Terra Firme Birdwatching is a brand specialized in offering birdwatching tours owned by the travel agency Walk Inn. Our tours cover a selection of destinations in South America, Asia and Europe and are tailored to suit both the confirmed birder wishing to discover new species and more debutant birders looking for a first travel experience looking for exotic species.
Vincent MOURET and Mathieu SIOL, both product managers and tour leaders, have been avid birders for a long time. Their curiosity together with their penchant for travel led them across the world, looking for new countries, landscapes, ecosystems, culture and bird species. If traveling is a formative experience, then these expeditions of ours surely have contributed to the idea of creating Terra Firme Birdwatching several years later.
Our activity and our tours are specifically conceived from a birdwatching perspective. The itinerary, the pace and the schedule are all built in order to enhance the quality and quantity of bird observation. Our guides are competent naturalists and they will be more than happy to share their knowledge of reptiles, amphibians, mammals or plants with you. Some of our itineraries devote a lot of effort to the observation of large mammals (Brown Bear, Grey Wolf, Wolverine…). We also offer photographic tours.
Our tours favor natural sites exhibiting an important biodiversity. Our wish is first and foremost for your travel experience to be exciting and rewarding. If birdwatching itself is of foremost importance, so do the beauty of landscapes and the traveling experience itself.
For this reason, while our itineraries stick to known biodiversity hotspots in some visited countries, we also visit less known, more authentic sites combining ornithological richness with a feeling of adventure and remoteness.
We are constantly aiming at the right balance between rewarding observations, travel experience and discovery of natural wonders. As a result, our tours can evolve over time owing to the feedback of our guides and customers to better approach this equilibrium.
Also, in order to favour comfort and tranquility in your ornithological observations, our groups are kept to modest size (generally between 4 and 10 persons, sometimes up to 12 on some destinations). When a tour is mostly spent in “closed” sites with limited visibility (such as in forest), our groups do not exceed 8 persons.
Our tours are prepared with care by experienced coordinators, accustomed to the logistical particularities of the ornithological travel, be it in fully developed places or in more remote corners with more rustic infrastructures. Walk Inn is a legal tourist travel professional with all the accreditations, labels and insurance necessary for the smooth conduct of the trip.
We are convinced that the success of a trip largely depends on the tour skill and dedication of the tour leader. Our team is composed of accomplished birdwatchers with a solid scientific background and good all-around naturalistic skills (mammals, reptiles, amphibians and plants). We all share the same passion for wildlife and wish to share our knowledge and experience with others. When we are not in the field guiding groups, we spend most of our free time birding either with our family or alone.
Our offer encompasses tours on three continents, with fixed itineraries, and starting date, advertised several months before on our website and leaflets. We can also propose custom itineraries, where the date, itinerary, number of participants and particular desires concerning the species of interest can be discussed beforehand.
In order to provide the best possible service and to enhance the rise of local ecotourism, we often rely on the exceptional knowledge of resident guides concerning the whereabouts of rare and localized species.
We also try to promote as best we can local conservation projects and initiatives. We are acutely aware of the role companies like ours can play in the emergence of genuine conservation policies combining ecosystem protection and economic impact through local population involvement in ecotourism.
We will be pleased to meet you, in the beautiful french mediterranean region where we are based, to discuss with us about a future tour.
Our staff will always be available to discuss and answer your questions regarding organization, logistic or the wildlife of your forthcoming tour.
By all means feel free to share your ideas and suggestions with us to improve the quality of our service.
For more details and information regarding practical details, logistic or paperwork related to our tours, you are invited to consult the following page practical informations.
