Red-breasted Chat— Photo: Brian Gibbons

More than 450 species regularly occur in this southernmost of Mexican states, including gems and rarities such as Red-breasted Chat, Pink-headed Warbler, Slender Sheartail, Bar-winged Oriole, Black-capped Siskin, and Nava's Wren. This tour will be attractive both to casual birders with little experience south of the US-Mexico border, as well as to widely-traveled birders searching for hard-to-find restricted-range species. It is designed to be easygoing, with most of the tour centered on one hotel, and, at the same time, allow us to sample a large proportion of the species that occur in the state of Chiapas, and to visit most of the vegetation zones that occur in Mexico.

Around Tapachula we will look for Blue-tailed Hummingbird, Giant Wren, White-bellied Chachalaca, and other restricted-range species, and around Arriaga our main goal will be the gorgeous Rose-bellied (Rosita's) Bunting.

One of our birding sites near the Chiapas capital of Tuxtla Gutiérrez will be the majestic Sumidero Canyon, a gorge almost as deep as the Grand Canyon, but clothed in tropical vegetation. We will spend one or two mornings here to adequately bird both the upper and lower parts of the canyon. Special birds here include Belted Flycatcher, Fan-tailed Warbler, Banded Wren, Bar-winged Oriole, and Yellow Grosbeak; even Thicket Tinamou, Pheasant Cuckoo, and Highland Guan are occasionally seen.

West of Tuxtla Gutiérrez we will spend one or two mornings searching for the very rare Nava's Wren and many other birds of the tropical rainforest. One afternoon we will visit a roost of dozens to hundreds of Green Parakeets in a huge limestone sinkhole. Another afternoon we will visit a zoo that doubles as a forest reserve, where Crested Guans, Plain Chachalacas, and Great Curassows were successfully reintroduced in 1980.

San Cristóbal de las Casas is a picturesque colonial city located in a pleasant highland valley, and surrounded by pine and oak forests. Here we will search for Pink-headed Warbler, Rufous-collared Robin, Mountain Trogon, Rufous-browed Wren, and many others.

We will also visit the Lagos de Montebello, or Lakes of Montebello, a scenic area with gorgeous mountain lakes of different colors surrounded by cloud forest. Here we will look for Slender Sheartail, Spot-crowned Woodcreeper, and Unicolored Jay among others.

Accommodations good; easy to moderate walking on roads and trails; warm to hot at lower elevations, cool and damp in the mountains; dry conditions overall, but rain possible in the afternoons.