Conveyance

Some exceptions to my strategy for upcoming entries may crop up, but my next posts will focus on a single species.  If there is a story to accompany the photos, I'll weave it in. 

I include the two photos below to bridge the narrative part of this blog entry and because there is no where else to put them.

Above and below:  What the heck is this?

When taking the photo above I committed an unintentional, but significant, faux pax on a birding trip.  This is, I accidentally bumped into the 'photographer' on the trip just as he was lined up for his shot. Yikes, the look!  It certainly did not win me a new friend.  

They look like black and white photos.  I don't know why.  It was not a black and white bird.  The ground was not black and white.  I don't even recall that it was a gray morning. We saw this bird in Kuusamo-Lakkisaari in Northern Ostrobothnia.This is Rustic Bunting (Emberiza rustica) and my photos of it go to the heart of one of my assertions below.  I almost deleted them but decided against it because they are the only two I have and this is a hard bird to see in Finland.  We also saw the Little Bunting (Emberiza pusilla), another difficult bunting to see in Finland, but I didn't get photos of it.  Aside from the already discussed Ortolan Bunting, the other buntings we saw, (Common) Reed Bunting (Emberiza schoeniclus), Lapland Bunting (Calcarius lapponicus), our Lapland Longspur, and Snow Bunting (Plectrophenax nivalis) also went without photos, the latter two because I was on the wrong side of the van.  Read on. 

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The following narrative is about our travel.  For this trip there was a lot of travel in [technically] two 9 passenger vehicles.  It was primarily a listing trip. There were plenty of photo opportunities, but many were often not conducive to good or careful photos. (If anyone reads my blog with any regularity, by now I must be famous for my poor photos - examples above and elsewhere.  Nevertheless, I am always trying to improve).  It was not a photography trip, so that part was okay for me.  

If I have a single complaint about the trip, it would be the cramped vehicles in which we spent so much time.  The cumbersome loading and unloading often tested my patience.  A couple of trip participants had significant mobility issues.  I always seemed to end up behind them.  Traveling in over-crowded vehicles does not lend itself to good trip stories, only to trip complaints and, worse, conflict.  When it's obvious that the trip is good, who wants to be the person in the back seat complaining?  Unfortunately, on two occasions, I had to complain.  I'm glad I did.  It was the right thing to do.  But it's still unpleasant. After the first few days we all became, more or less, accommodated to our method of conveyance, but my ears were attuned to the occasional complaint that was mumbled or whispered.  These mumblings were not meant for me to hear but they confirmed my insights. Considering the vehicles that were used, by my calculation the trip was oversold by three persons.  About halfway through one trip participant left the trip for personal reasons.  After her departure, in one seat, in one vehicle, it was easy to experience how it would have been had there only been ten people on the trip instead of thirteen.  There were also a couple of other negative externalities, i.e unavoidable situations that affected everyone, the specifics of which are not necessary here, but which complicated the situation.  

My blog is obscure to say the least.  I get quite a few monthly visitors, but this is secondary to having - as I celebrated earlier - now over 600 posts.  No one on the trip, or elsewhere for that matter, knows that I keep this blog.  For this reason, other than naming the tour company and the guides, I do not include the names of the other participants.  I think of blogs as I think of podcasts.  They are a dime a dozen.  As nearly as I can tell the topics of politics, cooking, gardening and nature and birding, with photography being the focus, are the main topics.  A blog with so much writing, such as mine is, is not tops on anyone's list.  On the one in a million chance that someone connected to this trip would find my blog, I think they would read the truth in what I have written.  

I keep this blog as a fun hobby.  Why is it important to write about travel discomfort?  I write about it for my own memory, but also to inform others - should they bother to read any of this.  Next time you are considering a booking, ask questions about things that are important to you.  It may not involve travel comfort at all, but might be something else you care about.

Finally, I will add that if I have counted correctly, this was my 16th international birding trip.  To this I will add that on this trip I was, by far, the least well-traveled of anyone.  I had gone into the trip thinking I was well-prepared, but it was as if I had only made it halfway around the block.  I have spent some time thinking about this. There are things to consider on every trip and things to forgive on every trip.  Bottom line, this was a great trip with great guides, great birds, great scenery, great hotels, great food (all these greats are not exaggerated) with the side effect of uncomfortable travel.  Would I go on this trip again? Unequivocally, yes.  But I now have more information to inform myself better for planning my next trip.      

The other reason I share this information is one of my other hobbies.  I use this blog to practice my narrative writing.  This entry will probably be edited over and over.