For many years Ken and I have hoped to get out on an east coast pelagic trip, specifically a Gulf Stream spring pelagic with Brian Patterson our of Hatteras, NC. Finally, this spring we made it happen, and on May 18 we flew to Raleigh-Durham on a red-eye (our morning flight was changed by Delta to a 10:45 PM departure) and by 6 AM on May 19 we had our rental car and headed east. We made a stop for a couple of hours at a cool place, the Alligator River NWR, where we eBirded 31 species on the Buffalo City Road access. It was great to dip our toes into the eastern U.S. birds.

From here we drove to Hatteras, where we narrowly escaped a bigger fiasco when Ken pulled off the side of the road, only to get stuck in the loose sand, bringing back memories of being stuck in the snow on the Waterville Plateau. This time instead of a local trucker dragging us out, a nice young woman stopped, and let us use her “”traction strips.” These are foldable plastic devices that we put under our front tires, and pretty easily backed out onto the pavement. A “save-and-a-beauty” moment.
We found a better spot to stop, and did a little shorebirding on Pea Island before calling it a day, to crash at a hotel in Buxton.
Up bright and early the next AM to meet the boat at the dock about a 25 minute drive from our hotel (we couldn’t get rooms on the weekend at Hatteras Village) only to learn at 5:15 AM that the trip was cancelled due to rain, high seas and high winds.
We spent the day birding on funes (the prior red-eye) and found a good spot (except for the ferocious mosquitos) at the Pea Island Visitor’s Center to walk out into the marsh on a path, dike and boardwalk. We saw 55 species

The most interesting place we visited IMO was the Ramp 43 &44 access area where we watched terns, gulls and shorebirds primarily. It was too windy to really look for Seaside Sparrow, a species that eluded us on this trip (I heard two) but it was fun to puzzle over terns and gulls.

We were able to reschedule our cancelled boat trip for the following day, and got out for two straight days of pelagic birding. Trips were on the Snowy Petrel 2, a 62 foot boat that had excellent places to bird on both sides, a small area at the stern, and a large area at the bow. Inside seating only accomodated about 9 people, so with 25 birders and 2-3 spotters, most of us were outside. For most of the time aboard it was too rough to safely and comfortably be at the bow, and often one side was the “wet side” so birding mostly came along the sides. The two days were both rough, but different. On the first day we had big numbers of Black-capped Petrels, Wilson’s Storm-Petrels, and not many other birds. A couple of Band-rumped Storm-Petrels gave decent looks, a few Audubon’s and Cory’s Shearwaters, a very few Sooty Shearwaters, and one surprising Cape May Warbler rounded out the birds seen. A young local birder IDed the Cape May Warbler by its flight call, amazing even the spotters, and it was cool to cheer on this wayward warbler as it circled the boat for a few minutes.

On the second day at sea it continued to be “unsettled” and there were considerably fewer pterodroma petrels in the first half of the day. About noon the call went out that a Trindade Petrel was approaching the boat from the stern. I had put my camera away because the temptation to take both hands off the railing and take photos was IMO dangerous with the boat lurching to and fro. The bird flew right up to the stern, seemed to look us over, and flew by the starboard side at close range. I got killer looks, but thought any photo op had passed. A few minutes later the bird reappeared, I went into the cabin to get my camera and managed passable photos, though nothing like others had on the first pass. This is a bird seen only a few times a year off Hatteras at best, and a great find.

As the afternoon progressed we had a pair of jaegers, one Parasitic and one Pomerine give great shows, the POJA circling the boat at close range for seemingly an hour.

A Leach’s Storm-Petrel was seen pretty well by all, and near the end of our trip, on the way back to Hatteras we stumbled on this Masked Booby on the water.

We tried to get on the trip the next day, because the forcast was for the weather and seas to get worse every day for the rest of the week, but the trip was full. It was a blessing, as no new species were found, the seas were worse yet, and we had a nice day ashore. Winds were very high, and we spent some time birding sheltered areas on wooded trails before going out to the Salt Ponds to try for new gulls, terns or shorebirds. We added a Lesser Black-backed Gull, and then decided to try the beach by the old lighthouse. We found a spot partly sheltered by a dune, and did a sea watch for a couple of hours. We managed to see a Parasitic and a Pomerine Jaeger and several Sooty Shearwaters, but really nothing new.
That night we got notified that the next day’s pelagic was being cancelled early, as sea conditions were worsening. We took advantage and were able to cancel our reservations for the night of May 24th, and headed back to Alligator River NWR. We had a nice day birding there, birding several areas, seeing several new species for the trip including Black-throated Green Warbler, Prothonatary Warbler, Northern Parula, Red-headed Woodpecker, and Gray Catbird.
We spent the night in Dunn, N.C., a city just north of Fayetteville, N.C. where I spent a 6-week tour at the ROTC Advanced Camp at Ft. Bragg in the summer of 1975. This was a more pleasant stop, as we were primarily looking for Ken’s lifer Bachmann’s Sparrow. I had seen this bird on a Florida trip to visit my parents near Orlando on April Fools Day 2000, but Ken had not had a chance. We were at the vdry northern end of its range, and so it was not a sure thing. This species likes mature Long-leaf Pine forests, with an open understory but a fairly dense ground cover. Sure enough, after spending most of the morning in suboptimal habitat where the understory was thin and dry, we came on what looked perfect, and I managed to hear a singing bird.

We had a really nice day seeing a nice list of species with lot’s of great views.

From here it was back to Raleigh-Durham for the long flight home and late arrival.
Ken’s youngest son John picked us up at Seatac and got us home safely.