Saturday, October 21, 2006

Simeon's Birthday Bluetail

21/10/2006, Thorpeness, Leaders: Simeon, Connor, James, Matthew

As it is Simeon's birthday on 24th October he decided to go for a twitch for his birthday treat (an idea heartily endorsed by myself!). There was only one possible venue - Thorpeness, for the red-flanked bluetail. We left at 10:30 with Matthew and Connor after dad had had a much needed lie-in. He had no idea how long the journey would be and got quite a shock upon learning it was 2 hours each way! The journey was enjoyable (for all except perhaps dad), but I started to worry when Connor's updates decreased from "showing well" to "brief views", followed shortly by a signpost saying "hidden dip"! The excitement heightened when we entered the village, and we all leapt out of the car. Dad went off to buy some breakfast and we went on ahead, guided by texts from Billy (Connor's dad) who was already viewing the bird, and leaving arrows for Dad to follow as we went. We were greeted by Billy, which was lucky as people were spread all over the area and we would have had a job finding him! We immediately set about finding the elusive beauty, fully prepared to wait hours, but after only a few minutes Billy called us as he was watching it with a small group of people. We followed swiftly and were soon stood gawking at a little brown bird with red flanks and a blue tail, flitting obligingly about in front of us. WOW! Matt almost managed to get a picture but the rest of us didn't even attempt it. Dad arrived just after it left, so we spent the rest of the time trying to get him to see it. We eventually tracked it down and Dad got a cracking view! The day's mission was accomplished....

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