A Road Trip to The Honey River (Rio Miel) and Magdalena Valley, Colombia. Parrots, Hawks and Monkeys.

For the Semana Santa week, I decided to take a road trip to the Rio Miel via Honda with my family. My first port of call was the Waka rural Hotel on the outskirts of Honda. This location gave access to some good walks along the sandstone cliffs that line the valley and a walk to the top of them to give views across the town. This provided me with some nice bird watching opportunities and I was able to get photos of various parrots and hawks. Yellow crowned amazon parrots were particularly common as well as large flocks of orange chinned parakeets.

Amazona ochrocephala (Yellow-crowned Amazon Parrot) Honda Colombia

Brotogeris jugularis (Orange Chinned Parrot) Honda Colombia

I also photographed this lovely blue headed parrot in the grounds of the hotel.

Pionus menstruus (blue-headed pionus ) Honda Colombia

Pionus menstruus (blue-headed parrot ) Honda Colombia

There were a number of hawk species in the countryside around the hotel including this pair of roadside hawks.

Rupornis magnirostris (Roadside Hawk) Honda Colombia

Rupornis magnirostris (Roadside Hawk) Honda Colombia

This crane hawk was in the cliffs near the hotel.

Geranospiza caerulescens (Crane Hawk) Honda Colombia

After a couple of days in Honda I drove to La Cachaza ecolodge on the Rio Miel where we stayed for three nights. On arrival our first wildlife encounter was with this lovely large golden tegu lizard.

Tupinambis teguixin (Golden Tegu) Rio Miel Colombia

The trees and bamboos along the river downstream from the lodge were home to red howler monkeys.

Alouatta seniculus (Colombian Red Howler Monkey) Rio Miel Colombia

Alouatta seniculus  Rio Miel Colombia

Alouatta seniculus  Rio Miel Colombia

This black and yellow poison frog was on the bamboo near our room.

Dendrobates truncatus (yellow-striped poison frog) Rio La Miel Colombia

Amazon parrots were common in the grounds and along the river as well as herons and a few hawk species.

Amazona ochrocephala (Yellow-crowned Amazon Parrot) Rio La Miel Colombia

Each day we explored the river by boat and floated back to the lodge on inflated rubber tubes. The canyon of the Rio Miel is particularly beautiful with waterfalls running down the canyon walls into the main river.

Canyon waterfalls

Canyon waterfalls

Sunset on the Rio Miel

Sunset on the Rio Miel

On one of the days we walked through a forest stream to a beautiful waterfall where we were able to swim in the large pool formed at its base, whilst morpho butterflies flew past.

Giant tree with buttress roots by the Rio Miel

After La Cachaza we drove back to Honda for a night at the Magdalena Colonial Hotel before driving back to Bogota on Good Friday. On route we stopped in San Francisco de Cundinamarca to visit the Hummingbird Garden. This was our second visit to this site and we were able to watch and photograph many colourful species of hummingbird.

Florisuga mellivora (The white-necked jacobin) San Francisco Colombia