The idea is to start in Johannesburg, South Africa, to drive the short distance to Maputo and then immediately northwards to the Inhambane/Panda area where the serious birding will begin. We want to focus on finding Mozambique bird specials not easily found in South Africa (although we should also stumble across quite a number of the birds found only in Kwazulu/Natal and southern Mozambique).
In the south, at the start of our trip, there are some exciting coastal birds such as Crab Plover, plus we will bird the rapidly vanishing woodlands of the Panda area for a host of phenomenal birds, Olive-headed Weaver being the most famed. We then continue northwards to Vilanculo, a resort town from where we will include a boat trip to the Bazaruto Islands, plus we will include enough time in the Save Woodlands which are a little inland from here. We will then drive northwards to the Beira area to bird some of the most legendary birding areas such as Gorongosa Mountain and National Park, Chinizuia Forest and Rio Savane.
Eventually, we plan to head further inland to the extremely beautiful highlands adjacent to the Zimbabwe border, for a host of birds traditionally (when Zimbabwean politics was in better shape) found by birders in the Eastern Highlands of Zimbabwe. We then either head back to Johannesburg via Zimbabwe (birding the Eastern Highlands for a day or two en route), or via the giant Parque Nacional do Limpopo/Kruger National Park transfronteir Reserve, ending the trip where we started, in Johannesburg. The trip can be 2-3 weeks long, depending on the consensus.
Our guides doing the planning for this trip (and subsequently joining the trip), have been to Mozambique before, but have not yet birded there extensively. They have, however, birded very extensively in nearby Malawi, Zambia, Botswana, Namibia, South Africa and other countries in the Southern African region.
The idea is for this – our first organized trip to Mozambique - to be cheaper than future trips since most areas are new to the guides as well. It will be a budget trip involving a lot of camping. We plan to include all costs (such as the boat trip to the Bazaruto Archipelago) in the price we arrive at.
We actually want to do both a summer and winter trip, because there are different birds present in the different seasons (e.g. Mascarene Martin, Mangrove Kingfisher and several other exciting birds are only present in the southern winter, but we only stand a chance of African Pitta and a lot of other migrants in summer – the pitta is there in years of good rainfall in late summer).
This trip deals mainly with southern and central Mozambique. A future trip would be to Northern Mozambique (incredibly exciting because it is so poorly explored and birded) plus Malawi (which Chris Lotz has spent a lot of time birding in – a marvelous birding country). We could arrive in Malawi, bird there, and then access Northern Mozambique along surprisingly good roads compared to southern and central Mozambique (which is nevertheless very well-birded these days).
Your itinerary:
Day 1: Leave Johannesburg in morning, drive to Maxixe near Inhambane, O/N Maxixe (might break the journey but we want to get where the non-South African birds are).
Day 2: Explore coastal areas before heading to Miombo woodland near Panda for Olive-headed Weaver, Mascarene Martin (winter), Southern Hyliota, Black-eared Seedeater, Red-faced Crombec, Neergaard’s Sunbird, Green-backed Honeybird, Pale Batis, Racket-tailed Roller, White-breasted Cuckoo-shrike, etc. We can also look for Lemon-breasted Canary. O/N Panda area.
Day 3: Spend entire day birding around Panda. O/N Panda area
Day 4: Final early morning birding around Panda, followed by drive to Vilankulo near Bazaruto Archipelago. O/N Vilankulo.
Day 5: Boat trip to the islands for Crab Plover and all the others. O/N Vilankulo. Possibly do a marine mammal trip where Dugong, whales, etc. are possible, hopefully with good seabirds. O/N Vilankulo.
Day 6: Bird between Vilankulo and the Save River, in magnificent woodlands, where birds like Green Malkoha, Livingstone’s Flycatcher, Plain-backed Sunbird, Grey-headed Parrot, Mangrove Kingfisher, Eastern Nicator, Chestnut-fronted and Retz’s Helmet-shrikes, Thick-billed Cuckoo, Dickinson’s Kestrel, Cuckoo Hawk, Racket-tailed Roller and many others lurk. O/N Save Woodlands.
Day 7: Bird Save woodlands and, time-permitting, bird Parque Nacional de Zinave. O/N Save Woodlands.
Day 8: Drive to Beira area for next leg of trip – the Central Mozambique leg. Start birding Rio Savane area. O/N Rio Savane area. Bird the Rio Savane area all day long. The floodplains here could generate Blue Quail, Eurasian Bittern, Madagascar Pond Heron (some of these are very challenging!), Short-tailed Pipit, Mangrove Kingfisher, Senegal Lapwing, Locustfinch and a host of other tantalizing species. Drive to nearby Chinizuia area. O/N Chinizuia Forest area.
Day 9: Bird the incredible Chinizuia woodlands for such spectacular species as Lesser Seedcracker, Chestnut-fronted Helmet-shrike, Slender Greenbul, Plain-backed Sunbird, Southern Banded Snake Eagle, Kirk’s Francolin, Barred Long-tailed Cuckoo, Silvery-cheeked Hornbill, African Broadbill, African pitta (Summer), Green-backed Woodpecker, Speckle-throated Woodpecker, Mascarene Martin (winter), White-Chested Alethe, East Coast Akalat, Yellow-bellied Hyliota and other cracking species. Chinizuia Forest.
Day 10: Another full day of birding these magnificent woodlands. O/N Chinizuia Forest.
Day 11: Bird the famed Gorongosa Mountain and National Park! Around the spectacular Mount Gorongosa, we will search for Green-headed oriole, Pallid Honeyguide, Swynnerton’s Robin, Chirinda Apalis, Moustached Grass-warbler, Anchieta’s Tchagra, Lesser Seedcracker, Magpie Mannikin, Thick-billed Cuckoo, Pennant-winged Nightjar, Black-and-white Flycatcher, Senegal Lapwing, Long-toed Lapwing, Racket-tailed Roller, Dickinson’s Kestrel, Collared Palm-Thrush and a diverse array of other exciting specials. O/N Gorongosa.
Day 12: A full day birding around Mount Gorongosa. O/N Gorongosa.
Day 13: Another full day birding the Gorongosa area.
Day 14: We will drive to the scenically stunning Mount Tsetserra area, which borders on the eastern highlands of Zimbabwe. Here we can find exciting highland specials, many of which birders found in Zimbabwe during better days there. We will look for Orange Ground-thrush, White-starred Robin, Red-faced Crimson-wing, Black-fronted Bush-shrike, Bronzy Sunbird, Roberts’ Warbler, Chirinda Apalis, Silvery-cheeked Hornbill, Chestnut-fronted Helmet-shrike and a plethora of others. O/N Mount Tsetserra area.
Day 15: A full day of birding this magnificent area. O/N Mount Tseterra area.
Days 16-18: We can either enter Zimbabwe and bird some of the legendary areas such as Seldomseen and Vumba in the Eastern Highlands, and then drive for 1-1.5 days through Zimbabwe and Limpopo Province back to Johannesburg, South Africa.
Or, we can backtrack and embark on a fairly long drive southwards again to re-enter South Africa through the Parque Nacional do Limpopo and adjacent Kruger National Park (which together form the new, massive, Kruger-Limpopo Transfronteir Park which straddles the border between Mozambique and South Africa). Both are exciting options, but we fully understand that many birders may prefer to avoid Zimbabwe.
A few additional days for birders wanting a trip of 3 weeks or slightly more – could explore the Zambezi River area with its fantastic but poorly explored coastal forest.
Notes:
Airfare is not included in the tour price.
Also see tour packages in:
Africa
Mozambique
Birdwatching
National Parks
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