What countries or regions are good for solo birding? (4 Viewers)

[pbjosh]

I also have the natural instinct that nearly anything can be done independently. Sometimes it's just so much easier to hire a driver and car, or a guide with a car, that taking a hardcore I will do it myself attitude does not make sense. Sometimes it's also just as expensive to do something yourself as to pay for a driver or a guide. There are times when local ecotourism norms should be respected and making sure some of your money supports local reserves / guides / communities is the right way to do it. There are a lot of remote areas where a local trail guide is just the smart way to do things. There is also the factor of balancing your time against your budget, and I do weigh the aspect of trying the clean up in areas where I go and make sure that for the ecological cost of my travel, I see everything possible.

That said, I still do most trips nearly or totally independently. In Madagascar we hired a car and driver, it's the right way to do it. We hired the (mandatory) guides in the National Parks - it's the right way to do it. Beyond that we just sorted everything out ourselves on a day to day basis and got along just fine. Going on a guided tour there with all arranged for you is certainly not a bad way to do it if that is your preference, but going hardcore independent seems like madness. Trying to self drive Madagascar to some of the remote sites would be way beyond even my tolerance for adventure and suffering. Trying to see all the birds unguided would run well afoul of park regulations and established norms and good visitor etiquette. However, in Comoros there are no guides and there are no parks. We did it all ourselves hiring locals on the spot to drive us places (taxis largely don't even exist), walking when we couldn't get rides, sorting out a boat on our own, etc, with me as the french speaker, and I don't speak french. Another example: I just spent 2 months in remote parts of the Brazilian Amazon and we used a local guide for one part of the trip to arrange the logistics to visit PN Serra do Divisor. It didn't cost a terrible amount, and I am not sure we would have gotten everything sorted on our own. Having the local guide with us was definitely helpful for knowing the territories of a couple of key birds, but we still found 98% of the birds on our own or before the guide did. Now that we have gone there, we have more contacts and more information and for future visitors we can now explain how to do it with an english speaking guide if you want one, with a local Portuguese speaking guide accompanying you, with the local guide just setting up the logistics for you, or with only the local accommodation in PN Serra do Divisor sorting the logistics for you - all are valid options depending on how much Portuguese you speak and how willing you are to sort logistics yourself. Trying to go there without park permission and without pre-arranged lodging, though, would just be frankly stupid but I don't think anyone here is trying to be that independent Likewise I don't think many people would try to go to some of the remote areas of Madagascar without a driver

Guyana is tempting as a destination but I'll likely go to Roraima before I get to Guyana and there's a good park for the Ground-Cuckoo there, so I may or may not ever find out just how hard getting around Guyana is unless I end up guiding there or end up going for Red Siskin.

All just my opinions - there are a lot of ways to travel depending on desire, and as long as you treat everyone along the way fairly, pay fair prices for things, and respect rules and norms, they're all valid

 

[kb57]

Best of luck, hardest hurdle will be to rent a 4x4 since without one, it is nearly impossible to go through half of the country and some back roads due to the potholes and dents made on the dirt road.

Also there's talks of a Brazilian/Chinese company building a road system which can potentially ruin a lot of the roadside birding once it is put up/being constructed.

Intrigued why a country with poor roads wouldn't rent a 4x4, when other cars would likely come back trashed...I did a quick google and it seems possible to rent a Nissan X-Trail (Progressive Rental), or from Europcar either a Subaru XV or VW Amarok.
OK some might say an X-Trail isn't that hardcore, and the Scooby a bit low to the ground for big potholes, but the Amarok should cope with most conditions, surely? The issue with lodges getting booked up years in advance could be more of a problem, if there are no alternatives in remote areas.

 

[pbjosh]

Intrigued why a country with poor roads wouldn't rent a 4x4, when other cars would likely come back trashed...I did a quick google and it seems possible to rent a Nissan X-Trail (Progressive Rental), or from Europcar either a Subaru XV or VW Amarok.
OK some might say an X-Trail isn't that hardcore, and the Scooby a bit low to the ground for big potholes, but the Amarok should cope with most conditions, surely? The issue with lodges getting booked up years in advance could be more of a problem, if there are no alternatives in remote areas.

And I kind of doubt that lodges are booked out years in advance with zero availability, 365 days a year... if they are, they should raise their prices frankly.

 

[lgonz1008]

And I kind of doubt that lodges are booked out years in advance with zero availability, 365 days a year... if they are, they should raise their prices frankly.

Intrigued why a country with poor roads wouldn't rent a 4x4, when other cars would likely come back trashed...I did a quick google and it seems possible to rent a Nissan X-Trail (Progressive Rental), or from Europcar either a Subaru XV or VW Amarok.
OK some might say an X-Trail isn't that hardcore, and the Scooby a bit low to the ground for big potholes, but the Amarok should cope with most conditions, surely? The issue with lodges getting booked up years in advance could be more of a problem, if there are no alternatives in remote areas.

The issue with the car rentals is (at least based on what the guide told me), that they put limitations so driving on dirt roads is not allowed/highly discouraged by placing high insurance fees and off road fees.

As for the lodges, from what I could see on the ground and the website of many international birding companies. What happens is that they book the lodges during the high/dry season of October to March, even if they don't get as many participants or the trips don't go through. On the flipside, during the wet season, visiting these lodges is limiting at best with many regions flooded making the birding/wildlife viewing impossible for some of the harder/big targets like the Ground-Cuckoo, the Trumpeters, the Doradito and even the Giant Anteater.

For example, we were originally meant to stay in Surama but they were booked so we went for Rock View Lodge instead. This wasn't a big deal for us, we just had to get up a bit earlier to get to Surama, but when we got there, we were told that the guests cancelled the month before due to Covid and they were mostly empty because of it.

The options are limited for lodging and because of Covid these lodges now take on the risk of simply being unable to predict if the bookings they got will stay there. But it also seemed like Atta and Surama had less rooms for stay as opposed to Iwokrama, Rock View and Caiman House.

 

[pbjosh]

The issue with the car rentals is (at least based on what the guide told me), that they put limitations so driving on dirt roads is not allowed/highly discouraged by placing high insurance fees and off road fees.

I can't speak particularly to Guyana but many car rental contracts the world over have fine print about dirt roads. It's never stopped me or anyone I know, and as long as you return the car in one piece it's never a problem. Sometimes you get charged a nominal cleaning fee but that's all I've run into.

 

[opisska]

Just be careful with thia approach in Australia, I have seen reports of people that they track the cars by satellite and if you go somewhere outside of the contract, you get heavy fines. So yes, it's possible almost everywhere, but not entirely. I have personally driven a Corsa to over 5000 meters a.s.l. on Argentina offroad through a barely visible track in a desert and it turned out fine

As for Guyana, one has to wonder - what would someone be renting an Amarok for if not for bad roads? There must be a bit more to it than meets the eye, especially if the information comes from a guide, who may not be entirely impartial ...