FIrst look at Peru

I have a brief moment in time to send you a few pictures of Peru before I pack and take off for NC to be with Susan and the children and grandchildren for the first complete family vacation ever.  I will eventually post more, but I hope these will encourage you to return later and see the rest.
These are not in any order, but the subsequent posts will be.  It was, truly, a bucket list trip.

The tour group.  8 world class birders, and me.  There were only a few rare moment of condescention, mostly
they all tried very hard to help me see everything they did (I didn't). But at the end of the trip, in comparing notes, most of the  others had added perhaps 3 or 4 birds to their life list, and I added 256!

The Madre de Dios River at 5:30  AM

A spectacular façade



Actually from the last day in Peru, Karl Humm, my nephew who is working with the Peace Corps in Peru, joined me for dinner in the Miraflores district of Lima at the Rosa Nautica on a pier on the coast for my final meal in Peru. Karl pointed out the Inca Tern, Peruvian Pelican, and Peruvian Booby, all life lists, while having dinner (on the Pacific coast, no less).

A Chestnut-breasted Coronet, found in a botanical Garden in Manchu Picchu.

My Jaguar!  Hardly a great picture, but from a racing canoo at 5:00 AM, OK.

Blue-headed Parrots, at the clay lick.

A smooth-billed Ani!!  A bird I have been hoping to see all my life.  Fairly common in Peru, a
ho-hum bird for all the other birders, but great excitement for me!

The Golden-collared Toucanet, absolutely one of my favorite birds of the trip.

A blue-crowned Trogan (female)

A Great Potoo!!!  We were at the top of a canopy platform for two hours before Gustavo spotted this bird less than 20 yards away on one of the supporting branches.  A master of concealment, Potoos look like dead branches and can fool even a Gustavo!

A Hoatzin



For you butterfly

A Jabiru! At  6 feet tall, the largest stork in the world.

Here is the Inca Tern, found at dinner with Karl

And the Peruvian Booby. 

Inside the Iglesia de la Compania in Cusco.

I have some pictures of Machu Picchu, taken mostly in very cloudy conditions.  I hope I can
subsequently rescue them on the computer.

The birders in the motorized canoe, headed down river on the Madre de Dios, on the 8-hour ride to
the Manu Wildlife Center from the Amazonia Lodge.

The Canopy tower stairs.