At the Prince Phillip Hotel

                                                

                                                               Part II

The following day, we stumbled out of the early afternoon heat into the cool damp air of the hotel.  We had spent the morning not far from Georgetown on a jungle trail that led to the banks of the Demarara River.  The heat and humidity had been numbing, but we had seen a black nunbird.  This small black bird with a very large red bill burrows nests in the ground and, if luck is with the birders, can be found near rivers in Guyana.  We were lucky that day.

            Mike had advised the group to skip the hotel elevator unless we wanted to risk spending some very hot and airless time in it, since the power generator functioned rather intermittently.  We slowly climbed seven flights of stairs to our rooms.  Showers and beers from the room fridges refreshed us.

            The only place to rest inside and still enjoy a cool breeze was the lobby.  The large marble-floored area was cool even in the heat of the afternoon.  As we descended the seven flights of stairs, we heard the crunching grind of the generator shutting down.  We exchanged looks but were too tired to comment on our good  luck.  The lobby was dim and quiet.  It was shaped like a cross with wide, marble floored hallways lined with small shops and offices.  The central portion held the massive wood main desk and entries to the restaurant and two bars.  Small shops lined the lobby.  We could hear John’s laugh coming from the nearest bar where the rather ingratiating Indian bartender regaled him with well-polished stories of unusual travelers.  Along the quiet hallways, potted reddish-green banana plants with four-foot leaves reached to the skylights. Flame-like red and pink ginger blooms nodded in the breeze from the open walkways leading to the garden.  We settled in rattan chairs near a trickling indoor fountain, where tiny brown birds flitted down, drank and disappeared into the surrounding ferns.

            “Hello, would you like to see a bird nest?”   The soft, familiar voice came from behind us.   Verna stood in the doorway of a small bookshop. 

            “Verna, hello,” I said.  “Come join us.”

            “I would like to show you a bird nest.”  Her soft accent made “bird” sound like “buhd”.  “My brother is a gardener here.  He showed me.  It’s just outside.”

            We  followed her down the cool hallway into the heavy brightness and damp heat of the tropical afternoon. She walked easily ahead, stepping from stone to stone.  We followed the cobbled pathway through the manicured lawn and tame roses into the back garden where the overgrown greenery looked like jungle transplanted inside the hotel walls.

            “Here, this way.  Follow me exactly now,” Verna said.  She turned to wait then directed us carefully off the path into soft, moist soil.  She pushed tree fern leaves out of her way and slowed to let us catch up.  Barb tried to detour around an especially large and wet looking heliconia but Verna caught her arm.  “No, this way.  Step here.”  She  obeyed.

            As we  pushed through a dense growth of scrubby, twisted figs, a hummingbird jetted by.  I felt the turbulence from her tiny wings as she flew past. “Damn - I think that’s a female blue-tailed emerald - wow,”  Barb said reverently as she turned to follow the tiny bird’s flight.  A blue-tailed emerald is a kind of hummingbird that we had been hoping to see.  The green feathers glow like emeralds in the sun, and the tail is iridescent blue.  The female is a duller version, but still wonderful.

            “That is she.  We are close to her home now.  Look,” Verna said.  She gently lifted the side of a three-foot wide gunnera leaf to reveal a brown and gray nest suspended like a tiny hammock from the underside of the leaf.  “No eggs yet, but my brother said that last year she had two babies here.  She will again.”

            The nest could fit into a child’s hand, yet it was sturdy and tight.  Ingeniously built under a leathery, thorned leaf, the nestlings would be protected from rain, heat and many predators. 

            Verna smiled.  “Isn’t it lovely?” she said softly.

            “Verna, this is a gift.  We would never see something like this on our own,” Barb said as she stooped to examine the nest.

            “It is my gift.  But we should go before mother becomes anxious about us discovering her home.”

            Following Verna, we carefully retraced our steps back to the stone pathway and from there to the cool depths of the hotel bar to celebrate our find.  John was no longer there, so we shared our excitement with the bartender who seemed a little surprised that a tiny green bird could cause the North Americans to be so happy.  Oh well, tourists are an odd lot, his look seemed to say.

            Later that evening the group gathered in the restaurant for our last dinner at the Prince Phillip Hotel.  A celebration was planned because of the outstanding number and variety of species we had seen during our short stay.

            “No John tonight?” asked Mel.  They sat at their usual table in the dining room, cocktails in hand.  Lunch was hours ago and we all were ready to order dinner.

            “He won’t be joining us,” Mike said.  “Got himself into a bit of a fix this afternoon.”

            We all made appropriate murmurs of concern while burning to know if he finally ran afoul of the local community.  There was plenty of trouble for an over-confident northerner to find in Georgetown.

            Mike’s face looked sober, but his eyes held an amused look he couldn’t quite hide.  “He heard a rumor about an occupied blue-tailed emerald nest somewhere on the grounds in the back garden and tried to find it on his own.  Son of a gun stepped into a nest of biting ants and they really played hell with him.”

            Verna stood quietly behind them with her order book in hand.  She smiled and asked softly “Will you be having wine tonight?”

           
              I bumped Barb's foot under the table but neither of us said a word.       

                                                               *





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