Wahai
The pleasant coastal village of Wahai is a day’s journey from Ambon. Early each morning direct buses leave Ambon’s Merdeka bus terminal, cross to seram by ferry and continue to saka, a small collection of huts and a jetty nestling by the side of enormous cliffs on Seram’s north coast. Public speed boats meet the buses in the late afternoon and whisk you off on an exhilarating, 2-hr dash along the coast to Wahai. As you pass the spectacular limestone cliffs-the end of a rugged ridge which still defies the road engineers-lookout for flocks of migratory Australian Pelicans loafing on sandbanks.
Just 8 km to the east of Wahai is the boundary of a broad swathe of the National Park that sweeps down to the sea. A day spent birding along the road tha runs through it to Pasahari provides a superb introduction to seram’s birds. Species to look for here include Gurney’s Eagle, Oriental Hobby and Pacific Baza soaring over the forest edge, Lazuli Kingfisher in partially cleared areas, Metallic pigeon, Claret-breasted Fruit-dove and Long crested Myna in the swamp forest and common bush-hen in the grasslands. You will soon be over familiar with the ubiquitous, explosive pprow calls of seram friarbird, the island’s most common endemic. It is so accurately mimicked by the black-naped oriole that most people leave seram unsure wheter they have relly seen the oriole. With the help of the National Park Rangers, a number of pleasant “off road” excursions can be arranged in this area: you can walk to the edge of the mangroves or through the swamp forest, or even float down the rivers to the sea on a bamboo raft.
Either on the way out or back (depending on the tides) check out the mangrove-lined mud-flats in air besar bay, just 2 km east of wahai. There are usually a few Australian ibises around and good range of shorebirds-and possibility of Channel-billed Cuckoos-in the migration season. The small patch of forest behind the quay is good for common Paradise-Kingfisher.
Source: Birding Indonesia. Periplus Publishing. Singapore