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Message: <blockquote data-quote="ovenbird43" data-source="post: 3519884" data-attributes="member: 64478">Jan 9 continuedWhen I returned to Rio Lagartos, I tracked down Tom in a small hole-in-the-wall restaurant and shared a delightful brunch of handmade empanadas.  We then walked down to the waterfront "tourist information" shack and booked a boat trip. As I already discussed in my first posting, for good birding it would be much better to go with Diego of Rio Lagartos Adventures, but we still saw some good birds including a handful not seen elsewhere, such as Common Black-Hawk, Reddish Egret, and a single Long-billed Curlew near the salt ponds. We had some nice looks at American Flamingos, though we ended up flushing a bunch which I was not too happy about - although I'll give the guide the benefit of the doubt, it was a very windy day and he seemed to be having trouble with the wind pushing the boat toward the birds as we watched.After we returned, we grabbed lunch at Restaurant Chiquila, which had a few hummingbird feeders that attracted a territorial Cinnamon Hummingbird and a few Mexican Sheartails, including a beautiful male. We then headed out to the Salinas, the salt extraction ponds to the east of Las Coloradas. The first 5 km or so were mostly devoid of birds, and we found that the levees described in the Howell guide were blocked off; but the further we went, the more we began to see. Here was the only place that I used my scope, a thoughtful anniversary/birthday/X-mas gift from Tom, and it was essential for identifying many of the shorebirds and gulls. Scattered throughout were thousands of American Flamingos, with smatterings of mixed shorebird groups including Short-billed Dowitcher, Stilt Sandpiper, Dunlin, Least, Western and Semipalmated Sandpipers, and a few Sanderlings. Two spots had a couple gulls loafing among the Brown Pelicans and Double-crested Cormorants, all in all 5 Herring Gulls, 2 Lesser Black-backed Gulls, and 1 Kelp Gull. There were also 2 pairs of American Oystercatchers, a few largish flocks of Semipalmated Sandpipers, 1 group of about 40 Wilson's Plovers (never seen an actual flock of them before!), and a handful of Snowy Plovers and Black-bellied Plovers. On the drive back we spotted the only Lesser Yellow-headed Vulture of the trip.Jan 10We left Rio Lagartos in mid-morning, headed for Cancun and our flight home.  The birding was not quite over yet - we spotted a couple White-tailed Hawks along the road south of Rio Lagartos, and when we stopped at a rest stop along the cuota highway between Valladolid and Cancun, I found a fruiting tree hopping with birds. It included two new additions for the trip, Yellow-bellied Elaenia and Yellow-winged Tanager, as well as others such as Black and Gray Catbirds, Altamira Oriole, Clay-colored Thrush, and Summer Tanager.The flight home went smoothly, all the way until our plane started descending into Syracuse - then the pilot came on and announced "Bad news" (yikes! minor panic at those words), "we're not landing in Syracuse... our de-icer isn't working so we're diverting to Pittsburgh".  Well, bummer.  But they eventually put us on another plane, after waiting to see if others were making the landings into Syracuse (also not comforting information - conditions were gusty cross winds with freezing rain).  It turned out to be one of the most turbulent landings of all the flights I've ever taken, but we made it home.I'll follow up with an annotated, complete checklist for the trip.</blockquote>

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