About halfway between Buenos Aires and Cape Horn along the Atlantic coast, our ship negotiated the narrow entrance to Golfo Nuevo and docked at the city of Puerto Madryn. The city itself is of only moderate interest, but it is the jumping-off point for two of the most spectacular wildlife settings in the world: Pennisula Valdes and Punta Tomba.
Our tour for the day was to
Punta Tomba, located 100 miles south of Puerto Madryn and the site of the
largest Magallenic penguin rookery in the world.
We dressed for cooler weather
today. Temps in the low 60’s with
wind. So we dug out our jeans and windbreakers
and were set to go. It was a 2.5 hour
drive to the penguin reserve. The
landscape looked very much like Wyoming to us.
We arrived at Punta Tomba and
started our hike down the path toward the ocean. Hundreds of thousands of penquins and a
variety of birds migrate to this area every year from September to April. The penguins court, mate, and hatch a brood
of chicks and are ready to migrate to warmer climates in Uruguay and Brazil by
April.
There were penguins everywhere
you looked, as far as you could see. As
I was unable to gather them together for a group photo, I just photographed a
few of them. There was a constant stream
of penguins going back and forth between the nests and the sea. These are Magellenic penquins, also called
Jackass penguins because they sound just like a donkey braying.
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| A Llama seen from the bus |
It was an interesting day. We’ll be seeing more penguins over the next
few days. Leaving Puerto Madryn, we now
sail toward the Falkland Islands, where the weather will be cooler and the seas
a little bumpy.
How fun, I love to watch penguins. I was surprised at the landscape....it does look a lot like Wyoming.
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