CHILE DAY 9: To the Andes

On our ninth day we had booked a trip to an area in the Andes near Santiago. We left for our first stop, El Yeso Valley, at about 7 am. We arrived at 9, with a stop at some abandoned military buildings to see grey-hooded sierra finches. When we got to the reservoir itself, it was beautiful and I saw a single bar-winged cinclodes flying around on the reservoir edge.

This is the view from the road that runs along El Yeso Reservoir

The grey-hooded sierra finch is difficult to tell apart from its Patagonian cousin

We then headed back along the road, stopping to see a flock of white-browed ground-tyrants, a single endemic moustached turca, a Chilean mockingbird (another endemic), a common diuca-finch, an American kestrel on a wire and two long-tailed meadowlarks.

The beautiful long-tailed meadowlark is known as the 'loyca' in Spanish

American kestrels are known for their ability to hover in the air while looking for targets

The Chilean mockingbird is, as its name suggests, found only in Chile

White-browed ground-tyrants are known for surviving at extremely high altitudes

After driving to a waterfall near a snow-covered dormant volcano, we kept driving towards it, until we got near a mining settlement, in a marsh where some southern lapwings were feeding. We had lunch there, by heating chicken skewers over a fire. The wind made this hard, so we ate only a little and had some empanadas (delicious Chilean pastries) for afternoon tea.