Hello and welcome

Hello all, and welcome to our Falkland Islands blog. Follow our progress through the wind, snow and penguins, and find out what it is like to live down here.

Thursday 29 December 2011

Escape to Bleaker ! (19 - 21 December)

We have all wanted to visit Bleaker island - close to the mainland, with its own sheep (lamb for the bbq) and cattle (milk on a good day!). Finally,our chance to escape for a couple of days to stay at Cobb's cottage, and some peace and quiet. We flew into the settlemen ton Monday 19th in glorious sunshine. Elaine and Robert live here all year round, quite alone apart from visitors (and Mike and Phyl Rendell, who own the island, whenever they are able to escape their duties in Stanley).

Cobb's cottage is very neat and rural - red roofed, all alone and surrounded by green fields, pet lambs and goslings, with a view of the jetty, the sea, and the spectacular southern giant petrels soaring overhead.

After lunch we set off for the sea lion colony, 20 minutes from the cottage - a gentle walk along the coast and then across the island. Accompanied by double banded plovers (shore birds with feet that move so fast it is hard to see them - and the tiniest babies, running alongside (think less than half the size of a wren), magellanic oystercatchers (elegant, black and white dippers, with long red daggers for beaks - capable of killing the big horrible predatory skua by stabbing..), petrels (wingspan up to nearly 2m, fabulous creatures), and the horrid horrid skua - big, brown, ruthless, and always ready to eat someone else's baby.  The sea lions were fascinating - around 30 or so, flopping noisily on the flat rocks in the sun. One huge male,with a spectacular 'mane' and a selection of females and young. The male works hard to keep his harem - growing, barking, grumbling. An adolescent male stayed in the waves just off shore,bobbing and watching - and when he saw his chance, landed and lay at the end of the colony. The established male suddenly noticed, launched across the rocks - and in a split second, the younger male was gone - he didn't hang around to question; it was clearly not yet his time.
We spent a long time sitting and watching the social behaviour - it is addictive - incredible to realise that this other world,with its social complexities and environmental difficulties, goes on completely without our interference, and in general without our knowledge.

Back to the cottage; we had asked Elaine for a bbq pack ( beef steak,lamb steak,home made beefburgers, and sausages for each of us - no veggies here), and we set off for the bbq barn to cook our supper. Excellent bbq, and fabulous sunset views. Phoebe fed the pet lambs. We wandered down to the jetty and watched the cormorants diving. Wonderful day.

Day 2 and we decided to set off with a picnic for the north of Sandy Bay, where the gentoo colony live. Falkland Islanders are not reknowned for their imagination, and Bleaker proudly boasts Sandy Bay, Sandy Bay island, Pebbly Bay, First island, Second island and Third island. Mmm
Sandy Bay is stunning; white, massive, and empty, apart from lines of magellanic and gentoo penguins trudging to the sea (and hanging about; they set off to fish and then all seem to congregate on the foreshore for a bit of a chat - it's a bit like going to the pub I think). There are also a number of cattle, which seem a little surreal set next to the penguins, but they seem to rub along. We walked up to the colony, intending to have our lunch in the company of penguin chicks, and inadvertantly entered a skua nesting site. We were dive bombed mercilessly; these are big birds, and we had to duck and run, with Bill waving sticks above our heads to fend them off.
We picnicked a couple of metres away from the colony; ate our sandwiches and then wriggled forwards on our stomachs to watch the feeding and the impressive fending off of the skuas. Most gentoos seem to produce two eggs - so two fast growing and unruly babies to control. Gorgeous pale grey balls of fluff, initially the size of your fist, but within two weeks around a foot tall, and comical to watch. The parents stretch their necks to the sky and screech, defending their young. These animals fight hard and selflessly, but many eggs are stolen and babies killed.
On the way back, we found the rockhopper colony at the top of the cliffs, behind great mounds of tussock grass. These tiny penguins, about 30cm high, chatter constantly and are always busy, running, hopping, scolding. They are enchanting; a little society of their own, with their tiny babies just hatching. They bend over like little old people and scurry around, climbing up high cliffs, hop hop with their fish to feed their family.
Around the corner is the largest colony of King Cormorants we have yet seen. Thousands of birds, all sitting on nests of eggs or chicks. Beautiful elegant birds, with swan necks, irridescent blue eyes, and orange pom poms on their beaks. As they come in to land, they hover, brake with feet down and splayed,and drop their necks into an architectural arch. Inevitably, the colony is surrounded by skuas - but again, these birds are not only courageous for their own families, but for their community; we witnessed a group of birds squaring up to a skua in front of a single nest -a line of four male cormorants in a line a bit like footballers standing in front of the goal. They took it in turns to run at the skua - a bird two or three times their size.
Another bbq, another big sky, more feeding of lambs, and a quiet quiet night; no noise, apart from the waves, no light pollution. We have become accustomed to islands without roads, lights, cars, and generally without many people. We may need to be re-socialised...
Day 3 - proper Falklands weather - this morning it hailed. We went to the shop (!)which is Robert's store shed where he keeps two big freezers full of his meat. We chose our Sunday roasts for the next few weeks, filled up our cool box, and then wandered on the beach until the heli arrived. Back to normality..
  
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Tuesday 27 December 2011

Mare Harbour Trip - Saturday 17 December

Saturday morning saw Phoebe up and out of bed a lot earlier than she (or anyone else) might have wished as we joined our neighbours for a trip around the harbour – well, Gill & Phoebe did.  Everyone had to wait for Bill to escape from work before setting sail.
Actually, there was no sail to set and for the ‘harbour’ one has to envisage only a couple of military jetties (warships, for the mooring of) surrounded by wide open spaces, interspersed with some stunning beaches (actually, that’s a description of most of the Falklands).  The boat was no kiss-me-quick special either, but our very own landing craft (military designations being kept to ourselves for obvious reasons!) which had the advantage of allowing us to land without getting wet feet.
A short trip took us to Pandora’s Point and the chance to visit the Gentoo colony there.  Cue attempts by Gill to shoo the Skuas away from the chicks and the general debate as to quite why these creatures often insist on taking a much longer land trip from the sea than seems natural.  As ever, however, there was the general contentment that seems to be associated with watching a colony of these birds looking after their young and getting on with life.
Having re-embarked, our trip over to one of the small islands was diverted for some 45 minutes when one of the Search & Rescue helicopters spied the boat and took the opportunity to practise winching on and off a moving boat – deafening, but spectacular.  SAR practice complete, we landed on the relatively small Sniper Island which, we were assured, one could walk around “in 5 minutes” – obviously by someone who had not set foot on it!  The island, less the rocky foreshore, is completely covered by tussac grass well over head height.  The tussacs were, however, separated by well-worn paths which could only have been made by the resident sea-lions and seals and so there was not too much blind charging about the place (warnings of not getting between a Sea Lion and the sea being uppermost in our minds).  Patience was rewarded by finding a splendid young male Sea Lion and a curious youngster on the south side of the island, who then proceeded to swim around the crystal-clear water (being a typical Falkland day, we had started out prepared to get cold and soaked to find ourselves now in glorious sunshine).  In all a fascinating few hours of wildlife watching – and all some 6 miles from the house!

Saunders island (again for mummy!) 16th December 2011

This was a girly trip for both mummy and I as Bill unfortunately had to stay at work. It was quite a long helicopter ride in some interesting weather conditions and at one stage we were told we might have to turn back. However, we arrived and set off first in search of the albatross colony which we found about half an hour later. When we found them, they were sitting on their nests which looked a bit like sandcastles. They were so white and their beaks were very impressive. They were also quite curious birds as one or two of them came to have a look at us a few times. Mummy said that she saw a baby chick as one of the birds stood up for a second (the lady who owned the island thought that they would all hatch in the next week or so).
After the Albatross, we headed up the hill to find a colony of Rockhopper penguins who had chicks which were probably about a week old at the most. Unhelpfully, there were two sheep also in the middle of the colony who were having difficulty trying not to step on the chicks! The Rockhoppers have red eyes which are quite scary but when you lie down next to them, they will come and see what you are. They are also quite amusing when you sit for a while and watch them.
After the Rockhoppers, we went down onto the beach and had a picnic surrounded by the Gentoo penguins and their chicks. We also saw some Magellanic penguins which nest in burrows underground and are said to be covered in flees.
After lunch, we made our way back up to the helicopter, and on the way got dive-bombed by Skewers, (which are birds which steal eggs from penguins).
By Phoebe xxxx