Birding Tour Angola: Rare Endemics and More

Since Angola’s three-decade-long civil war ended in 2002, the country has enjoyed peace and stability, along with a massive surge in infrastructural advancements, opening the country up to tourism (much to the delight of birders, who want to see its 1,000+ bird species, including many endemics and other speciality species).

Swierstra’s Spurfowl is one of Angola’s more challenging-to-find endemic birds.

During the initial post-war years, Angola was deemed to be a country only for ‘hard-core’ tourists, and even the few birding tours available were typically overland camping adventures. Fortunately, this has changed dramatically. While a sense of adventure is still required, an ever-improving road network makes this country easier to traverse and, with suitable accommodation options available along the entire route, this tour has no overland camping. Angola is, without a doubt, one of the finest birding countries in Africa and a destination not to be missed by any world birder.

The spectacular Kalandula Falls are a sight to behold, and conveniently offer some excellent birding nearby!

This comprehensive tour takes us through the western parts of the country and to all the key birding areas. Beginning in the capital, Luanda, we venture to the remote scarp forests in the north of the country, where we will try for our first endemic, the handsome Braun’s Bushshrike. A visit to the spectacular Kalandula Falls and their exciting swamp forests follows, before calling in at the dry woodlands of the Kissama National Park outside Luanda. We progressively make our way southwards through the country, visiting the disappearing forests of Kumbira and Mount Moco, along with the disappearing miombo woodland between them. We end up in the southern city, Lubango, which opens up the stunning Tundavala Escarpment and its host of endemics, along with the nearby Namib Desert (hosting almost all of the Namibia near-endemics we get on our Namibian tours as well). Working our way up the west coast, we return to Luanda, where this tour comes to an end.

This well-designed and efficient route gives us a chance for all the country’s endemics, near-endemics, and specials, including such rare and poorly known species as Gabela and Monteiro’s Bushshrikes, Gabela Helmetshrike, White-headed Robin-Chat, Swierstra’s Spurfowl, Red-crested Turaco, White-fronted Wattle-eye, Pulitzer’s Longbill, Angola Slaty Flycatcher, Angola Cave Chat, Gabela Akalat, Bocage’s Sunbird and Angola Waxbill.

Angola’s national bird is the endemic Red-crested Turaco – while it can be difficult to find at times, we have several chances to see this handsome species.

Many other more widespread species are also best sought within Angola and include the likes of Anchieta’s Barbet, Margaret’s Batis, Yellow-bellied Wattle-eye, Angola Lark, Black-and-rufous Swallow, Black-necked Eremomela, Black-collared Bulbul, Falkenstein’s Greenbul, Bubbling Cisticola, Rufous-tailed Palm Thrush and Dusky Twinspot. Not to mention all the more typical Namibian near-endemics, which can also be expected.

This tour can be combined with our São Tomé and Príncipe birding tour immediately after, as there are direct flights from Luanda to these endemic-rich islands.