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We visited so many interesting habitats on our tour through Chile. Here is our group on the Altiplano, an amazing landscape of lakes and volcanoes. Photo by guide Willy Perez.

Chile is a vast country with the most spectacular landscape and super unique birds and wildlife. This tour covers almost all the possible habitats that this long and narrow country can offer. We went from the bottom to the top, enjoying every single place but more importantly every single bird that came across our journey. Starting in the vast flat land of Patagonia, crossing the Strait of Magellan to the Isla Grande. Admiring the impressive peaks of Torres del Paine, and feeling very small, close to the big and old Alerce (Patagonian Cypress) tree in Los Lagos province. Watching the fumaroles and the strong smell of sulphur in the Nevados De Chillan was the best feeling that the earth is alive in that part of the world. We also ventured to the Pacific Ocean to feel the strong and rich Humboldt current, with birds everywhere. The super colorful turquoise water with snow capped mountains behind in El Yeso valley. We even experienced the contrast going from the Atacama desert (sea level) where nothing is growing to 15.000 feet, to the Altiplano with stunning mountains and lakes, in just a few hours. The itinerary was full and the birds were superb. Looking at my notes I can see what some of the super cool memories were.

Some people had different birds that made their trip more memorable. It seems that for some of you, the size was important, and we had big birds like the Magellanic Woodpecker, Andean Condors and Royal Albatross; they were so big that we couldn't miss them ...right? Other birds were admired for their names that sound unreal; Moustached Turca, Crag Chilia, Des Murs's Wiretail were the most unusual ones. We had to work a bit, but yes we saw them well. We had very colorful ones too. The best were the Many-colored Rush-Tyrant, but also the super unique Diademed Sandpiper-Plover that we saw in two different spots.

The night birding gave some people very unexpected experiences, especially the two Rufous-legged Owls that surprised us with their hoot, but the best one was the Band-winged Nightjar that almost landed on my arm. Chile has also the most fancy ducks in the world. What about the Spectacled Duck in Torres del Paine, and the strong Torrent Ducks that we saw swimming in the rushing waters? Some of you liked those, too. The hummingbirds were one of the top priorities and our special journey paid off when we found the Chilean Woodstar nesting. Rodrigo even found a couple of lifers: Pied-crested Tit-Tyrant and Short-tailed Field-Tyrant. They are flycatchers but very nice ones.

There are a lot of stunning birds that deserve a recognition, Cormorants, Penguins, Rheas, Cinclodes, etc, but for me the winner of all is my best friend RUFI that was everywhere, saving the moment.

Just to finish I would like to say thank you to all of you who came to do this trip with us. Rodrigo and I certainly enjoyed it and we hope that we will see you again birding somewhere.

All the best and keep birding.

Willy.

KEYS FOR THIS LIST
One of the following keys may be shown in brackets for individual species as appropriate: * = heard only, I = introduced, E = endemic, N = nesting, a = austral migrant, b = boreal migrant

One of the special birds we saw was this beautiful Diademed Sandpiper-Plover. Photo by guide Willy Perez.

This Spot-flanked Gallinule and its chick were nicely photographed by participant Ian Harris. It's interesting that the chick doesn't look much like the adult.

The most southerly hummingbird that we saw was this wonderful Green-backed Firecrown. What an amazing color! Photo by participant Ian Harris.

This gorgeous pair of Spectacled Ducks was one of the treats for us at Torres del Paine. Photo by participant Ian Harris.

We enjoyed an amazing spectacle of thousands of seabirds at the Lluta River mouth. Photo by guide Willy Perez.

This colorful Chucao Tapaculo thought it was hiding from us, but we were able to get good scope views of it. Photo by participant Ian Harris.

One of the well-camouflaged Rufous-bellied Seedsnipes that we found at Lauca National Park stood out a little bit from the rest of the group. Photo by guide Willy Perez.

We saw three species of flamingos, including these beautiful Andean Flamingos at Chungara Lake. Photo by participant Ian Harris.

Here is one of the Rufous-legged Owls that hooted at us in Chillan. Photo by participant Ian Harris.

The southern subspecies of Silvery Grebe has fantastic golden cheeks; we got really nice views of this lovely bird. Photo by guide Willy Perez.

All penguins are wonderful, but King Penguins are big, and are one of the best-looking species! The colony we saw is doing well, and these are just a few that we saw. Photo by guide Willy Perez.

Another great landscape we visited was the Yeso Reservoir. Photo by guide Willy Perez.

Magellanic Plovers are rare, but if you know the right place to go, you can see them well! (And we did!) Photo by guide Willy Perez.

Among the specialties we saw were some very striking finches; this one, the White-bridled Finch is restricted to Patagonia. Photo by participant Ian Harris.

We saw all four of the camelid species of Chile, including this cute Alpaca that posed for a portrait. Photo by guide Willy Perez.

One last shot of our group; we had fun, didn't we? Photo by guide Willy Perez.

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS

We also saw a lizard in Chillan and it was a:

Liolaemus chillanensis (Lagartija de Chillan)

Totals for the tour: 273 bird taxa and 18 mammal taxa