Hoopoe at last plus Little-ringed Plover

Jimmy & I set off to tick the long staying Hoopoe that is in Staffs at Hinksford G P,armed with a map from Brian who had seen the bird a couple of weeks ago.
Leaving at 5am we arrive on site at 7. 30 am after a 140 mile drive, I take a couple of wrong turns but not to bad, at first it looks bad as the target had not been reported at all yesterday & the place was very boggy with a lot of water about after yesterdays heavy rainfall.
After scanning the area for what felt like an hour Jimmy finds the bird on the ground at the bottom of the hill.
We spend the next hour with the bird & have it all to our self as well so loads of photos taken as we get very close to it & it just feeds without worrying about us being there.
We are only 4 miles away from Dudley cemetery so we go & pay our respects to one of the finest footballers that I had the pleasure to see play & was taken away from us far to early in the Munich air crash of 1958 at the age of 21, Duncan Edwards was already a great player & would have gone on to captain England and become one of the greatest players ever.
All very sad but really glad to have done it & to also pay a visit to the church of St Francis to see the stained glass window commemorating his short life.
Back to birding now as we head to Sandwell Valley rspb, just north of West Bromwich our first visit here &  we love the reserve.
As we get outside the visitor centre Jimmy picks up a tick when he gets see not 1 but 8 Bullfinch, thank god for that it's  been driving him mad & Brian has been taking the micky a bit.

In the hide that is only a short walk away we see 2 male Goosander  a pair of Goldeneye along with Oystercatcher, some Grey Wagtails & a bonus when we are put onto a very early Little-ringed Plover for a year tick for both of us.

Hoopoe

One of the Bullfinch