Feature Creatures

20060331_15537
Originally uploaded by mail2jmcl.

Finally I have seen some Argentine wildlife, and I don´t mean the Irish bars in Bariloche!

Having hooked up with Jon and Richard for a few laid-back days in hippy town El Bolsón along with their friend Jo, the three of us hopped on a night bus to the other side of Patagonia for a bit of sun, sea and the Atlantic wildlife reserve of Penninsula Valdes near Puerto Madryn.

The flat and (to my untrained eye) barren stretch of land is home to wild horses, sheeps, cows, llama-like guanacos and hares inland, but it´s the creatures who hug the coastline who draw the crowds. There are sea-lions and very cute penguins, but the main attraction is the Orca whales who, if you are really lucky, will swim up to the seal colonies during March and April in search of a mid-morning snack.

We hired a car which Richard drove at breakneck speed along the bumpy gravel roads to the Penninsula after a guy in our hostel helpfully told us over breakfast that we should have left two hours earlier, and we arrived at the viewing point to find fifty or so other tourists standing motionless staring at a patch of water just offshore from the hundreds of basking seals. After a few moments of nail-biting tension we saw the sight that inspired Spielberg: the black fin slicing through the water, mere feet from the beach.

It was soon joined by at least three others, and they obligingly swam up and down along the coast right in front of the gaping tourists for around 90 minutes. They apparently weren´t hungry so we weren´t treated the very rare sight of them sliding up the sand to grab an unsuspecting seal pup which, to be honest, might have offended my delicate vegetarian sensibilities. It was still an awe-inspiring experience and I´m glad the seals got to live another day. (This is the closest picture I could find to what I actually saw - mine will be up any day now!)