Welcome to Panama! After arriving at Tocumen International Airport you will transfer to the beautiful Summit Rainforest Resort. After settling in at the hotel, you will meet your guide and enjoy some birding around the hotel grounds in the afternoon. Pleasing species such as Blue-gray, Palm, and Crimson-backed tanagers, Red-crowned Woodpecker, Bat Falcon, Collared Aracari, and other common Neotropical birds are often seen right on the grounds. Overnight at Summit Rainforest Resort.

A “Panamanian birding bucket list” spot, we will check in at the Ammo Dump Ponds to scan the open wetland for Rufescent TigerHeron, Wattled Jacana, Whitethroated Crake, Greater Ani, Yellow-tailed Oriole, and forest edge species too. The Pipeline Road is a track through the lowland rainforest of Soberania National Park and is home to hundreds of species, including Red-capped Manakin, Black Hawk-Eagle, Purple-throated Fruitcrow, Slatytailed Trogon, Spotted Antbird, Cinnamon Woodpecker and some other less common rainforest species, including Ocellated Antbird, Streak-chested Antpitta and Pheasant Cuckoo. In the afternoon we will stroll around the grounds of the Gamboa Rainforest Reserve. This property offers trails, forest, open areas, wetlands and is rich with birdlife. Here we’ll keep an eye out for Gartered and Black-throated Trogons, Golden-hooded Tanager, Collared Aracari.

This morning we will check out of our hotel and take a short flight from Panama City to Davíd, the gateway to the Chiriquí, Panama’s exquisite western highlands. We transfer to Mount Totumas Cloud Forest Reserve (~2 hrs drive from Davíd), a fantastic spot near the Costa Rican border and one of the best places to find the Three-wattled Bellbird in Panama. Upon arrival we will settle in and have lunch. In the afternoon we bird at Mount Totumas, familiarizing ourselves with the birds of western Panama. Here we may encounter Band-tailed Pigeon, Rufous-browed Peppershrike, Chiriqui Foliage-gleaner, Mountain Elaenia, Yellowish Flycatcher and Sulphur-winged Parakeet. This is an excellent place for hummingbirds with Lesser and Brown violetears, as well as Talamanca Hummingbird, White-throated Mountaingem, Stripe-tailed Hummingbird, Violet Sabrewing and the tiny Magentathroated Woodstar. We’ll enjoy a delicious dinner in the restaurant with sweeping vistas of the reserve. Overnight at Mount Totumas Cloud Forest.

The cloud forests of the Talamanca Mountain range are home may regional endemics including Chiriqui Quail-Dove, Black-faced Solitaire, Slate-throated Redstart, Dark Pewee, Silvery-fronted Tapaculo, Spot-crowned Woodcreeper, Peg-billed Finch, Flame-throated Warbler and much more. There will also be more chances to see and photograph Three-wattled Bellbird, Resplendent Quetzal, hummingbirds and others. Mount Totumas is also an excellent place for finding dozens of species of butterflies and other insects of the region, and after dark it is worth visiting the moth sheet at Bellbird Lodge to see an incredible diversity of nocturnal insects. Nights at Mount Totumas Cloud Forest.

After lunch we return to Davíd to catch our early evening flight back to Panama City with some possible birding along the way. We will enjoy a final dinner together and then overnight at Riande Aeropuerto Hotel which is within a few minutes of Toucomen International Airport. Tour officially ends after our evening meal.

Flights home.