More Pinguins !!!
Trip Start
Mar 01, 2006
1
277
551
Trip End
Dec 01, 2007
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Isla de los Pinguinos,
Argentina
Thursday, March 1, 2007
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This morning we woke up at 7 in our trailer. The night had been cold, with freezing air passing through the many holes of the container, but thanks to our electrical heater it had been a sweet night. We called Hector, and he said the weather was ok to go out. We got up, and Lionel tried to go take a shower... the camping owners had closed the toilet block, and the reception was closed too. We had to do a quick washing on a tap outside, and we we pissed on the wall, because we needed a place sheltered from the wind, and also because we were upset. We are bad, hey?
We went to the pier, where a 6m semi-rigid boat was waiting for us. Hector gave us raincoats and lifevests, and we all hopped in the boat, with two other crew members (Leandro the son of Hector and Massimiliano a friend of theirs). There was just enoug space on the boat. We exited the Ria and quickly were in open sea, where we followed the coast for one hour before reaching la Isla de los Pinguinos.
The wind was pretty strong, creating waves of a reasonable size. Hector was the only one who had accepted to take us out, the other 2 operators wanted more people to go, and did not like the weather.
With the wind and waves, we were splashed over and over, which is normal. We were freezing. But the sun was going up, radiating a bit of heat, and on the way we passed by Magellan pinguins and sea lions, who were sticking their heads out of the water to watch us, and then diving all of a sudden. There were also imperial cormorans, floating around in the water, flapping like mad to raise up in the air above us, before flying in front of the boat for a while.
We were hoping to see dolphins (Doninas, which are small, black and white dolphins), who usually come around the boat to swim along, but we were unlucky for that.
We set foot on the island, or rather periliously jumped from the boat onto the rocks, and we were still freezing, with a wind to unhorn the cows, as we say. We walked to a small hut, where we left our lifejackets and raincoats, and we started exploring the island.
First thing: there were Magellan pinguins absolutely everywhere, a bit more shy than in Punta Tombo, running away like hell as we approached, tripping on rocks, keeping running on their belly, standing up again while running with the held of their arms. Hilarious, although we did not provoke it for fun. We walked to the light house, abandoned and falling apart... but still good enough for the pinguins, who made their nests everywhere in there!
Then we walked along the coast, the wind was freezing but a the same time our clothes were getting dryer, and the sun was there, strong in a blue sky, with an occasional cloud passing by. We eventualy found the rockhopper pinguins, with their typical yellow "eyebrows" that continue over their head, like a carnival mask with floating feathers. I had seen a few in the Doubtful Sound, in New Zealand, and they are also dead funny, getting ready to move from a rock to another, and hop! , jumping over in a big leap followed by smaller hops, cause that's their way of moving when they are on land, thus their name... got it?
There were not many of them, but we got really close, as our path was going straight through where they were standing. And we saw them hop hop hop. And we saw babies too, and youngsters who were changing their feathers (don't know how to say that in english, have to look it up - en train de muer, quoi).
Then we walked along the coast, on the rocks, and arrived near a beach where were lying a lot of sea lions, and a sea elephant. The sea lions there were all males, some of them really huge. There were also a lot of sea birds, and a group of pinguins. Hector told us that this island was a place where usually old sea lions come to die. There were a lot of dead and well dried sea lions and pinguins all over the island, having died there or been thrown ashore by the waves.
We sat there for a while, watching the animals, drinking coffee and mate. Then we continued walking around the island, avoiding to disturb the colony of sea lions (we did though, as once they got under the wind from us they did not like the smell and started being nervous, but we were really far so all wecould say was... sorry?)
We picked up a few sea lion teeths from very old remains, they are impressive. On one beach there were dozens of scattered squeletons of pinguins and sea lions.
We took our lunch while Leandro and Massi were still freezing on the boat waiting for us, and Massi was throwing up too because of the waves (from then on they called him "vomitor", interesting, hey?). We prepared their snadwiches before heading back on the rocks, from where we jumped on the boat. Hector told us he had fallen in the water the previous time... I con't even imagine that happening, it was tooooo coooooold!
Back to the camping, we agreed on the program for the next day: weather permiting, we would go to Cabo Blanco, to have a big asado and, weather permitting, a dive with the lobos (sea lions).
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Comments
welcome in hell
Waouu ils sont démodiaques tes pingouins!!!Fait gaffe si tu veu les embrocher, tu va cuire en enfer...!