The Falkland Islands
After a day at sea, we reached West Falkland Island
yesterday morning and headed out early to see the island and its teeming penguin
and albatross rookeries. All excursions
require loading ourselves into zodiac boats, wonderful pontoon boats that are
very stable and can go just about anywhere.
Our first landing was on a dock, so “dry” except for the spray from the
waves and wind. Rain pants and rainproof
jackets are essential, as are high-topped rubber boots for “wet” landings.
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| Settlement on West Falkland Island |
Our first hike was across a ridge
from one side of the island to the other—about 1 ½ miles and 350 feet (not an
impressive hike by Colorado standards, but very pretty). We arrived at a steep area of rock fall that
is the nesting area for thousands of Rockhopper Penguins and Black-browed
Albatrosses. The former are small
animals with spiky headdresses, while the albatrosses are huge. They mix it up all together in this rookery,
with lots of snorting, shrieking and howling.
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| Caracara landing on West Falkland Island |
The Rockhopper Penguins are really
remarkable. They nest high up in the
tufted grass, which means that they have to hop down to the water to get food
and then hop back up again to get to the nest.
With each hop, they obviously are lifting their full body weight, so it
has to be exhausting as their nests are usually 300 to 500 feet above the sea. One parent sits on the nest for a couple of
weeks, eating nothing, while the other parent heads out to sea as far as
necessary to find food (sometimes hundreds of miles). Upon her or his return, the now well-fed
parent regurgitates food for the chick, if the chick has hatched, and then
takes over parenting duties while the hungry parent goes out to sea for several
weeks to feed. If the egg is left alone
for even an instant, it will be devoured by the circling gulls, cormorants and
caracaras.
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| Rockhopper Penguin pair nesting |
Don and I hiked back over one of
their mountains, which on West Falkland Island, are about 1000 feet high,
seeing lots of birds and sheep. The
Islands aren’t much good for farming, so the primary agricultural activity is
raising sheep on these barren and rocky bits of earth sticking up out of the
Atlantic.
The farmer’s family, living in what
the Islanders call a “settlement” (a farmhouse with outbuildings) provided tea
and delicious cakes to all 119 of us. I’m
sure it is a good source of cash for them, as they are very isolated and quite
self-sufficient, but with little ability to generate cash. This particular family has a rambling
farmhouse, herds of sheep, a windmill and diesel generator for electricity, a
spring for their water, which is now piped into the house, and an extensive
vegetable garden to feed themselves year-round.
Most Islanders grow vegetables for their families in their backyards
and/or greenhouses. There are no roads,
though they do have a couple of Land Rovers to take tourists across the island
on rutted tracks. All travel off the
island is by boat.
In the afternoon, we sailed around
West Falkland Island to Saunders Island, where we once again landed on shore
via Zodiacs. This time the wind had
picked up, so the surf was pretty high as we plowed through it. We piled off the sides of the pontoons into
the surf, grateful for our rubber boots and waterproof pants, and stumbled
ashore onto a beautiful, white sand beach.
This island has Gentoo and King
Penguins, also nesting in a number of rookeries. There is a huge area where albatross nest as
well, so lots of activity despite the need to incubate the eggs and protect
them from the large birds that always hang around the nesting areas. The king penguins are beautiful, tall,
stately birds, with patches of bright yellow on their heads and necks. They ignore the tourists but are very pleased
to be photographed.
Today, we spent the day in Stanley,
the only town of the Falklands. I will
write more about it tomorrow. All these
islands are rocky and barren, with no trees and lots of gorse in full bloom,
brought by the British to serve as hedgerows, but now an invasive pest on much
of the islands. About 2100 people live
in Stanley and 600 in the “camp”, the rural areas on the other islands. They are a British Overseas Territory, with a
British-appointed governor, and an 8 member (5 from Stanley and 3 from the
camps) elected legislature that governs these specks of land. More about their politics and fears of
Argentina tomorrow.
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| Black browed albatross nesting |
Meanwhile, we are back at sea for 2 ½
days, heading to South Georgia Island, where we hope the weather will let us
land (meaning winds below 35 knots and surf that won’t crash over the Zodiacs).
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| View from West Falkland mountain |
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