Thanks to everybody for hanging in there through all these posts. I really had not intended for this to go on for so long, but there really was so much to see every day - and I am sure I am forgetting quite a bit too!
Saturday morning we were (re)scheduled to go out with Frank's Glass-bottom Boats to Little Tobago Island at 9:00am. We started the day walking to the spot where Gladwyn suggested we check for the Ruby Topaz, and although I had great looks of one just a few feet away from me, Pam was in the wrong spot. Running out of time if we were going to get breakfast before the trip, we headed to the inn for breakfast with the Rufous-vented Chachalacas and Ruddy Turnstones. This time, I tried getting a few movies of each...
We were also pretty entertained by the crabs on the beach...
Turns out that our friends Linda & Dave from earlier in the trip were also on this day's trip along with two British couples, Chris & Yvonne and Trevor & Jill, that we'd seen around the inn and restaurant for the last few days. The crossing to Little Tobago Island, a nature sanctuary that was made famous by David Attenborough in his "Trials of Life" series, was a little rough but not too bad. I'd been looking forward to this part of the trip for a while, as there are birds on Little Tobago that aren't really seen at any other part of this trip. We'd seen Brown Pelicans and Magnificent Frigatebirds since we arrived, but we were about to see some seabirds that I'd not seen before. We landed on the island, disembarked, and led by a guide from Frank's tour, headed to a lookout over a bay that provided wonderful looks at a bird I've been dreaming of seeing since I first opened a field guide - Red-billed Tropicbirds.
Although a scope was needed (and we did bring one) we also got great looks at Brown Boobies as well as both the brown and white color morphs of Red-footed Boobies. I tried a bit of digi-scoping at about 60x to document these sightings:
White and brown morph Red-footed Boobies at nest
Then we were permitted, two at a time for just a few moments each, to visit a Red-billed Tropicbird on it's nest:
On the ride back, the glass-bottomed boat really came into play, as we passed over coral reefs including "Einstein" one of the largest brain corals in the Caribbean. We then had lunch, a brief refreshing swim in the bay, then decided to hike along the Starwood trail on the Blue Waters Inn property - a successful walk which finally got Pamela great looks at the Ruby Topaz (although still no pics), as well as picking up a few new lifers including White-fringed Antwren, and Black-faced Grassquit.
We also passed a few employees of the inn on the entrance road who pointed out a large green Iguana lounging on a nearby tree branch: 
After another long day, full of birds, warm weather and sun, we headed back to the room to relax, think about all the wonderful experiences of the past week, and to pack for our trip back north to wintry Massachusetts. Little did we suspect that we still had a few new birds to see before that happened though.
