More trips out in September and Flamingos galore

These are the last of the photos from trips out with my brother in September - after that I have one more post of vultures from the beginning of Sept, then I can post the photos from when my brother and sister in law were here!! Luckily the weather hasn't been very nice so we haven't done anything special since they left, so I don't have anything else to blog about. Ha! I will catch up in December I reckon! 😀

One afternoon we went for a drive around the Corbieres as I wanted to show some of the amazing scenery, and Cathar castles, to my brother. I think it's best to view all these photos large so click on them either individually, or read the blurb first then click and look at all the pics. Certainly the flamingo ones will be best viewed larger. 

This next castle is the Chateau de Peyrepeteuse, which Keith and I visited some years back. I wouldn't get up there now, I'm too unfit!

This next is the Chateau de Queribus, which is very close by. One day we will climb up here - I think the car park is a bit closer up than the one at Peyrepeteuse. 

It's not often we see an old windmill that still has sails.

We then drove down the very narrow Gorge de Galamus. It's hard to get shots of as the road is so high up compared to the little river down below!

Unfortunately the sun was shining in the wrong place 😀 so the shade line runs right through the Hermitage de Saint-Antoine, somewhere we have again visited many years ago.

Another day we went back to the coast for lunch out and a walk around the salt works, hoping to find some flamingos to show to my brother. Luckily there were plenty of them, but all these ones in the foreground are juveniles, as they don't yet have the pink colouring that the older ones do. There are some slightly older ones in the salt pans further back, as they have a little pink on their legs.

All these little waders in the background are Dunlins - way too far off to get shots of other than like this.

Looking back inland towards the mining area. In the foreground is the old disused mine where some Blue Rock Thrushes live - we've been here three times and each time we've seen either one or two!

All the piles of white in the distance are mountains of salt!

A view of Mt Canigou (furthest on right), the highest peak in the Pyrenees Orientales dept.

Our first sighting of a gecko here in France! There are several species in the south of France and I think this is a Common Wall Gecko (Tarentola mauritanica). It was on a rock near the car parking area!

So that was a fitting end to September's outings, seeing something completely new to us here in France (I have seen many a gecko in the past as I was born in Fiji and there they are common running around house walls!).