Alagoas
Murici
The best but most expensive place to stay is the Quilombo Parque hotel in União dos Palmares. It is pleasantly situated with plenty of birds in the grounds, including Seven-colored tanager Tangara fastuosa. It takes at least 50 minutes to get to the reserve from the hotel.
The road to the IBAMA reserve, near Fazenda Bananeiras, is very bad and you will need four-wheel drive if there has been any rain. Take a dirt road to the right off the BR-104 (signposted Fazenda Serra Nova), 700m north of the entrance to Murici. The way is complicated, with many tracks to the right and left. Keep to the “main” road. At a T junction with another “main” dirt road, turn left. Ask for Estreito and then Bananeiras. There is a small dam on the left at Bananeiras. The reserve is up the hill after the hamlet, forking left near the top. There is a chain (unlocked when we were there and no guard) at the entrance, 16.4km from the asphalt. The forest remnant along the left of the road before the reserve is good for Long-tailed Woodnymph Thalurania watertonii, Pinto’s Spinetail Synallaxis infuscata and Smoky-fronted Tody-flycatcher Poecilotriccus fumifrons. Look inside the reserve for the local specialities: Scalloped Antbird Myrmeciza ruficauda, Orange-bellied Antwren Terenura sicki, Alagoas Tyrannulet Phylloscartes ceciliae, Alagoas Antwren Myrmotherula snowi and Alagoas foliage-gleaner Philydor novaesi (in order of increasing difficulty).
There is another bit of good forest, slightly lower, beside the telecom tower on the left of the BR-101, 16km north of the junction with the BR-104.
