Northern Ecuador, The Maycu Region

We did a mission in Loja, Ecuador and for the few days following the mission, we were on a budget and a time crunch, so we decided to forego the obvious choice; the Galopagos Islands. I was also too naïve to consider the other obvious choice of going to one of the grand lodges outside of Quito. Instead, I tried for weeks to book a birding lodge closer to Loja, but nobody answered my emails or phone calls so in desperation I stumbled on the Yancuam Lodge which is on the Peru border. It is geographically fairly close to Loja, but in reality was several hours away on some of the sketchiest roads I have ever been on. The owner of the place assured us that there was a birding guide available, but that was not the case. At that time, I was pretty new to birding, so I did my best with a guidebook looking at pages of plates of birds trying to make definitive IDs. The region is home to several tanager species and it is the spot to go to see the Orange-throated Tanager which is endemic to that part of South America.