The morning arrived and it was very cool demanding long sleeved shirt, jumper and body warmer to keep warm. Breakfast was a buffet of fresh fruits, cereals, cakes, meat, cheese and toast. Plenty for all tastes - there was even a toasted sandwich maker if you wanted hot fillings!
After breakfast we set off at 6am even though the park didn't open until 8am as there were some good birding stops, which didn't disappoint, enroute. First stop we saw saffron finch, water tyrant, crested orependular, - calling and tipping its head forward and tail in the air and a group of yellow crowned parakeets chattering and preening - sadly the sun wasn't up enough to get a really good picture. (For all birds see later list) As we got to the park gates 1300 metres up it was just 8 am so we could pay and go in. Canastra means box and the plateau from a distance looks like a box; the national park is the enormous area on top of and around the plateau....this contains the cerrado habitat which is what we are going to explore.
Before we went in however Fred got a black chested buzzard eagle on its nest in his scope - it was far away on the rock face - and he also spotted a juvenile bicoloured hawk in a tree beyond the entrance - a bird rarely if ever seen in these parts - I got a long distance photo but sadly it flew before we could get closer. We had a really good morning birding and saw most of the species Fred said we would including on our way to the lunch spot 3 great rhea and the campo mina, a bird that only appears on recently burnt ground and then seemingly disappears. On the mammal front we saw pampas deer but no anteaters or maned wolf albeit we did find some fresh wolf poo.
The grassland on top of the plateau stretches for miles and is dotted with termite mounds and craggy outcrops and the odd trees and bushes. It also has a little oasis of vegetation which marks the source of the Sao Francisco river - one of the most important rivers in Brazil and the longest if you exclude the Amazon and it's tributaries. The spot is marked with a statute of St Francis of Assisi - patron saint of wildlife. Fred and I crossed a wet area ( John who is allergic to getting wet waited and watched the mocking birds) and went into the undergrowth in search of the tapaculo - a rare small ground living bird with a big call- it came so close I couldn't photograph it - because it is so small and light you don't hear it coming then you look down and there it is.
The lunch spot was a quiet pool - until a bus load of Brazilian children on a biology and geography field trip turned up- above the first falls (190m) on the Sao Francisco which we get to see tomorrow.
The afternoons mission was to find a pesky anteater and any more birds we might have missed in the morning.
We were all giving up - well - John and I were Fred never gives up - then at about 4.30 as we were scanning the landscape from a hill top Fred said he could see a giant anteater- he checked in his scope and after some anxious moments when he lost it and he thought he may have seen another anteater like rock - we saw it definitely moving through the thick grass - you could just see its back moving. We made a plan to walk towards it and get closer staying downwind so it didn't smell us - the poor eyesight means you can get close without disturbing it. As we set off it became clear that the ground underfoot was not as easy as it looked- the grass was thick and covered rocks and holes and the dip between us and the anteater was a marshy area which required careful traversing. John decided to stay and sit on the slope while Fred and I crossed the marshy area and made our way towards the anteater who was snuffling slowly towards us -this allowed me good opportunities to photograph and film it. As it got closer it was blowing its nose as if a termite or some soil had got lodged in it - it even scratched its nose with its massive claws in an endeavour to remove whatever was tickling it. We tried our best to move out of its way as it fast approached but it kept changing tack following its food trail - finally it froze lifted its head and smelt us - immediately it turned around and scuttled off in the opposite direction - it moved quite fast considering it has really no predators - with those claws a puma would have to be pretty hungry to go for one; apparently they don't taste too good either. After the extraordinary encounter we made our way back across the challenging terrain, smiling as we went, to the car.
Next stop, as the sun went down was the source of the Sao Francisco river - this time looking for scissor winged nightjars but to no avail. Enroute back we saw a couple of paraque - sadly any other nightjars would have left the road due to a car travelling in front of us. When we arrived back in the town it was just after 7pm and we decided to go straight for dinner in the same restaurant as last night so then when we got back to the hotel we could shower, get everything ready for tomorrow and have another early night to prepare ourselves for another long day and 5.30 start tomorrow.