The start of the journey South: The Falkland Islands

The flights from Heathrow, San Paulo, Santiago and Punto aries ending at Mount Pleasance in the Falklands went rather smoothly, with the journey taking two days. We stayed the night in Santiago, which resulted in an hour and a bit in a taxi into town whilst fearing for our lives due to fairly crazy driving, which was worth it for an amazing steak and roasted sweet potato. The airport check-in started at 5.30am the next morning, so everyone set early alarms. This was unnecessary as we woke to the hotel shaking violently at 4.30am. It was my first earthquake, lasting about half a minute, the epicentre was several hundred miles away, although it measured at 6.8!

Once in the Falklands, we boarded the awaiting bus which took us outside of the military base, and through barren rocky landscapes until we finally made it to Stanley. We had a day and a half here, so walked to Gypsy Cove past several wrecks.

 

Back on the ship, we listened to several safety briefs, and had a muster and lifeboat drill, we organised all the fresh produce (‘freshies’) in the hold, ready to be delivered to the islands. After seeing food, I decided to go into town one last time, and buy some food for the last time in 18 months. We left the harbour at sunset, with everyone standing on the monkey island (above the bridge) watching birds flying past.

 

There were several Gentoo penguins porpoising towards land, making that two penguin species in as many days. That was soon to be broken though. We moved to a different harbour to refuel for a couple of days, so we made the four hour round-trip to Bertha’s Beach, having heard that there is a Gentoo colony at the end. We were greeted by a few hundred penguins calling to each other, with some on eggs and passing pebbles around, with sheep wandering past the colony.

We sat and watched them for a time, until the sun started to disappear. As we were making our way back to the ship, I saw something near the surf. It turned out to be the 3^rd penguin species in as many days, a King. Now I just need to see some seals!

Watching a sleeping king

We returned to the beach the next morning to try and remedy the lack of pinniped sightings, and were not disappointed. The king penguin was still present, as were South-American terns, a Southern sea lion, and about 8 commerson dolphins. We watched the dolphins for half an hour or so as they were surfing the waves and coming into the shallows.