Immerse yourself in one of nature’s greatest spectacles on our upcoming tour in beautiful Veracruz, Mexico.
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Don’t Miss the World’s Largest Raptor Migration!
Located along Mexico’s Gulf Coast, Veracruz provides the ideal location to witness millions of migrating birds, including birds of prey known as the Veracruz River of Raptors.
From sandy beaches to Mexico’s highest peak, join us for this birding adventure in one of the country’s safest and most diverse states. Experience incredible excursions with endemic species, spectacular hawkwatching, local flavor, and history on this remarkable trip.
This tour is limited to just 6 guests — one of the smallest group sizes offered anywhere for this migration — ensuring an intimate, unhurried experience with direct access to your guides at every moment. Every spot on this tour includes a $500 donation to the Pronatura Veracruz River of Raptors monitoring program, the organization behind one of the most important bird conservation projects in the Americas.
Phenomenal Birding
Our expertly crafted itinerary ensures the best Veracruz has to offer — from stunning birding and hawkwatching to diverse cultural highlights — so you can make the most of each day of your trip.
Zone-tailed Hawk
Stunning Landscapes
We handle all the logistics including accommodations, meals, tour transportation, and packing lists so you can just sit back and enjoy the view.
Expert Guides
With a maximum of 6 guests, you’ll have unmatched access to two expert leaders: Pteravia’s Jeff Birek, with over two decades of field ornithology experience across five continents, and Kashmir Wolf, who spent 17 years with the Veracruz River of Raptors project and knows this flyway better than almost anyone alive.
Groove-billed Ani
Diverse Experiences
Striking a balance between birding excursions, cultural exploration, and leisure, you’ll enjoy seeing over 200 bird species while also having the space and time to experience Mexican history, culture, and food.
Our Itinerary
Leave the planning to us and spend your time enjoying the birds, history, culture, and food of Mexico without the hassle.
Day 1- Sept. 22
Your guides and driver will meet you as you exit to the main terminal at the Veracruz International Airport (morning flights through Dallas or Houston are recommended from the US and Canada). We will drive approximately 20 minutes to our hotel. Built by Spanish architects in the 1940s, Hotel Mocambo is a great place to start our adventure. After check-in, your guides will be available if you need anything, but plan to give everyone time to relax and recover from their travel. The hotel property and beach are great for birding, swimming, relaxing, and wandering. Dinner will be provided at the hotel.
Total Estimated Drive Time: 20 min
Accommodations: Hotel Mocambo
Meals:
• Dinner at Hotel Mocambo
Monk Parakeet
Day 2- Sept. 23
After an early breakfast at the hotel, we will go birding in Las Barrancas, an expansive coastal grassland. This unique habitat supports a rich diversity of birds including Double-striped Thick-knee, Northern Jacana, Lesser Yellow-headed Vulture, Aplomado Falcon, Common Tody-Flycatcher, Fork-tailed Flycatcher, Veracruz Wren (endemic), and Grassland Yellow-Finch. We will stop at Playa Mata de Uva to look for Northern Potoo before having lunch at a nearby restaurant. After lunch we’ll drive back to Hotel Mocambo. We’ll have time to relax this afternoon followed by sunset birding and dinner at the hotel.
Total Estimated Drive Time: 1 hour 40 minutes
Accommodations: Hotel Mocambo
Meals:
• Breakfast at Hotel Mocambo
• Lunch at El Jarocho restaurant
• Dinner at Mariscos Villa Rica
Boat-billed Flycatcher
Day 3- Sept. 24
After breakfast and birding at the hotel, we will drive to the hawkwatch site in the small town of Chichicaxtle. We will hear a short presentation on the monitoring project and get our first taste of the raptor migration. We will then drive to the mountainous city of Xalapa, the capital of Veracruz. After a delicious lunch, we will go birding at El Haya Park. Here we can find many species including Squirrel Cuckoo, Rivoli’s Hummingbird, Violet Sabrewing, and Golden-olive Woodpecker. Dinner will be at a local restaurant near our hotel.
Total Estimated Drive Time: 2 hours
Accommodations: Gamma Xalapa Nubara
Meals:
• Breakfast at Hotel Mocambo
• Lunch at La Estancia de los Tecajetes
• Dinner at Flor Catorce
Violet Sabrewing
Day 4- Sept. 25
Breakfast will be at the hotel before we take a short drive to Macuiltepetl Park, arguably the city’s best birding location. Here we will be on the lookout for Bearded Wood-Partridge, Wedge-tailed Sabrewing, Blue-capped Motmot, Green Jay, Blue Mockingbird, migratory warblers and other species. After lunch, we will visit the Anthropology Museum with a large collection of Mesoamerican artifacts dating back over 3,000 years. Dinner will be at a popular restaurant that is a staple of Veracruz tradition.
Total Estimated Drive Time: 30 minutes
Accommodations: Gamma Xalapa Nubara
Meals:
• Breakfast at hotel (Gamma Xalapa Nubara)
• Lunch at Oropéndola Barra de Café
• Dinner at La Parroquia de Veracruz
Blue-capped Motmot
Day 5- Sept. 26
Today we will drive to Las Minas at the foot of the Cofre de Perote volcano. This area is located on the edge of a canyon at an elevation of 6,000 feet with beautiful pine and oak forests to explore. Our birding targets for the morning include Mountain Trogon, Brown-backed Solitaire, Striped Sparrow (endemic), Rufous-capped Brushfinch (endemic), Golden-browed Warbler, and Red Warbler (endemic). After lunch at a nearby restaurant, we will drive back to Xalapa to give everyone time to relax and explore the vibrant city before dinner in Xalapa’s downtown.
Total Estimated Drive Time: 2 hour 20 minutes
Accommodations: Gamma Xalapa Nubara
Meals:
• Breakfast at hotel (Gamma Xalapa Nubara)
• Lunch at La Bruma restaurant
• Dinner at La Casona del Beaterio
Red Warbler
Day 6- Sept. 27
Today we will drive back down from the mountains to the hawkwatch sites in Cardel and Chichicaxtle. The River of Raptors peaks around this time every year. Here we may witness tens of thousands of migrating Broad-winged Hawks per hour. We also can see huge numbers of American White Pelicans and Anhingas as well as many other resident and migratory species. We’ll spend the next two nights at Hotel Puente Nacional & Spa. The roof of the Hotel Bienvenido in Cardel is an official hawkwatch site and one of the best places to observe the migration. We will have lunch at a restaurant adjacent to the observation deck. After lunch we will have the option to go to Chichicaxtle for more hawkwatching or to head back to the hotel to relax before dinner.
Total Estimated Drive Time: 1 hour 10 minutes
Accommodations: Hotel Puente Nacional & Spa
Meals:
• Breakfast at hotel (Gamma Xalapa Nubara)
• Lunch at Hoel Bienvenido
• Dinner at Hotel Puente Nacional & Spa
Zone-tailed Hawk
Day 7- Sept. 28
There are two birding options this morning: leave early to look for Mexican Sheartail (endemic) or rest longer at the hotel before going to Cardel for the hawk migration. Breakfast could be on the go for the early risers and at the hotel for those who stick around. In the afternoon, we will visit the home of Hernán Cortés and take a boat trip on the La Antigua River where we can see Black Skimmer, Collared Plover, and other shorebirds as well as Ringed, Amazon, and Green Kingfishers. We’ll eat dinner at a great local restaurant just steps away from the boat dock and return to Hotel Puente Nacional & Spa.
Total Estimated Drive Time: 35 minutes (plus optional 50 minutes)
Accommodations: Hotel Puente Nacional & Spa
Meals:
• Breakfast at Hotel Puente Nacional & Spa
• Lunch at Hotel Bienvenido
• Dinner at Las Delicias Marinas
Broad-winged Hawks
Day 8- Sept. 29
After breakfast at the hotel, we will visit El Mirador, a biodiverse shade-grown coffee plantation. This farm was purchased by German immigrants in the 1850s and is still operated by the family. We will spend the morning looking for species such as Lesson’s Motmot, Collared Aracari, Keel-billed Toucan, Ivory-billed Woodcreeper, Common Chlorospingus, and Black-headed Saltator around this private protected site. We will share lunch in the home of our welcoming hosts where you’ll be able to sample and buy the amazing coffee produced there. After lunch we’ll head back to the hotel for a break before our final dinner at a restaurant near Hotel Puente Nacional & Spa.
Total Estimated Drive Time: 3 hours
Accommodations: Hotel Puente Nacional & Spa
Meals:
• Breakfast at Hotel Puente Nacional & Spa
• Lunch at El Mirador
• Dinner near Hotel Puente Nacional & Spa
Collared Aracari
Day 9- Sept. 30
As our unforgettable journey comes to an end, we’ll enjoy our last breakfast together at the hotel. Transportation will be provided to the Veracruz International Airport. To help keep the experience alive, we will share a platform for participants to exchange photos and videos from the trip. This adventure is sure to yield lasting memories that will be reflected on for many years to come.
Total Estimated Drive Time: 1 hour
Meals:
• Breakfast at Hotel Puente Nacional & Spa
Birds You Are Likely to See
- Squirrel Cuckoo
- Wedge-tailed Sabrewing
- Azure-crowned Hummingbird
- Double-striped Thick-knee
- Collared Plover
- Lesser Yellow-headed Vulture
- Roadside Hawk
- Ferruginous Pygmy-Owl
- Blue-capped Motmot
- Collared Aracari
- Golden-olive Woodpecker
- Aplomado Falcon
- Bat Falcon
- Olive-throated Parakeet
- Fork-tailed Flycatcher
- Veracruz Wren
- Common Chlorospingus
- Striped Sparrow
- Rufous-capped Brushfinch
- Rufous-capped Warbler
Featured Guides
Jeff Birek
Jeff is a professional ornithologist who has spent more than two decades in the field across 27 countries on five continents: studying birds, training biologists, and finding the kind of rarities that still show up in field notes years later. Over 15 years working with the Bird Conservancy of the Rockies, Point Blue Conservation Science, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and a dozen other agencies and universities, he led large-scale bird monitoring programs across nine states and trained more than 200 field biologists to identify birds by sight and sound.
He has personally found the first breeding American Three-toed Woodpeckers in Nebraska in nearly a century, a Laysan Albatross lost in the middle of the Sonoran Desert, and critically endangered Black Stilts in New Zealand. Jeff founded Pteravia Conservation Birding Tours to put all of it to use.
More at pteravia.com · jeff@pteravia.com · +1.530.400.5301
Kashmir Wolf
Kashmir (“Kash”) Wolf grew up in Veracruz and spent 17 years working with the Veracruz River of Raptors project, one of the most significant raptor monitoring efforts in the world. Few people on Earth know this flyway and its birds as well as Kash does.
Since graduating from college, he has been conducting avian research and monitoring across Mexico and throughout the region. He interned for Hawk Mountain Sanctuary (PA) in 2010, and has studied the endangered Black-capped Vireo and Golden-cheeked Warbler in Texas and Oklahoma. Through these and other experiences, Kash has developed outstanding guiding and bird identification skills that he brings to every excursion. With a maximum of just 6 guests on this tour, you’ll have real, daily access to one of the most knowledgeable guides working this migration.
Veracruz and the River of Raptors Tour
September 22- September 30, 2026
Enrollment Is Limited. Maximum of 6 Participants.
Double Occupancy*
Price: $5,290.00
Single Occupancy*
Price: $5,590.00
*(per person includes van transportation, accommodations, food, expert guides,
and a $500 donation to the Pronatura Veracruz River of Raptors monitoring program)
Nonrefundable Deposit: $500
(All Payments due by September 1, 2026)
Please review our Terms and Conditions before booking your trip.
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