Goa (December 2023) - A whim-chat

This was a mini-twitch, if I can call it that. Right after I got back from Namdapha, we were headed for a family and friends holiday to Goa. While there was no birding on the anvil, the news that some local birders had found a rare vagrant there perked up the ears. The said bird in question was a Whinchat, seldom seen on the subcontinent. So the question, "I'm already there, it's just a couple of hours of birding, what say?" became that much harder to answer in the negative. And so here I was, a couple of hours after arriving in Goa, meeting up with local birder Fondu Rane at a spot near the new MOPA airport.

Fondu took me straight to the spot, a nondescript scrub-field with a few concrete poles serving as a fence. And on one of those sat a bird that looked, at first glance, very much like a Common Stonechat. A slightly closer look, prompted by Fondu, confirmed that it wasn't the above, and was indeed the rarity I had come for. What followed was a few minutes of observing the bird (remarkably like a Stonechat) and taking a few photos. The chap was quite relaxed in his adopted surroundings, allowing me to take photos and not even batting a metaphorical (avian) eyelid when a dog bounded past or two men sauntered across, chatting nineteen to the dozen.

Anyways, I spent not more than 15 minutes with this delightful little vagrant. Then, happy with my lot, I thanked Fondu (who had ridden more than 40kms to show me the bird) with all my heart and put birdwatching to rest for 2023. A year that began with an awesome trip to Kashmir in January, then saw birding drying up for most of the year, finally concluded on a high in the North East and then with this vagrant in Goa.

Next year will feature more birding, I said to myself as I headed back, having bid adieu to my newest friend, the Whinchat.