January 5-13, 2026 with Jesse Fagan
Santa Marta is one of the premier tour destinations for anyone visiting Colombia for birds. There are several draws to this tour including an easy flight schedule (with direct flights to Barranquilla from the US), a sensible tour length at 10-days, and numerous endemics (25+) that can only be found in the Santa Marta region. And for those of you escaping the frigid temperatures of the north in January, the Caribbean coastline with its abundance of sun is just too appealing.
We started the tour in Barranquilla and got out early our first morning (“pre-breakfast”) to visit a local site for Chestnut-winged Chachalaca. We heard several at dawn, but we needed a bit of patience before we finally saw one well. Later in the morning we birded a newly minted mangrove boardwalk, and though a little too narrow for our birding group, it proved productive for Sapphire-throated Hummingbird. We lunched in Santa Marta at the mall since we were detoured by an unforeseen road closure. This proved a blessing in disguise as we were able to visit the nearby park, Quinta de San Pedro Alejandrino. The birding was good here as we ticked off Caribbean Hornero and Bicolored Wren, plus several large Green Iguanas lounging in the grass. This site is also notable for being the place where Simon Bolivar spent his last days and died on December 17, 1830. We got into Riohacha a little late on this first day but had a nice dinner on the rooftop before finally getting to bed.
The next morning, we were off again visiting the coastal dry forest site of Los Camarones. Our local guide, Johny, took us around to a bunch of birding spots where we slowly ticked off the specialties: Bare-eyed Pigeon, Green-rumped Parrotlet, Fulvous-crowned Scrub-Tyrant, Pale-tipped Tyrannulet, Vermilion Cardinal, Orinocan Saltator, Tocuyo Sparrow, and, finally, Chestnut Piculet. We had just about given up on the piculet before we spotted it (actually heard it) as we were loading into the van! We enjoyed lunch at the small beach community with coconut lemonade and fried snapper before making our way back towards Santa Marta. In Santa Marta, we loaded up into several large 4x4 vehicles for the bumpy trek up to the ProAves El Dorado Lodge.
We spent four nights at the El Dorado Lodge. This allowed us to have ample time for exploring the upper, mid, and lower elevations of the mountain side. (Just a quick fact, the highest point in the Santa Martas is Pico Cristobal Colon at 18,700 feet, which is only 26 miles from the coast, making it one of the highest coastal ranges in the world.) The first morning was magical. We departed very early and made a stop on our way up to San Lorenzo Ridge for Santa Marta Screech-Owl. As we were standing in the dark, I felt a rush of air by my head, and scanning around with my thermal scope, spotted a glowing object above the vehicles. “Okay, everyone, turn around slowly.” I brought up my flashlight and flicked it on, illuminating the endemic screech-owl for the group. Quick high-fives and we continued up the mountain, still pitch-black outside. We made it up to San Lorenzo Ridge as the first packets of light were warming the eastern ridge and watched a spectacular sunrise over the higher, snowy portions of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. The sunrise looked like fires burning on the mountains. It was a productive morning here with regards to the birds, as we worked hard to find many of the specialties like Santa Marta Warbler and Yellow-crowned Redstart, Hermit Wood-Wren, Black-cheeked Mountain Tanager, and Streak-capped Spinetail. There was also a cooperative Santa Marta Antpitta visiting a worming station. That’s about the only way you are going to see that species! The next two days we spent time working areas below the lodge (the middle elevation) between Minca and the El Dorado Lodge. This zone has several important birds, too, like Groove-billed Toucanet, Coppery Emerald, Santa Marta Woodstar, Rusty-breasted Antpitta, Yellow-legged Thrush and Black-hooded thrushes, and Sierra Nevada Brushfinch. Even time spent around the lodge was fun as loads of Band-tailed Guans wandered around and Lined Quail-Dove visited the seed station. We also had some interesting critters around the lodge that included scorpions, frogs, and an endemic tarantula (Kankuamo marquezi) which also made its way into a couple of cabins!
On our final day, we reluctantly dropped down again to Minca with a couple of birding stops as we slowly made our way back to Barranquilla. Lunch in Minca on the outdoor patio was delicious, with buzzing jacobins and White-vented Plumeleteer beckoning us to stay a little longer. However, we had one final bird we wanted to look for in the marshes around Barranquilla. Northern Screamer had eluded us on our first day, and we made one last final ditch effort to find one before heading to the hotel. Unfortunately, most of the suitable habitat had been swallowed up by shopping malls and food stands (progress they say!), but eventually we found a couple of birds feeding quietly in grass nearly up to their heads. A cool bird to end the trip.
We had some group highlights that most everyone agreed upon: Carikker’s Mountain Tanager, Blue-naped Chlorophonia, Santa Marta Woodstar, and Santa Marta Antpitta, all had multiple votes. The winner by a nose was White-tipped Quetzal which gave us lengthy views at San Lorenzo Ridge. The range-restricted quetzal is almost a Santa Marta endemic. Everyone was also torn on their favorite experience. It was a tie between the spectacular sunrises and sunsets from our lodge and the night monkey feeding event. Finally, I want to thank all of you for trusting Field Guides for your birding travel. I really enjoyed spending time with you in the field and look forward to our next adventure together. Also, thank you to Manuela and Dario for their excellent work.
You can see my complete trip report on eBird at this link: https://ebird.org/tripreport/481327
You can see my iNaturalist report of non-avian taxa at this link: https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/field-guides-birding-tours-colombia-s-santa-marta-mountains-2026-with-jesse-fagan
You can download a combined PDF of this page and the eBird report at this link: https://fieldguides.com/triplists/cms26aTRIPLIST.pdf
-- Jesse Fagan (aka Motmot) from Lima, Peru