We drove to the rainforest, stopping now and again for Newton to point out certain sights /birds to us. He had a magnificent spotter scope that enabled us to see birds that wouldn’t haven’t been possible with the naked eye. We were even able to take some brilliant photos through the scope.
Newton took us through the Gilpin trail and he pointed out that anyone can do this walk – but I can promise you – all we saw was a beautiful rainforest with the sound of birds all around us. Newton would stop in mid track and set up his scope – within seconds, he would say ‘take a look …..’ He showed us the most unbelievable sights – incredible birds that seemed within touching distance, but no, even looking outside the scope, we could still not see them, but Newton knew exactly where they were.
He is absolutely passionate about the birds of Tobago and his job. Even though he is in semi retirement – it’s obvious that this is not a job – it is his life. We spent time watching the mating rituals of mannequins (sp?). Newton was so excited, he almost spent more time looking though the scope at the ‘dance’ than we did. We found it amazing to watch and Newton was just as excited as we were.
We finished the trip with a visit to Adventure Farm, to see the humming birds, but unfortunately, the owners were not around so we said we would come back another day.
Newton has so much energy it is astounding, we got back to our hotel by about 1:30pm, had lunch and rested for the whole afternoon – he had worn us out.
It was a brilliant day and something that we had intended doing for the past few years. Newton is definitely ‘THE MAN’ when it comes to birding in Tobago. There were four of us on the tour and it was a good number - any more and we wouldn't have seen all that we did. It was great.
