Peregrine Falcon #42

Today we were in North Wales for a full day's birding with Alan Davies from the Biggest Twitch. We started at the Great Orme and were immediately greeted with a pair of Peregrine Falcons hunting, two Choughs coming in and out of their nest hole and a black guillemot on the sea - 3 birds we'd not seen this year. These were quickly followed by a Raven, Rock pipit and Shag - 3 more new birds, and it wasn't even 9am! 

We moved on to some woodland near Betws -y-coed and had a lovely view of a pied flycatcher being chased through the trees - gorgeous little bird.  On towards Llyn Brenig and we had great views of the skyline in all directions and found loads of buzzards, 2 cuckoo(distant), a huge flock of crossbills, tree pipit and the star attraction a goshawk! Never have I seen one before so this was a real treat, even if it was quite distant. 
What a fabulous morning. 
We went on to Llyn Brenig for a nice lunch and then onto the osprey viewing platform. Although, like most osprey platforms, they were quite far away, we could clearly see both the male on a tree stump and the female sat on the nest. Unfortunately, the male was in a very lazy mood and just sat there for ages so we moved on. I'm not quite sure where we went next - somewhere quite high up with lots of moorland around, where we saw 3 whinchats - not a bird I've seen before I don't think and then another amazing bird - a male Hen Harrier. They are quite rare birds and have been unfairly persecuted for years. They have the nickname "ghost of the moor" as they are so pale - our final amazing bird before our return back to Llandudno to pick up the car. 
I've put a few other shots in extras as there were so many fantastic birds to see - not all of them are blip-worthy, but I wanted them in my journal.

Sorry about the lack of commenting lately, I've just been too busy with home stuff and executor duties, but at least things are starting to come together. I will try and catch up over the weekend.