There's Always a Sunnyside!

Well, we are back from Italy, I have been to Hospital and my shoulder isn't as bad as the Italian doctors made out. There are no broken bones "just" snapped ligaments which will heal given time. So back to work tomorrow.

Now for the Sunnyside.... As I was not able to ski on the last two days and my legs were intact I had arranged to go out and get the cable car up the mountain and meet Tina & Jo for lunch up the top. So I set out early with my mini bins and digital bridge camera for the 20 minute walk from the hotel up to the cable car. I had only been walking a few minutes when........

Yes after driving to Scotland to various 'guaranteed' Crossbill sites, visiting  Eymore Woods etc. Purely by accident there they were. For two days on the trot, this is a photo from the second time. I even took Tina and Jo later on, on the Saturday and they were still about, but not as close. So if I hadn't done my shoulder, I wouldn't have got the Crossbills. Having said that I think I would swap the pain for no Crossbills!!

So what else: I have identified the mystery bird from my previous post, a Nutcracker, lifer no 1 for the trip.

The swift we saw was an ordinary swift as it was all black, Alpine have a white belly, I can only think this was passing through the Alps on its way north for Spring as we never saw any more swifts. The martins were House Martins as we saw these daily and got good sightings.

On the way home on Sunday, Tina spotted a crow with a yellow beak, so that must be an Alpine Chough. So lifer No 2.
Down in the Aosta Valley on the way to Turin Airport a Great White Egret was spotted in a field near the river.

Now its get my shoulder healed and sorted so we can spend some time in Somerset next month.