Spring Moon of the Southern Cross
51 degrees 00 minutes S 57 degrees 27 minutes W course 000 degrees, due north
The Falklands are in our rearview and we’re headed due north to Buenos Aires. The next two days are at sea.
Have you ever seen a rockhopper penguin? They’re pretty damned cute. Long feathers, light colored, jut out from over their bright red eyes and, darned if they don’t, they hop from rock to rock. They’re shorter than the Magellanic penguins we saw in Otway Bay, Chile, but their markings are black and white, too.
When they move between rocks in rockhopper mode, they hunch their shoulders forward and look like Dickensian accountants, shoulders stooped by many years working for Scrooge and wild eyebrows to shield their eyes from candle flame too close. Their manner as they hop seems very serious, as if hopping required all their avian skill, as it well might for all I know.
Getting to see them found Kate and me in a Land Rover, well used, with the exhaust pipe up and curved away from the driver’s side window, accompanied by two Albertans and driven by Rod, a twenty-five year resident of the islands.
Rod has done a lot of tour guide type work, but has a certain flexibility that accounts for his residence in these islands. He spent several years in Cairo where he said, “The working Egyptian is just like anybody else. And, if they have just enough money in their pocket for a Coke, they’ll give it you.”
A twelve month contract brought him to the Falklands and he’s never left.
He did clean up work following the Falklands war and, demonstrating flexibility again, met a guy in the Globe Tavern, the local pub, on his way to Antarctica. “I need somebody to cook for my crew,” the guy told Rod. “What kind of cooking?” “Regular stuff.” “I can do that.” Rod ended up in Antarctica for 8 weeks, paid to be there as a cook. When he got back, the guy put a 10,000 pound check in his hand.
Rod drives for Murrell Farms, the owner of the land on which the rockhopper’s nest. A small farm by Falkland standards Rod estimated it at 9,000 acres. They raise sheep for the most part though they have a few head of cattle, too.
The sheepherding occurs on motorbike or 4X4. On the latter they have a small shelf on which sit two cattle dogs. They drive out to the herd, let the dogs out and the dogs return the herd to the shearing spot. “This is,” Rod said, “A lot less work for the dogs than when they used horses. Then, the dogs had to run out and back.”
As you might imagine, a sheep farm does not have well traveled roads, especially since they use 4X4’s and motorbikes, so the one hour ride back to the rookery took us over up and down terrain, some muddy spots and a land filled with small holes and sudden drop offs. Rod and the others in our little safari, three LandRovers, a Mitsubishi SUV and a Ford pickup with the large cab, knew the trail well and we had as comfortable a ride as the conditions permitted.
The rockhopper location itself was not very large, perhaps 300 feet long and thirty feet wide on top of a rocky promontory that overlooked the Atlantic below where the penguin’s mortal enemies, the sealions, live.
Digital cameras along as many photos as you want, so I took a lot. Penguins on eggs. Penguins hugging. Penguins directing traffic. Penguins hunched over, rockhopping. Penguins crying in alarm as juveniles prowled around looking for mates. Penguins standing alone looking out to sea. Penguins watching us watch them.
Oh, and a local note. When I visited the port-a-potty for a quick break, I proudly noted the Made in Minneapolis, Minnesota stamp on it. As it happens, Jon (stepson) went to school at Breck with the folks who have made millions selling just these units. And here they were in the Falklands.
Port Stanley could be in the English countryside. It has the telly booths, public houses, a Thatcher Drive, their own pound notes, a proud post office making a big deal out of Falkland stamps. They drive on the left side of the road and have an English school system with small classes which includes college at Winchester College in England at age 16 and, if the kids do well, university after that. The schools are modern and well maintained.
This is a place it would be fun to come to for vacation, if it weren’t so far from home. In fact, Kate and I have liked Ushuaia and the Falklands well enough to live in either place, although they have the same problem as our third favorite, Hawai’i. Too expensive for travel to see the kids or for the kids to come see us.
The trip after Valparaiso, which began in Puerto Montt, included the Chilean fjords and several glaciers, went on to Punta Areanas, then Tierra del Fuego and Ushuaia, finishing here in the Falklands has been by far my favorite part of the trip. Cooler, for one thing, but also terrain and wildlife that was both exotic, yet somewhat familiar, and an isolation that appeals to both Kate and me.
The next few days return us to Latin America, Buenos Aires, Montevideo and Rio, then home.
