And here is another top class photo of another endemic, the Cuban Gnatcatcher, taken by Roberto Jovel. I have written before about this species and shown Roberto's photograph of a nest that he found east of Guantanamo here. Roberto lives with his partner at Baracoa where they have a casa particular called Villa Paradiso.

The Cuban Tody is a tiny Cuban endemic. It is just over an inch long and weighs less that 6g. It is a year-round resident of Cuba and the islands just off the Cuban coast and is found in dry lowlands, evergreen forests, coastal vegetation, and near streams and rivers. They have a distinctive call which is a loud rattle like the chatter of a machine gun. Their diet comprises mainly insects and spiders but also includes small fruits and lizards.
They nest from April to July and excavate a tunnel about 30 cm (12 in) long in a clay or sand embankment with a terminal chamber, although sometimes they use a rotten trunk or tree cavity. They cover the walls of the tunnel and the egg chamber with a thick glue-like substance mixed with grass, lichen, algae, small feathers, and other materials. Three or four eggs are laid and they are incubated by both parents.
The above photo is probably the best that I have seen of a Cuban Tody as it's difficult to get a picture with an uncluttered background. It was taken recently by Marcos Verdecia Diaz. Well done Marcos.

Our journey to Maria la Gorda on 5 Aug was not the easiest. No problem with traffic, but it was a long way over roads with loads of potholes - such a relief to arrive in front of the Hotel reception. But then horror of horrors the rear wheel of the vehicle had a flat tyre. The real problem was that Although Duviel had a spare tyre it was not fitted on a wheel. And a garage with the equipment to do this was probably a three or four hour drive away. We always respect Cubans for their competence and tenacity and we weren't disappointed. A guy who ran a very small hire car fleet at the hotel immediately offered to help Duviel and off they went round the back of some buildings. A short while later Duviel and the van reappeared, puncture repaired. Amazing! But the really amazing thing was that they had mended it with a condom. And that repair lasted for many hundreds of miles more till we got back to Havana!
This morning we went for a walk down the track from the hotel this morning for just a short way after breakfast and saw some of the same butterfly species including a female Cloudless Sulphur Phoebis sennae.

But there was a also a Louisiana Waterthrush feeding on the edge of the track. This was a bit unusual but must have been a downed migrant on its passage to the south. Both Northern and Louisiana Waterthrush are common winter residents and transients in Cuba. Northern Waterthrush prefer the mangrove swamps so are more coastal than Louisiana Waterthrush which prefers woodland streams and ponds. The differences in appearance can be subtle but Northern has a streaked throat, darker legs, finer bill and a supercilium that tapers behind the eye and is usually buffish (though it can be white). Louisiana Waterthrush has a white unstreaked throat, pink legs, stouter bill and a white supercilium that broadens behind the eye.

Compare this to the Northern Waterthrush that I photographed at Guardalavaca in mangroves on 7 October 2017.

We also saw the beautiful Evening Skimmer Tholymis citrina that we've only seen once before in October 2017 at the other end of the island.

We said our farewells at Maria la Gorda and headed off towards Vinales stopping only for two Hammock Skipper Polygonus leo that were sat on the road imbibing salts.

Although there have been occasional problems with the non availability of fuel here in the UK, the problems in Cuba during our holiday (and since) were gigantic! We needed fuel on the journey to get back to Vinales today, so Duviel visited a Government office yesterday to get a permit to buy fuel as he was transporting tourists. Us! We set off today but the tanker had not arrived so we had to do the journey on a very low tank.
We got to Vinales to find all sorts of problems at the hotel. However having sorted out that we could actually stay, Duviel  returned to the previous town, some hours away, spent the night there in order to be in the queue for when the tanker arrived. Fuel had been a problem right from the start but the situation had deteriorated considerably following devastating explosions and fires at the huge fuel depot at Matanzas. Duviel spared no efforts to ensure we had good trips and a brilliant holiday.