Lifer: a birder's road trip to the Drakensberg I

Posted by Ben De Boer on 21 April 2009

Wahoo, yes, yes, yes, I have seen a new bird! And a very cool bird to boot. A Drakensberg Rockjumper, and yes we did have to go to the top of the Drakensberg to see it, and yes, it was jumping around on some rocks. To find this very pretty and interesting bird I dragged my wife, sister and brother-in-law to the highest mountain pass in Southern Africa.

This spectacular place, the Moteng and Mahlasela pass in Lesotho (3250m), is one of the few places in Southern Africa where you can find Drakensberg Rockjumpers. They are high altitude specialists and are normally only found higher than 2000m above sea level. As with many birds, once you are in the right habitat they are not too difficult to find.

I had commandeered my week’s leave and set about looking for a place to have a holiday. What few people know is that when a birder plans a holiday, he starts by looking at his life list and seeing where the birds live that he has not yet seen. In my case it was either northern Zimbabwe – too far and problems with Bob; northern Namibia – way too far; northern Mozambique – not enough time, or the Drakensberg. So the Drakensberg it was, with four birds on my ‘hit list’. The Bearded Vulture, the Drakensberg Rockjumper, the Drakensberg Siskin and the African Rock Pipit.

My wife has become a birder by default and now enjoys birds as much as I do, although she does not have the same urgency as I have to see new species, she goes along with my strange excursions and shares my passion. My sister and brother-in-law were not quite as well aware of what they were in for, luckily for them (and me) Clarens is close to a couple of the places where I had a good chance of finding my target birds; Golden Gate National Park, Sterkfontien Dam vulture restaurant, and the Lesotho highlands.

Clarens offered the non-birders a place to shop, drink coffee or beer and view artwork; all a bit of a waste of time as far as birders are concerned, except the coffee if it is before sunrise and the beer if it is after dusk. But soon enough I had them hooked. While they were reading whodunits, I was studying road maps, bird books and playing strange calls on my PDA and soon enough they asked what I was up to. Once I explained the true purpose for us being in Clarens and specialness of the birds I was after, they were in!

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