Antarctic Expedition Dec 19 West Point



Rockhopper penguin - they seemed to be about 1 foot tall, or less.

West Point is a private island at the west, obviously, of the Falkland Islands. It is a nature reserve owned by a couple who live there, and have built a small pier that tenders can use to load and unload passengers. The island is one of many extraordinary areas in the Falklands for seeing birds. In this case Rockhopper Penguins, and Albatrosses. It’s a 1.2-mile walk to the Rockhopper rookery, so it’s a good thing that they and the Albatrosses nest together.

Our trip was the first of the included excursions, which all of our Antarctic landings will be also, so I’m counting this as the first of those adventures even if we are not officially in the Antarctic yet. For the Antarctic landings we will be going in on 12 passenger zodiacs, not the 60 person tenders. Essentially only 100 people can be on land at any one time, and that means that when the weather permits landings, we will only have about 2 hours max to make the trip, for each group. The tender loading at Stanley dissolved into a real mess, of a type I haven’t seen since I watched the Chinese board an airplane at the Chongquin airport. We almost had a riot. To avoid that in the Antarctic zodiac loadings we have each been given a round badge with a letter on it. There are 4 or 5 colors of badges, which will indicate which group you will load with, and the letter indicates which zodiac you will be in. Mary Alice and I are white-A. That meant that for West Point we took the last tenders out, at 1:45 p.m.

The morning was cold, foggy, and drizzly. First group out at 7:45 a.m. By 1:5 p.m. the sun was coming out, it had warmed up, and we had the finest weather for the trip. Those who are last shall be first, as they say. We tendered for about 15 minutes to an idyllic setting where a small farm was set amongst large patches of scotch broom in bloom, the grasses green, the sky blue with white clouds, and the water a beautiful blue. You could have sold it to me as a great place to retire.

We walked up a somewhat steep hill and then traversed the island on a slightly rolling g path. Our first wildlife encounter (not counting the farm geese and cow) was a Striated Caracara – a raptor – which was walking slowly near the trail, looking for prey. It did not care about us in the least, and I got some great photographs. We passed 3 or 4 of them en route to the rookery.

Like the Caracara, neither Albatross nor Rockhopper penguin show any concern because people are around them. A rough path has been created through the tussock grasses, which surround the rocky part of the rookery. Birds nest in the tussocks too as we could clearly hear, but none were visible. The rookery itself was a few hundred feet above the sea in a kind of steep valley. To the left rises the highest cliff in the Falklands, about 1100 units high (feet? Meters?) The penguins walk up, along a trail they have made; the Albatross fly in, and were doing so continually while we were there, at times flying only a few feet above our heads. From the ship, which has been accompanied by albatrosses for several days, it is hard to see that they have about a 7-foot wingspan. From the ground it was easy, and still hard to believe ones eyes.

The Albatrosses tend to have actual nests, possibly in the tussocks. The Rockhopper penguins, who do hop through the rocks, raise their young in between the Albatrosses. Mostly they get along. We did see one squabble between one penguin and a nearby Albatross. More frequent, I believe, are squabbles between penguin families. We saw and photographed one of these. Both species had chicks, and it was possible to see the Rockhoppers feeding their young. They point their heads up in the air as if really enjoying life, and make this strange sound as they regurgitate food for the chick. The chick hears it, I guess, for it pops up from under the other penguin of the pair, head up and beak open.

I took more pictures than Mr. Kodak imagined possible on his best days when he invented the pocket camera, only all digital of course. I think 60+ survived the cull. With luck I’ll post one today.

Home in Stanley

As we left Stanley yesterday it was like sailing off the edge of the world. We are still in the Falklands today, visiting a penguin colony at West Point – but only 2 people live on the island and they are the last people we will see for 9 days who are not attached to the Marco Polo, unless we visit one of the scientific bases in Antarctica.

Its not that we will be lonely. There are something like 1000 passengers and crew on board. But we must be self-contained from here on out. Passengers who have not gotten 12” high waterproof boots (I got mine at the Bootlegger in Garberville) will not be allowed to land in Antarctica. Likewise those without waterproof pants. Why is this? Because in the Zodiacs going from ship to land we are likely to get wet, and we may have to step into the Southern Ocean to get out of the boat. Temperatures will hover around zero and if the weather changes for the worse, we may be stranded on the rocky Antarctic shore for up to 24 hours. That’s a long time, but if you are wet its life threatening so, if you can’t dress so you will stay dry, you stay on board. Until we left Stanley it was possible to buy what you needed.

This is also largely true of camera supplies – need a special battery? Out of luck. Any problems with the camera, and no photos. Of course you can probably get what you need once you return to Buenos Aires, but that’s going to be a bit late. So we double-checked everything yesterday. We have spare batteries, battery chargers, extra memory cards, good boots, waterproof pants – the works, I hope.

It is very foggy at West Point and a drizzly rain was falling as the first tender loads of our expedition went ashore to peek at penguins, and see the exotic birds. The waters around the ship were full of penguins this morning, traveling in small groups, heads just above the water, and then suddenly the entire group dives. The ocean where they were is empty and it makes one wonder if it were all an illusion, then they reemerge popping up to do it all over again. Occasionally one leaps right out of the water while making its dive. There are other birds as well, some swimming, some flying out of the fog then back into it.

My camera is working well. I figured that the ideal camera for the Antarctic would be digital, with a good pixel count and a powerful optical zoom lens. One model leapt out to meet this description. It is an Olympus with 8 mega pixels and an 18 power optical zoom. I got a couple of 2 meg memory cards (each will hold hundreds of pictures, and I download to the Mac laptop every evening so I can take more.) I have 3 sets of rechargeable batteries, and a spare backup camera with a 10 power zoom. Seemed great 2 years ago. There are little tricks to the cameras that are no doubt in the instruction books, which I never read because they are impenetrable. One is when on the long zoom half way click the button before pushing it all the way down to take the shot. That focuses the shot at the long zoom. Last night I discovered burst shooting – the camera will take 15 or so shots really quickly –I thought this would be useful for birds in flight so I tested it this morning. Like most digitals, my Olympus has a delay between the moment you press the button and the time when it takes the shot. That moment still exists in burst mode, but once it starts shooting it sounds like a machine gun, only quieter. Looking at the pictures is like seeing a flipbook movie. Now I’ll get a shot of the Cape Petrel, if another one shows up.

We have been getting some excellent presentations by our “expedition team” – i.e. the people who know things about Antarctica who have come aboard the cruse to make presentations and be resources for us while we are in the Antarctic region. ,

One is Peter Hillary, son of the Hillary who first climbed Everest. He has been to a number of quite remote places –but is anywhere really remote any more? He went to the north pole and while he was there a U.S. submarine surfaced through the ice – he had some astonishing film of it. Then as he was atop Mount Everest for the second time in his career, looking about at the spectacular scenery, there was a sudden sound. It was his satellite phone, someone calling to ask how he liked it up there.

He made a very entertaining presentation discussing his rather astounding trips, and one theme running through them all was this interconnectedness that now encompasses the globe. Of course you could go to the top of Everest without your phone, but to get the money to make the trip you need sponsors, like radio stations who want to share with their listeners your experiences as you are having them.

Remember that cruise ship that sank in the Antarctic a few weeks back – that sank at the place we will reach on the Marco Polo within 100 hours? They were rescued by another cruise ship that was less than 100 miles away from them . At the Falklands Phiatelic desk they showed me a list of the cruise ships expected in December 2007. There were somewhere between 15-20 of them, and another passenger reports that the season total will be about 90. Of course those that visit Antarctica almost all visit a few points on the Antarctic peninsula – a small northern appendage of a huge continent. Its as if the only visitors to North America only reached the Atlatnic coast of Florida. Very few Antarctic ships go even to South Georgia (coindicence of names) much less around the re ist of the continenet. Those trips are still rare, possibly 1 or 2 a year into the Weddel sea, and quite expensive (you should see the bill for this much more modest trip). So there are probably places where you can be really isolated – you and 100 other tourists and 100 more crew, that is.

But, I’m not complaining. The Marco Polo is realistically the only way I would ever get to set foot on the continent of Antarctica, so its ok with me to travel in company.

We are anchored in the bay outside Stanley, the largest town in the Falkland Islands. The water is not deep enough at the dock for the Marco Polo to come in, so we take 15 tender rides from the ship to the dock. It is mostly overcast and a bit foggy, about 50 degrees today. The sun broke through for a few minutes in the afternoon.
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I like Stanley. What can I say? It is orderly, no slums, no poverty, and a great Philatelic Bureau. That was my first stop. I walked in and said “I want to buy some stamps, I have an account with you.” I do, but it was a bluff. To my amazement they agreed, and said I could charge my purchases to my account.

I was after covers – envelopes with stamps from the Falklands used on them. I mailed myself a number of them, using different stamps, then mailed some more with too little postage, addressed to me at the Stanley post office. They put postage due stamps on these. Extremely helpful and friendly peope behind the counter.

Then we went looking for yarn for Mary Alice to knit. Last time we had found an interesting little shop. This time it was out of business. In fact our map showed a number of businesses ranging from gift shops to internet cafes, and many of them were gone. Other businesses had taken their place. Somehow I thought of Stanley as unchanging, but now I think of it like Garberville with the sea bringing tourists rather than US 101. Businesses come and go.

The stamp store was closed as the sole prop. Is also a tour guide. Another potential yarn shop out of business. We ran into friends and went to Deano’s Bar for fish and chips. The bartender was an immigrant. He had moved to the Falklands from St. Helena (where Napolean was send in exile and died). Strange. Fish and chips came with canned peas.
All good but the peas.

We hit pay dirt next street down. Geniune Falklands yarn. Then the Pink Shop, which had moved, had a great selection of books, artwork, and backpacks. Got a backpack to carry rain gear on the hike tomorrow. The weather is changeable here. Bought a cover. But, they didn’t take credit cards and we were out of money. So I walked down to the bank and got $100 in US dollars on my credit card – no ATM this was an over the counter transaction. Getting dollars was very lucky since the Falkland Pound is not usable off the islands.

I also bought a book – it was a diary kept by a resident during the 74 day Argentine occupation during 1982. I was up till midnite reading it. The Argentines were not unpleasant, it seems, they were inefficient, with a confused command structure that showed no concern for the soldiers, some of whom died from lack of equipment that would withstand the cold. Biggest complaint, the Argentines made Falklanders drive on the right side of the road. I understate the problems – especially as the infrastructure collapsed under the strain of thousands of new inhabitants. But the Argentines idea was they were liberating the inhabitants, not waging war against them. The British battle to retake the islands created the most stressful times as there were bombings and shelling, houses afire, and all the dangers of being in a war zone. Fortunately the Argentines surrendered before the ground battle actually got into the town itself.

Its 25 years later but Falkland history is still divided into pre-occuation and ost-occupation, and one tour from the ship was a battlefield tour.

We're back. It is Sunday so virtually everything in Puerto Madryn was closed. Those things that were open today were open in non-siesta hours, it seems. We walked around a bit, and then we heard the drums of a parade. It was about a block long with many banners, some of which had writing on them but none of which we could read. The parade went for several blocks to the beach where it turned into a rally. I decided on little evidence except thinking that I saw “Jesus” on one banner, that it was Protestant evangelicals – on the grounds that Jesus made it religious, and I didn’t see any obvious signs of it being a catholic march – no saints, no priests. No protestant priests either, could have been a political march for all I know. Still, I love a parade.

Lunch was once again a process of a very friendly Spanish only speaking waitress and us trying to work through the menu. I got langoustines con bacon, which turned out to be shrimp or as they called them prawns, on rice with a lot of cream sauce and some chunks of bacon – but not crisp fried bacon. It was good, and more to the point, it was a single serving. Mary Alice again got a plate full of fried seafood that could have fed several people. It was about $20 with a double sized beer and a coke.

The waitress called a taxi and we went out to the Ecocentro, “not to be missed,” said Lonely Planet. They also said open 12-8 every day or something similar. No way. I checked while the cab waited. It was open 10-1 on cruise ship days (it was 1: 20 when we got there) and then 5-8pm which put us at risk of missing the boat and having to fly to Chile so we could fly to the Falklands to meet our cruse. So we cabbed back to town, where we found the Municipal Art Museum. Closed. It would open at 5pm. That was pretty much a bust.

Then we meet another couple from the boat who wanted to taxi to Punta Loma for the sea lion colony. $10 each and the driver waits while you look at the wildlife. We went for it and soon were sliding around on this gravel road. Admission was $20, only that’s pesos not US dollars, and then we were standing on the observation platform looking down into this small cove packed with sea lions, and more coming in every minute. Above the sea lions on the cliffs were nesting cormorants with chicks that were pretty big. Pix if possible to upload.

We must have hung out at Punta Loma an hour or so, got great pictures, then slipped and slid back to town on the gravel road. We visited a supermarket and I looked at some craft items, like wooden vases. All Hetcho in China, just like home.

Nice sunset as we sailed away