Wednesday’s excursion into the world of natural wonders is brought to you from Punta Tombo, land of over 170,000 breeding pairs of Magellanic penguins. A decent drive south from Puerto Madryn finds you at a rookery unlike anything I had expected.
I mean, penguins live on the ice, right? As it turns out, not all of them!
Magellanic penguins hang out in Patagonia where the water is still frigid enough to mean they dress just as smartly as other penguins, but they build burrows in the arid, desert landscape and share the hills with guanacos, skuas, seagulls, foxes, hares, snakes and rodents. It’s quite the sight to see a black and white penguin against a backdrop of gravel, low brush and sand, nesting in the open or under a small bush, not huddled together for warmth against a polar wind.
Dude looks pretty pleased with himself 
Penguins in the desert. What the? 
Sun-baking is better with friends 
Punta Tombo Nature Reserve 
I’m ready for my close up Mr de Mille 
Meeting the locals at Punta Tombo
They still make much the same sounds though and the chorus was magical. We spent over an hour walking a path between burrows, overlooking the steppe to the sea where they go to fish and stopping to let them cross the path – where else would you see official signage saying “Give way to penguins”?
Yep, definitely Argentina 
Magellanic penguin colony at Punta Tombo 
Desert dwelling penguins with beachfront burrows. Of course. 
Skuas at Punta Tombo 
Big Sky, Patagonia 
Big sky at Punta Tombo
I was one of the lucky ones to see a few parents stand up to feed their tiny babies. The little chirps from a tiny ball of fluff no bigger than your hand were heart-achingly awwwwwwwww-inspiring….right up until the parent flattened them again as they lay back down. The adults get up to 45cm at full size but when born they weigh no more than 80-100gm, just tiny, downy tufts of grey.
Awwww, bebe! 
Bebe! 
Nesting is tough work 
Bebe! – Punta Tombo
From the colony we went onto Gaiman, a town built on a river, by Welsh settlers from around 1860’s who were fleeing English oppression and left their mark with distinctly Welsh tea houses, a Welsh/Argentinian school and a continuing tradition of exchange students from Wales. The landscape changes dramatically as you come down from on the top of the steppe to the valley below, made verdant by the Welsh-engineered irrigation channels. Cherry trees, vegetable crops, tall poplar trees, green grass and numerous rose bushes. Kagan and I took a shared tea service that included a giant tea pot of robust tea (compete with tea cosy of course), homemade bread and jams, cheese and 7 different kinds of sweet cakes and slices. With the tune “It’s a long way to Tipperary” (yes, I think that’s Irish, huh?), it felt like I was nowhere near Argentina.
We also made a stop at the Museo Paleontológico Egidio Feruglio – a marvellous Dinosaur museum in Trelew. It features fossils from the biggest dinosaur discovered – the Patagotitan
A wee bit of Wales in Argentina. Ty Cymraeg Casa de Te in Gaiman 
Ty Cymraeg Tea House 
All I need is a drink and I’d never have to move 
Tyrannotitan: the giant carnivorous dinosaur at the Museo Paleontologico Egidio Feruglio in Trelew 
Patagotitan dinosaur leg bones – The biggest of all the dinos with an estimated weight of 74 tons, 40m long, 8m high.
Back on the bus it was a long drive back to Puerto Madryn (everywhere is a long way from everywhere here), Kagan and I had a great chat about strange people and their idiosyncrasies. We got back just in time to walk around town and buy groceries before battling for supremacy in the hostel kitchen. Now, I think Iron Chef should have a super-finale with the added challenge of using a hostel kitchen with at least 7 different languages, 3 bent saucepans, 5 odd frypans, no sharp knives, the world’s smallest chopping board, and people trying to either burn the place down, play cards in the corner and everyone drinking 970ml bottles of local beer. And at the end, we ALL end up with pasta: the staple diet of every backpacker.
We stayed up past midnight talking, time passes in the flashest of flashes (to quote Rowan Atkinson. But who can guess the movie?). The sun is up till at least 7pm which I find terribly confusing so dinner is usually at 9…you can imagine how well that lasts when you’re doing 9-10hr excursion days with 6.30am wake up’s.
But it’s all so totally worth it. Es Pura Vida!!!