The Third Wheel Chronicles; Chapter 2: Arrival in Astana

    Following a fairly short flight, we had landed in Kazakhstan's bright and shiny capital city: Astana. Although we arrived in the early hours of the morning, by the time we reached the apartment in the Northern Lights Buildings at around 4 am, the sky was beginning to brighten up. As we unpacked, I set up the scope like a good creeper in the window, scanning down over the surrounding strange urbanity. At first light, I got my first life bird of Central Asia: the Caspian Gull! Then it was off to sleep for pretty much the rest of the day. When we woke up later in the day, we took a walk in the surrounding area to the shopping mall literally across the street. In this short distance, I picked up my second life bird of Kazakhstan: the White Wagtail, with a beautiful male in the desolate parking lot, hopping into the crevices beneath a truck.

I love this setup...

6/22/15

    For our first full day in the city, we walked around and explored a few parks. The area seriously reminded me of China, with all the new buildings, just really devoid of large human concentrations.

Begging fledgling Great Tit

Another fledgling Great Tit.

Rock Dove with poise

Rock Doves with less poise

Yellow-winged Darter (Sympetrum flaveolum), the most abundant dragonfly I saw in Astana.

    As we continued walking through the streets, we eventually came across a bridge over the Ishim River leading to the city's large central park. 

Caspian Gull seen around the Ishim River. My only photograph of this lovely larid.

Black-headed Gull

Eurasian Tree Sparrow mid-brake

Enallagma cyathigerum (I think...), quite abundant in the city park.

In one of the canals were 5 random Whooper Swans. I'm not sure if these birds were introduced or actually living in the area (they are native after all) but regardless, the close-up views of this species were really amazing.

Feeding time. It is really entertaining watching this behavior in a bird of this size.

Fieldfare in black and white just because. I love this shot.

Black-veined White (Aporia crataegi) in black and white, but like, not really.

Some freshly hatched Hemipterans

Everyone's favorite plant, growing quite literally, everywhere, in Kazakhstan.

    Continuing on with my little exploration, I came across my favorite part of the park: a quiet bike trail with mixed meadow and trees on the side. Birdwise it was mostly just filled with Great Tit and Eurasian Magpies but the walk was the most pleasant of the day. Shortly afterwards, we walked back to the apartment, being surprisingly tired.

Greater Whitethroat, one of (in my opinion) the prettiest of the Old World warblers with its rather dull but still quite stylish color scheme.

What I believe to be a Bluish Bloomrape (Orobanche coerulescens), a lovely parasitic plant with no photosynthetic capabilities. In layman's terms, a mooch.

Azure Tit displaying its great capabilities of climbing and looking like the most adorable mofo in existence.

On the way back we saw this interesting vehicle bridge crossing the Ishim. More interesting, however, were...

...these wannabe Azure Tits?

While walking up the stairs to reach the parking lot, I noticed a raptor flying into the wind between some tall buildings. My first raptor of Kazakhstan: the Black Kite! The contrast between the bird and the urbanity was quite striking.

Juvenile White Wagtail 

TL;DR: Astana, see cool things, more coming

To be continued...

    So I am really behind with my posts about my sightings of things after returning from this great trip so I guess The Third Wheel Chronicles will have a temporary hiatus for some catch up. Anyways, thanks for reading!