Played for and got

Another day, another attempt at seawatching from Fife Ness. I had not realised it at the time of planning all my autumn trips but it happened to be the Fife Bird Club's annual 'Big Day' at Fife Ness. Perfect. But what would the weather do? What indeed.

It turned out to be rather benign. As usual I might add. You just can't plan for these things, and even if I could I expect something would happen to prevent me seeing any sea birds. An impenentrable haar the most likely. Whatever. I didn't care, I was going to go anyway, even though it meant getting up at silly o'clock. The ancestral seat is in mid-Fife, and Fife Ness whilst not actually that far away, seems to take forever to get to so I don't go anywhere near as frequently as I would like.

I arrived at Fife Ness just after six in the morning. My luck was in and not only could I park down by the shore, there was also one seat left in the hide. Even luckier than that, the creme de la creme of Fife (and Stirling!) sea-watchers were in the hide. I took my place amongst this stellar crowd and started to get my eye in. Manx Shearwaters were passing frequently, almost all north, with the odd Sooty Shearwater. For a relatively frequently-encountered seabird it still blows my mind where these come from.

The first indication of quality came just pretty quickly, with Jared picking up a Balearic Shearwater slowly tracking north. Despite my best efforts to distract him he was still able to give directions and I managed to get on it at the first turbine. Pretty distant all things considered, and I hope to see a closer one at some point. Skuas were fairly numerous, keeping us all interested - you can't beat a good Skua.

We peaked just before 8am. A bird came in really from the south, really quite close. So close that it passed the hide before we really knew what was happening. Initially called as a Long-tailed Skua on colouration, that changed quite rapidly as the realisation of what was passsing began to take shape. Not for me of course, I was very much a passenger still. Jared corrected himself, still not really quite confident in the words he was blurting out.

Bridled Tern. 

Cue pandemonium. Screams of "is anyone still on it???!!". I was, it was heading north rapidly, I tried to give directions but probably just flapped uselessly. We exploded out of the hide as one, running north, shouting to the other assembled seawatchers as we did. Not sure if anyone outside the hide had been on the initial pick-up, but they ran too, around the pillbox to scan the bay to the north. And there it was, flying around in big circles, dipping occasionally to feed. Back to the hide to fetch scopes, it was still utter chaos with Ken trying to shout directions, put out Whatsapp messages ("BRIRDLEVN TERN FN HANGINFG ABOUT" will go down in history), and phone every birder in Fife simultaneously. Gradually common sense returned and a few of us returned to the hide to get the scopes and start watching the bird properly. Colin came out, features started to get discussed, all the while directions stil being given. Amazingly the bird continued to fly around just offshore, not as close as the initial sighting, but the scope views were excellent. As it drifted a little further out it caught a small fish and appeared to then drop onto the sea. I might have been the only one still on it at this stage as most people were distracted by phones, messages, the first tentative photos and identification features, but I was amazed to find that it had landed on a buoy. 

It was very distant, but soon most people's scopes were back on it and a nice line of optics awaited the first arrivals. Malc fetched a few from Crail who had been en route even before this monumental event had occured, and gradually the numbers swelled. I don't know how many eventually saw it but had you been in Fife and moved even moderately quickly you would have been able to get it. It changed buoys after a while but remained in the area for another three hours before heading away and north-east. A first for mainland Fife following a 2013 record on the Isle of May - the two seemed to be treated quite separately.

To say people were elated would be a huge understatement. Huge. Ken was beside himself, a 25 year wait for this moment. A master-communicator (see above!) his sole aim was getting the news out, "check the underwing" frequently instructed! The only confusion species is Sooty Tern - that's black and this was a greyish-brown. I've seen one before of course, recounted here back when this blog was moderately good, but this was in Fife and counts for so much more. Mostly it's notable for being my first ever decent seawatch here during years of trying to time my visits to coincide with something decent. In the days before I had arrived there had been twitchable Cory's Shearwater and Sabine's Gull in the Forth, and Great Shearwater past Fife Ness. This is completely normal and always happens a few days before I arrive. But this time I actually scored, and whilst it was a big Shearwater that I had really wanted, I'll take a mega Indo-pacific Tern.

People trickled back to the hide, the vigil resumed. It would be hard to top what had just happened, but this was a big day and we needed to stick at it. Manx and Sooty continued to pass, but there were long periods of nothing. Greenshank on the rocks, and a small group of Barwit passsed south. Dum-de-dum..... Puffins.......Gannets.......Common and Sandwich Terns. Should I leave? Oh, another Pomarine Skua north, one of three. Maybe I'll stay, after all it's nearly 4pm, not long to go....

"CORY'S!"

"Close in, coming north!"

A large browny-beige Shearwater hove into view at close range, gliding effortlessly on bowed wings past the hide in lovely light. A magnificent moment. As good as the Tern had been, this was what it was really all about. Played for and got. This was the one I had wanted, the one I had planned for I don't know how many times and always got my timing wrong. Other than birds seen from a boat off Madeira - see below - this was easily the best views of a Cory's Shearwater I'd ever had. Sublime, utterly magical. I have been on cloud nine ever since. 

Cory's off Madeira

What is average anyway?

Regular readers (Hi Alan, hi Seth!) will know that I love a list and a stat. A couple of the last entries here have contained a nice round stat, with a Fife patch and my garden both getting their 100th bird. A long time coming. This post also concerns 100, albeit in a more regular way, and the keen-eyed (unsure if this is Seth or Alan) will notice that this is also my 100th post this year. 

Yes, somehow I have engineered things such that my patch-year list has gone over 100 at the precise moment that I tap out my 100th post, and shortly after Letham Pools and the gardens at Chateau L have also reached 100. Timing is everything.

About half of the time I would reach 100 before August, one year I even managed it in April. As you would expect I keep stats on this kind of thing. Love a list, love a stat. So one of my recreational spreadsheets shows that since I started tracking this stuff my patch average by the end of July is only 99. Only once at that end of August does that average rise to 103, and in fact such is the joy of numbers that if I reach 103 in the next week or so then the average will increase to 104. If I reach my average I remain below average? A bit unfair.

Anyhow, the 100th bird this year was a Spotted Flycatcher in one of the burnt bits on Wanstead Flats. It was followed almost immediately by a Common Redstart in the same place. Whilst it's sad that the patch looks like the interior of a BBQ it does seem to draw in the birds, all of which seem to shine out in constrast to their charcoal background.

There are more birds to come. It is Tree Pipit season for starters, and I would expect Pied Flycatcher too. I need to get my skates on if I'm to see a Common Tern though, it may already be too late - they tend to visit the Park sporadically on feeding trips and the need for those may be diminishing or finished. Other targets include Sedge Warbler which I missed in the spring, and I suppose that one mustn't completely discount Wryneck or Short-eared Owl, both of which have appeared towards the end of August in years gone by. And then of course there is all the winter stuff which I missed earlier in the year due to motivational struggles. Fieldfare...

Here's one I prepared earlier

Game changer

It was my birthday a few months ago and my extended family bought me a Coravin. For the uninitiated this is a device where you can extract a small amount of wine from a bottle without pulling the cork and without impacting the continued aging of the bottle. A thin but very robust needle is inserted through the cork, and inert argon gas is inserted whilst wine is extracted. This means that oxygen never comes in contact with the wine, and thus in theory it continues to age as if it had never been touched. This means that you can taste individual wines by the glass rather than committing to opening an entire bottle. In a house where I'm for the most part the only red drinker this could be supremely useful. Possibly this is why the family bought it for me, so that I drink a glass rather than a bottle. I'm touched.

It took me several months to pluck up the courage to use it. Nearly six in fact. The sacrificial bottle was a 2013 Cavallotto. The cartridges of argon gas are not cheap - think ink cartridges for printers in terms of the equation here - so you need to think reasonably carefully about what you use it on and not waste it on something cheap. It's also not entirely foolproof, there are a reasonable number of stories about wine aging prematurely despite the argon, so it's probably not one to use on that special bottle of Richebourg either. Cavallotto's Bricco Bochis is neither of these things and as I have a couple it seemed like a good candidate. Of course it was totally delicious, this is a producer with whom you cannot really go wrong - incredibly fragrant and tasty. The real test will be the second glass that I extract, will the wine be as if I'd just pulled the cork, or will it show some signs of having been opened? Once you've taken a glass and extracted the needle the cork should then reseal itself. Anyway, it's back in the cellar and so far there does not seem to be any seepage, so let's see how it goes. Could be a game changer.

Twenty years

I've lived in Chateau L for over 20 years. A mere blip in the history of such an esteemed residence of course, and who knows what came before, but in this, my 21st year, an important milestone - perhaps the only possible milestone - has finally been reached. 100 birds.

The full garden list is here, and of course normal rules apply. That is to say that this is birds seen or heard from my garden, rather than birds in my garden. Otherwise the list would be about fifteen. It's an important distinction - if I can see it or hear it from within these four walls turrets then on it goes. So mostly it is flyovers, and some birds have flown past just once in those twenty years, or at least just once when I've been here to see it happen. Then again is Osprey a daily occurence? Likely not.

Gratifyingly the 100th bird was one of my top predictions, a Great White Egret. A southern European species that has been steadfastly moving north, it was only a matter of time in my view. It took 14 years to see one at all, but since 2018 I've now seen nine here. Most of them have been seen whilst I've been out birding on Wanstead Flats, elation as still a rare bird by any standard, but often tinged with disappointment knowing that had I been at home the bird would have easily been visible from the battlements.

Finally, this weekend just gone, the inevitable happened. I was at home, or rather back home, having already returned from a pretty mediocre visit to Wanstead Flats. Minding my own business in the kitchen I noted my phone beeping. It was the local birding WhatsApp group, the ever-alert Tony informing us that a GWE was flying west from Alexandra Lake towards Coronation Copse. West is key, it means the bird is coming towards Chateau L. East and it is already too late. 

I grabbed my bins, still on the side from my recent outing, and charged up the stairs like a man half my age. Gazelle-like, possessed, three at a time. How long had it taken him to type the message, should I look out the back or the front? Would it carry on west, would it veer north? Crucial decisions that I've got wrong before, Oystercatcher remains to this day 'heard only'. I threw open the french doors to the balcony. No, it felt wrong. Back to the front, to the tried and tested method that has in the past netted Osprey and Raven, standing on the toilet with my upper body fully out of the velux and thus able to scan 180 degrees unimpeded.

Boom! Perhaps 30 seconds later it actually flew down the street, or at least over the gardens of the houses opposite. Lazy but deliberate, floppy yet controlled. I drank it in as it disappeared north-west towards Walthamstow. It felt like forever but was probably through and gone in a just a few seconds. No time for the camera but that is always a secondary consideration. That  one view is all you need for a garden tick that will remain for time immemorial. Here's what it looked like (though the bill was black on this one), one of my photos from somewhere else entirely. Clearly it would have been wonderful to have had it with local rooftops in the frame, but I'm not fussy, it was still a 'moment'.

Annual

Well it is that time of year again. Grass fire time. Wanstead Flats is being repeatedly set on fire by either idiots or full-on arsonists. In July the bit to the east of Alex went up again, it had just about recovered from the last fire. We lost about ten acres on Monday in the SSSI, and at some point in the the last few days an area near Angel Pond has disappeared as well as a new part of the SSSI.

Motorcycle Wood

It's annual now. Each year by late July the patch is tinder dry, fires just waiting to happen. This was a major fire. I was coming home on the bus on Monday and could see fire engines and blue lights everywhere, towers of smoke and flame. As you can see above Motorcycle wood has been saved by the monumental efforts of around 70 firefighters, but it has been burned on all four sides. 

Walking around the area a few days later, I came across this:

Is it any wonder? When will these things be banned - they're for sale in shops about two minutes walk from Wanstead Flats, prominently displayed outside on the pavement as you walk towards Forest Gate. This falls into the idiot category of course, but I do wonder if these fires are more sinister. They seem to be so close together, only a day or so apart. The cynic in me thinks about someone looking on in delight as all this goes on, and when that high has diminished creeps out and starts another one. Who knows? As far as I know none of these fires have ever been traced to anyone, including the massive one a few years back that nearly caused my street to be evaculated in case it crossed the road. Those flames were several metres tall, I remember the whole area being in a cloud of smoke, it was like something out of Apocalypse Now.

Angel

This is our future. Annual fires destroying the habitat, more pressure on breeding sites and feeding areas. And it seems only a matter of time before one of these coincides with a hot and very windy day and it becomes more than a grass fire. Let us cross our fingers that never happens. Anyway, that's the news from the patch as autumn begins.

Letham and around

 

Letham north pool

So whilst the sea-watching didn't go especially well I managed to spend a bit of time pottering around my usual sites in mid-Fife. I wasn't able to add anything that other people would consider especially tasty at Letham, it's the right time of year but the water levels remain too high for most waders to pay it much attention. But I did walk down the water treatment compound access lane on the south side on the off-chance that there might be some birds on the sunny sheltered side. This is a dead end leading to the gates and I don't go down here frequently as it's a little awkward to get out again in the car, but I reckon I should as it was a hive of activity with loads of Blue Tit, Great Tit, Willow Warbler, Chiffchaff and Wren, and better still Song Thrush and Treecreeper, both of which were site ticks. I literally could not believe it when I raised my bins and saw the Thrush, it has been a target for ages but I assumed I would hear it from afar and perhaps get a scope view. It positively shone on the branch before flitting deeper and away. The Treecreeper (and it turned out there were two) I heard before I saw it, then the desperation of needing to see it kicked in. I could hear it constantly, and then all of a sudden it was in front of me. Wow! Pure magic - the power of a patch. Further down there was another. This meant that I was now tantalisingly close to the magic 100 mark. 

Before this week I had expected that any new birds would have had to have come from the sky - a passing Osprey or something like that, which would need time and luck - but that lane now seemed to hold the key. All it would take is a Blackcap I mused....

Letham south side, from the lane

The next morning I arrived at Letham just after 7am. This time I pulled straight into the lane. As I got out of the car I various small birds scattered. Was I imagining it but could I hear Blackcap tacking? I could! A family group of three in one of the hedges by the road! 100 species for Letham! Otherwise the lane held broadly the same species as the previous day, albeit no Treecreepers or Song Thrushes. I first went to Letham in 2020 and this was my 51st visit. There is a price though - I worked out that I've driven a minimum of 900 miles as part of those visits which is a little sobering. Then again I've driven 6,000 miles to and from Rainham over the years. The way I see it is that I've driven virtually zero miles whilst birding Wanstead, and if Wanstead Flats were the same distance from my house as Letham is from the ancestral pad I'd have driven 25,000 miles. It makes you think though, how many miles do UK birders collectively drive whilst birding 'locally'?

Elder bush marked on the left, the lane to the gates on the right.

Back on the road between the two pools I pointed my scope back at the water treatment plant and zoomed up. Amazingly one of the first birds I settled on was the/a Song Thrush sat on the edge of the main tank! Right, now here's a challenge! You can guess what I mean by that. It took a while but eventually I picked up a female Blackcap in an elder bush - about 300m distant! It is a moot point as the lane is clearly part of Letham as I see it, but it was still very satisfying to be able to see it from where I normally stand. My standard patch inclusion rules are "on or from", i.e. if I could definitively see a Red Grouse on the East Lomond from where I was stood it would be on my Letham list! Whilst on this detailed scan of the south side I also picked up four Grey Wagtail on the rotating arm, four Magpie on the buildings, three Robin, a Blackbird, multiple Chiffchaff and several bright yellow Willow Warbler. It didn't end there though, the 101st bird arrived very shortly as a Crossbill circled the site and then continued south. I'd heard Crossbill in late July down on the coast at Dalgety Bay, and also that very same morning at Angle Park. They are on the move and on reflection I suppose it wasn't a huge surprise to get one here too, even if wasn't on my immediate radar.

So, Angle Park then. This is rapidly becoming another regular site as it is under two miles from Letham as the Crossbill flies and so is easy to combine into one outing. This is where I found a GWE last year, the vanguard of what amounted to an invasion in Fife over the following weeks. It's next to a landfill and is carpeted with Gulls a lot of the time, but that aside it's pretty decent with a lot more exposed mud than Letham at the moment. This delivered a Ruff which was new for the site and I also added House Martin and Canada Goose. Green and Common Sandpipers were here too. I've given up on The Wilderness, the landowner has made it increasingly difficult and you can barely see the water any more. 

As good as Letham and Angle Park are, they're a few miles from the house and when I'm up here this is where I spend most time. So more than a few hours were spent simply skywatching from the garden. Swallows and House Martins were constant, and the odd group of Swift came through as well. On Saturday afternoon my patience and alertness were rewarded by a distant raptor. I was on the terrace having just finished a family lunch, and as binoculars weren't really appropriate in that setting I had to charge into the house to get them. It turned out be a juvenile Marsh Harrier, fortunately moving slowly enough that a 20 second delay didn't prove fatal, and was a great garden tick. A decent bird in Fife as well, but most of my satisfied glow on this visit came from Letham.

Fife seawatching

I spent a few days in Fife recently, the normal family stuff but at the same time I had hoped to be able to get some time in seawatching. It didn't quite turn out like that and I could only spend one weekend morning out at Fife Ness during which the conditions were some way from being classic. My plan had been to take a weekday off on a better (i.e. worse!) weather day but due to various factors I wasn't able to take the time off from work. Storm Floris thus completely passed me by which is a shame. That said those strong winds on Monday were not ideal for Fife Ness either and whilst there was some movement there wasn't anything spectacular brought in. The day before I arrived there was a twitchable Cory's Shearwater lingering in the Forth.....when booking my trips this year I had picked promising dates, but I went home Cory-less again. One day one of my visits will coincide with the perfect weather pattern and I will experience an unforgettable seawatch, but for now it remains yet another one that got away. One day I'll be free to do whatever I want... 

  

Even though I knew the weather wouldn't deliver anything I went anyway. For a land-locked birder like me the weather is sort of irrelevant - I don't normally get to look at the sea at all and so even on a dull day in Fife I can have fun. The hide out at Fife Ness has had some serious TLC recently and is looking tip top with many more years in it. I spent an hour there on Sunday morning and was able to pick up Manx Shearwater, lots of Kittiwakes, Arctic, Common and Sandwich Terns, Shags, Common Scoter. Gannets probably stole the show, hundreds upon hundreds heading north to fish or returning south to the Bass Rock. Almost all were adults, I just love watching lines of them rise and fall in complete coordination. On the rocks in front of the hide were Oystercatcher, Curlew, a single Whimbrel, Redshank and Turnstones. On Balcomie Beach Sanderling and Ringed Plover skittered around, and Eider and Goosander rested on the rocks. Most of these birds I have never seen in Wanstead, a couple I see once in a blue moon. I take none of them for granted when I am up here.

Coast and Castles - July 2025 - Trip List

So that was the trip. A lot of fun but also very hard work. Six counties in six days, and about 220 miles covered as follows.

Newcastle to Blyth - 21.5 miles

Blyth to Seahouses - 50.7 miles

Seahouses to Eyemouth - 40.7 miles

Eyemouth to Haddington - 35 miles

Haddington to Edinburgh - 30.5 miles

Edinburgh to Fife - 38.6 miles

I saw a lot of birds, a surprising number really, with a total of 103 species seen between Newcastle and Fife. East Lothian was the most productive, perhaps due to that dedicated session at Musselburgh, followed closely by Northumberland. Both counties are now close to 100 species - on my next drive up or down I will try and put that right. Here's the list in spreadsheet form, and if you wanted to see it in eBird it can be found here. Here also is Mrs L's non-organisational contribution to the trip.

Coast and Castles - July 2025 - Fife

Technically I suppose Mrs L and I are now beyond the Coast and Castles route, which starts in Newcastle and ends in Edinburgh. At this point, and in fact since Berwick, we have been travelling along CR76. The Forth Road Bridge is a cheeky but iconic short cut; the route in fact goes all the way across to Stirling and then back down the other side to Rosyth. I had been  greatly looking forward to this moment. Partly for the views, partly to say I'd done it (all my children have done it), and partly because I was sure I was going to be able to see loads of birds from up there. 

As a result it took me ages to cross and Mrs L left me behind. And other than a handful of Common Tern on some rocks near the North Queensferry side I saw no birds at all. We were in Fife! Now my Fife list is 208, and I was 100% sure that it would remain on 208 despite taking a slow route to the original Chateau L. So this was more about seeing if anything could be added to the trip list from a numbers perspective. We passed through Inverkeithing and bought some lunch, and then headed east for the first time down to the shore. I've never seen the bridges from this perspective. Along this track there was another Bullfinch, as as we went around the edge of Dalgety Bay some unseen Crossbills passed overhead - these were new for the trip and they are on the move at this time of year.

Dalgety Bay

We had lunch overlooking Pettycur Bay, high up on the bluff between the train tracks and the road. Not especially glamourous but the view is nice. I scanned the Terns and Waders on the sand before the tide came in but other than a couple of Barwits could not sift out anything particularly special. 

At Kinghorn our route turned inland for a while to cut out a corner. Kinghorn Loch was only a very short distance off the CR76 so we paused there for a cup of tea. The home stretch. I had been hoping for a Gadwall, or perhaps some Shoveler but it was not to be. A suspicious Pink-footed Goose was with some Greylag, but at least it didn't come in to the family chucking bread about. 

Back in the saddle we moved slowly north-east, the hill out of Kinghorn requiring getting off an pushing. There was then a lovely mild gradient downhill section to Kirkcaldly on Standing Stanes Road, and we hadn't gone far before a Wheatear flipped off the road and into the field. Our glide into Kirkcaldy complete, we pedalling slowly along the esplanade. The seafront at Kirkcaldy does not show Fife at it's best. The planners were asleep at the wheel and the 1960s and 70s seem to have been particularly unkind. I had a last scan of the sea and then it was up into Thornton.

So close. Birding was put to one side, I just wanted to get off the bike. The last few miles were thus pretty rapid and we arrived at the ancenstral pad at around half four. A case of pinot noir had arrived earlier that day (sent by me in a moment of desperation en route) and so we cracked a bottle open shortly afterwards. Done!

The visit was brief - we spent the whole week getting there and had to go home more or less immediately!

Coast and Castles - July 2025 - East Lothian and Edinburgh

I am not sure where exactly we crossed into East Lothian, but by the time we reached Torness that's where we were. Near where the cycle path begins there's a lake, Whitesands Quarry, and another prolongued stop added Great Crested Grebe and Pochard for the trip. This was where I first detected some frustration - checklist #49 if you were wondering - so she did pretty well. There was a Yellow Wagtail along here somewhere as well.

So, East Lothian. In contrast to the Borders I've actually been birding here a few timest. My first recorded visit was for a Hoopoe in 2010. I'd been staying in Fife and back in those days I thought nothing of driving a few hours for a bird, I was at my most rabid. It was near a burn at Dunglass. I then neglected the county for a decade before going birding at Musselburgh in 2020 when there was a White-winged Scoter present off the beach. In then in 2022 I went to Aberlady Bay and dipped something but I can't now remember what it was. Presumably a duck of some kind. These visits meant I started this trip on 68 species, but with none of them having been in the summer months I was missing lots of common things.

The Bass Rock looms large

We bought a picnic lunch (as well as food for the evening) from the Co-Op in Dunbar and took it to the seafront where we found a pleasant bench. This close to the Bass Rock Gannet passage was excellent, and my count of 750 is probably a massive underestimate. There was a sole Fulmar and also just one Sandwich Tern, but Kittiwakes were passing in good numbers. Things like Sand Martin, Swallow and Swift were all new.

Pied Wagtail

Seafield Lagoon

At this point we headed inland, cutting out the lump of North Berwick and Gullane. We cycled past Seafield Lagoon which necessitated another stop, and then encountered what I felt was possibly the most miserable part of the route so far, a three mile straight line slog alongside the A199 against a direct 20mph headwind. We turned south at East Linton and from there it was only a few miles to our stop for the night at Morham. This was a one room bothy in the middle of endless cabbage fields that Mrs L had stayed in before, and it was possibly my favourite night of them all despite having to sleep in a sleeping bag on a rock solid bunk. It just had some real charm about it. We enjoyed a basic but very tasty home-cooked meal, a jammy Co-Op syrah without any finesse whatsoever, and listened to an episode of A Prairie Home Companion which somehow seemed appropriate.

Bell's Bunkhouse Bothy. Sleeps 6.

The following morning we woke up to rain. Pah! Thanks Scotland. We packed up and got ready as slowly as we possibly could but ultimately were forced to leave in some light mizzle of the sort that gets you wet but not really wet. I did not break out the waterproof trousers. Despite the weather I continued birding, and by the time we reached Haddington it had brightened up sufficiently to get my bins out. We cycled along a small river into town, the hightlights being a pair of Grey Wagtail by the weir, and a calling Green Woodpecker closer to town.

The Great East Lothian Cabbage Belt

After a nice but bad for me breakfast in a local deli (where we also stocked up on another picnic lunch), we headed up towards the coast a Longniddry. This was along a disused railway line and was quite wonderful, with lots of Warblers, Blackbirds, Chaffinch, Yellowhammer, a Buzzard and best of all a male Bullfinch.

Oh look, there's someone up ahead waiting for me

The sea at Seton Sands was like a mirror. Rafts of Eider floated passively on it, there was barely a ripple. As ever the number of dogs being walked on the beach beggared belief and so waders were thin on the ground. I think I added a single Bar-tailed Godwit, and at Port Seton shore, my keen eyes picked out a Kingfisher which I insisted Mrs L, some way ahead of me again, to come back and look at. We would never get to Musselburgh she said.  

But we did, and at a perfect time for lunch. I wanted to go and explore the lagoons, so she settled down to more sock and I scooted off. I joined some birders on the sea wall looking for (and finding, with Velvets) the long-staying drake Surf Scoter, and then cycled up to the old lagoons. These were teeming with birds until two young ladies decided to try and inflate a dinghy on one. I mean really? Anyway, lots of Little Gull on the left hand pool, with Shelduck, Lapwing, Redshank and a few Dunlin, and then at least seven Common Sandpiper on one of the rear pools. There was supposed to a Wood Sandpiper knocking around as well, and I was a little disappointed when the intrepid rowers failed to put it up. Lots of Pied Wagtail on the short grass.

Surf Scoter in amongst Velvet Scoters

I rejoined Mrs L at the Esk and we carried on into Edinburgh, East Lothian finishing on a pleasing but oh-so-close 97. My Edinburgh list stood at just 26 and is basically just my sister's garden and the airport. A couple of random housing estates added Song Thrush and Long-tailed Tit, and then all of a sudden we were rounding Arthur's seat and after a long graffiti'd tunnel popped out quite near the Royal Mile. From having been in the middle of nowhere for large parts of trip to now be in a huge throng of people was a little discombobulating, but we took it in for a while before carrying on to my sister's house, the run of which we had to ourselves as the whole family was out. We did boring things like all of our washing, and then walked into town to Aizle, a posh restaurant I'd booked a few days earlier when the deep-fried fare had been getting me down. We had a five course tasting menu that was simply exquisite, with wines that matched the food well but were (in my spoiled brat universe) fairly unexciting. I failed to take any photos of the food as seems so de-rigeur these days, but it was as beautiful as it was delicious.

Edinburgh

Well rested and well fed we awoke the next morning for the final leg. Over the Forth Road Bridge and onwards into Fife. I am not sure of the exact route, but it was inland rather than along the coast, passing through Craigleith and Davidson's Mains to Dalmeny and finally to Queensferry. I'd been looking forward to this bit.

Never gets old

Coast and Castles - July 2025 - The Scottish Borders

It was a steep and very enjoyable descent down into Eyemouth. As I had quipped earlier to some friends I find that I cope with half of the hills really quite easily. The other half tend to be more challenging... There had been sections of the ascent to the border marker where I'd simply had to get off and push, itself quite hard going with a heavily loaded bike. Going down hills this extra weight on the bike, and other - ahem - extra weight, meant that I attained considerable speed, passing Mrs L and her lighter, er, panniers quite easily. She's a maths teacher and tried to explain gravitational potential energy to me but basically my bike is just faster.

If my Tyne and Wear list was pathetic you should see my Scottish Borders list. Four species. Four! Crow, Rook, Woodpigeon and LBB from some random list on the A68 near Jedburgh. I suspect I was just trying to colour in the map as I went through. The trip had been tweaked specifically to allow more time here, including a crack at St Abb's Head. So as soon as we reached the border at Mordington I was off and away, recording 22 species along about three miles of the CR76 down into Ayton.

Eyemouth

At Eyemouth we settled into our accomodation above the Ship Inn - recommended and they even have a bike store - and went for a walk along the beach and up onto the headland from where you could see St Abb's Head about four miles distant. Seabird traffic was light, but I still picked up Guillemot, Kittiwake and Gannet passing. By the end of the day the Scottish Borders was a lot healthier on 39. We had dinner outside at the Ship, watched attentively by a Herring Gull (#6). I had a shellfish bonanza, Mrs L a sweet potato curry - at last something approaching proper food.

St Abb's Head from Eyemouth

Herring Gull

I had been vacillitating about whether or not to visit St Abb's Head. It was late in the season, most birds would be gone, it was out of our way and most annoyingly it was a bloody great hill. Having come this far though we decided to do it. We cycled to the far end of Mire Loch and then I ditched the bike and walked the rest of the way up to the lighthouse, abandoning Mrs L to brake repairs, tea and the continued knitting of socks. She hates being on bird cliffs with me and would rather I fell off without her seeing. It was indeed quite quiet up there, with only a handful of Guillemot left on nests. The most abundant bird was Kittiwake, the colony seemed to be in full swing still, and there were plenty of Gannet. It took forever to find a Razorbill on the sea, and with only binoculars my tactic was to find a dot and then take a picture of it with my camera. I've invested in a very small yet very powerful zoom lens, the Sony E 70-350mm f4.5-6.3 G. On the APS-C body that I have this works out at 525mm in real terms, which given it's the size of a can of drink is really quite something. Once said dot is located, which itself is quite hard on a featureless sea, I can then zoom in on the photo and separate one auk from another. Perfect, if rather a faff. I couldn't find a Puffin, and it was lucky I'd seen a Fulmar fly past at Eyemouth on the way out as I couldn't find one of them either. HMS Queen Elizabeth was rather easier. My allotted hour passed all too quickly and I made my way back to the bikes.

Mire Loch held a few Tufted Duck, Mallard, Coot and Mute Swan, some Greylag flew over, and the woods at the start of the approach road had calling Nuthatch and Song Thrush. Meanwhile Meadow Pipit, Swallow and House Martin were everywhere, Stonechat were in the gorse, and a family of Peregrine zoomed around. 49 for the Borders, soon up to 50 with a Greenfinch at Coldingham.

Stonechat

Meadow Pipit

The Bass Rock dominates everything for miles around

I added Buzzard and Dunnock and Headchesters just before lunch, and then we had the mother of all descents into Pease Bay which is just south of Torness. Good thing Mrs L had sorted out my brakes otherwise I might now be writing this from the North Sea. We stopped for coffee, a Whitethroat and a Sedge Warbler here. The route then goes alongside the A1, past the power station, and then cuts across to track a bit closer to the sea whilst going through a quarry and cement plant, from where a proper cycle track starts. But of course this is now East Lothian.

Looking down towards Torness

Coast and Castles - July 2025 - Northumberland

Cambois

Blyth dawned grey and miserable, I can't say I was surprised. However better things lay in store, the forecast suggesting that by 9am it would be a lot nicer. We headed for breakfast in a happier mood. Breakfast is the one meal where I don't mind the use of oil and deep-frying, and so we settled down to a stupidly large and calorific feast to set ourselves up for the day. I birded out of the window whilst supping on coffee, the usual suspects for the most part but I was surprised by a small fleet of Goosander in the channel. My Northumberland list is streets ahead of Tyne and Wear mainly due to it being somewhere I've actually stopped at on the way to and from Fife. There was the Bridled Tern twitch on the Farnes in about 2013, and then the Grey-headed Lapwing near High Newton much more recently, but mainly it appears I just dropped in as I passed if there was something worth stopping for. So I've got a record of a Great Reed Warbler from East Chevington in 2021 for instance, and then Pacific Golden Plover at Boulmer and a White-winged Black Tern from Druridge Bay on the same day in 2020. Along with all the incidentals that meant I started the day on 65 yet Goosander and Magpie were both new.

It was going to be an exciting day, I was going to meet my blog reader. Many people as they age become more and more antisocial, less tolerant of everyone and everything. Maybe that is a gross generalisation but I feel there's some truth there. In my case the opposite seems to be happening, and as I age the more I gregarious I seem to be becoming. All relative of course, I am still a grumpy old so-and-so. Lockdown was the catalyst. After spending so long in different periods of relative isolation, when it was finally over I threw caution to the wind and made a real effort to leave my four walls, meet new people and cultivate new friendships. Generally this was through shared passions, chiefly wine. These other people felt the same way and so versus a few years ago I now have a fairly wide network of friends and aquaintances in London and beyond, extending to a lot of the south-east and even as far as Edinburgh. The same is true of birding in Fife - despite having visited there for years it is only in recent times that I've made a deliberate effort to speak to other birders up there, and have joined the Fife Bird Club and their various WhatsApp groups. I cannot really explain it other than by that period of enforced nuclear family solitude.

So before I left London I used Social Media (gah!) to get in touch with Alan who I knew lived somewhere along our route. Alan is a fellow birder, and is one of those people who I felt that I really should have met many years ago, yet at the same time I felt as if I already had. It's curious. Anyway, would he like to meet for morning coffee in his neck of the woods as we passed? He could have ignored my message but good soul that he is he did not! I think he felt much the same as I did. A time and date were set, and it was later this morning.

The Blyth Estuary

The weather did indeed start to clear up, and as we cycled along the Blyth Estuary and out towards Cambois the joy in what we were doing really began to set in. Fresh air, it was warm, there was a modicum of sun, there were no people (go figure!) and the views were fantastic. Remember for a moment what I spend most of my life gazing out at: concrete. The first Swallows appeared at Cambois as we cycled between the village and the sea, chattering overhead. As the journey went on, along with House Martin, Linnet and Goldfinch, their calls became our constant companions. 

We met Alan and Suzanne at the Drift Café just outside Cresswell mid morning. It was great to finally put a face to the name. We have known of each other for many years, brought together back in the days when blogging was actually popular and people actually read them, before micro-attention spans became the norm. His own, like so many, has fallen by the wayside, but like me he continues to follow those few that soldier on. He wondered how I managed to continue to write, a topic I've covered here before, the answer being that it is as much for myself as for anyone else. Perhaps chiefly for my own benefit in fact, which is probably a good thing when you look at the stats. Mrs L joked that I should start all future posts with "Dear Alan", and I may yet do so. We had a good old natter about birding, birds, Fife, Northumberland, London, people, work, writing, travel, cycling, America, childen, and probably a few other things too. And of course it all felt completely natural - I'll try and keep in touch. Thanks for the tea!

We carried on north, past Chibburn Links, East Chevington and Low Hauxley before gliding into Amble for lunch. We shared fish and chips from the Harbour Fish Bar and very nice it was too. I would have ordered a large one but that was an extra seven minutes wait so I settled for medium. It was a like a battered Humpback Whale on an Ayer's Rock of chips, God only knows how big a large one would have been, and we couldn't finish it. Fish and chips is something that I very occasionally have a real hankering for, as was the case now, but once I get through about half of it I don't want to see or think about fish and chips again for several months. That's me done for 2025 I reckon. We ate it down by the RNLI station and looked at the harbour one way and Warkworth Castle the other. This is the life.

A quick stop to look for small Curlews

Amble

Carrying on we went past the castle. I saw some Shelduck and heard a Kingfisher on the River Coquet here. Eventually we reached Alnmouth and Boulmer, and at Longhoughton Steel (where the PGP had been) we stopped for some tea from our flasks and felt very middle aged. I had wanted to spend more time scanning the shore here but it wasn't long before the haar rolled in and we were in the mist. Onwards then, along an unpaved track to Howick Burn. It was about here that I questioned why we hadn't heard Yellowhammer yet, and right on cue two appeared and from then on their song never left us. A Rock Pipit was on the beach.

Billy has the Farnes all sewn up

Seahouses

Embleton followed by our final destination for the day, Seahouses. It was packed with day-trippers and holiday makers, lots of people coming off Farne Island boats. Hopefully they saw some Puffins this late in the season and got pecked on the head by Arctic Terns. We had done fully 50 miles today and I was feeling all of them, but at least we were dry. We sorted ourselves out at the B&B down the road, had a nice walk along the harbour, and then went for dinner. Pizza, another north-east classic.

Starlings at Seahouses

Geeb

A flight of Whimbrel

Inner Farne

The following morning we set off for Eyemouth. First up Bamburgh Castle, slightly west of which I was forced to stop for a singing Grasshopper Warbler. Constant stopping upon hearing or seeing something was a regular feature of this trip and resulted in over 80 individual eBird checklists being submitted. The only Mistle Thrush of the trip were near here and I stopped for those too. And for a Spotted Flyctacher near Kettleburn Farm... If this drove Mrs L to distraction for the most part she was very forgiving, stopping a short while later when she realised I was no longer behind her. Mind you this was only day two, and by day five I detected more of a frisson in the air, more angst, and an increased desire to move me along.

Bamburgh Castle

Goswick

Cocklawburn (I think)

Er, the North Sea

We crossed the A1 shortly after this and were faced with a killer hiller into Belford. I got off and pushed, everyone has a breaking point. We then tracked inland with wonderful views of The Farnes, Bamburgh and Lindisfarne. This is probably the section that gives rise to the "Coast and Castles" moniker, but for such a famous stretch parts of the route weren't much to write home about. At one stage we had to cycle through a field, albeit a good birdy field, and then the very final stretch into Berwick was rather lumpy. Lovely views but I really wanted a nice paved bit as I had to spend a lot of the time looking at what my front wheel was about to hit rather than taking in the wonderful scenery. I am probably wrong but I wondered if there was a "get orf my land" recalcitrant farmer along here somewhere. We had a late lunch in Berwick looking out over the estuary with views of Mute Swans and Goosanders, and after that climbed another seemingly endless hill from the A1 before we crossed into Scotland. Which is where this post ends. I would later discover that I had taken my Northumberland list from 65 to 96 simply by going on a long bike ride. Nice.

Berwick-upon-Tweed