Whale of a day out!

Dropping off my old friend Martin's spare furniture at Aylsham was the perfect excuse to continue northwards for an afternoon at Cley.

While we were drinking coffee at the reserve centre a Rough-legged Buzzard drifted eastwards - very distantly, unfortunately. Then people suddenly gazing intently towards the sea: through the 'Cley Spy' guy's telescope we could make out a pod of small whales heading towards Salthouse - we slurped down our coffee and followed them!

After five minutes at the beach we decided to walk westwards to see if they'd turned back, but all we encountered was a decent flock (60+) of Snow Buntings and a Stonechat, so we retraced our steps.

Back by the site of the old carpark a group of well-known birders had refound the whales about three-quarters of a mile offshore. Although distant, I grabbed a few images which identified them as Pilot Whales - possibly Long-finned. A little closer inshore was a couple of Red-throated Divers, but little else.

We returned to Cley for another coffee and then a walk along the East Bank: no sign of the Long-tailed Duck, but a Little Egret was eating sticklebacks at close range!