Birding Oaxaca 2004 - Valles Centrale

01 Feb 04 Oaxaca City, Oaxaca, Mexico
We arrived from Los Angeles International Airport via Mexico City in the middle afternoon. We were met at the airport by former Alaska Bird Observatory intern and friend Ramiro and his wife, Ruth and baby boy, Joshua. They drove us to the very nice Hotel Victoria, where we will base.

We did some birding around the hotel grounds in the remaining daylight. The grounds and the birding were pretty good. A Cooper's Hawk greeted us at the hotel, and we found a Rufous-collared Robin and a White-throated Towhee in the shrubs. When the light grew dim, we birded from the hotel bar.

Birding from the bar, Hotel Victoria Oaxaca City, Oaxaca	There was some smoke in the air from farmers burning their fields in the surrounding countryside, but the city and the valley are very nice. There are high mountains to the north and south, the Sierra Madre Occidental and the Sierra Madre Sur, respectively. The city is large by our standards, estimated to be 800,000 or so.
Looking north to the Sierre Madre Occidental Oaxaca City, Oaxaca	After dark we went down to the Zocalo, the central square in the city, and tasted our first Oaxacan mole ("mo-lay"), the sauces that are important to Oaxacan cuisine. We didn't taste a mole we didn't like. Ram has one of his mist-netting stations on the ridge north of the city. We didn't have time to get there, but we will on our next visit.