Stanley, Falklands Islands

March 10^th, 2024

We had an extremely rough and bumpy night, and I did not think that things were looking good for the tenders ashore. 25 minutes trying to get to the dock in rough seas didn’t seem to be on the cards.

But suddenly, the wind died down and the sun came out. The announcement was made that we could collect our tender tickets. Yay! We were going ashore.

The 25 minute ride in the tender was quite rough, but we have experienced worse, and with penguins as our goal, I didn’t mind at all.

Finally we arrived at the dock, and it looked just like we were back in the UK!

We had booked our tour to Volunteer Point through Shaun Jeffrey, and Patrick, his representative met us at the dock, and showed us, and another couple we had met on the tender, to our awaiting Land Rover, and our driver, John. Off we set, joining the convoy of the other 4X4 vehicles in search of penguins.

Stanley is very small, and in no time we were travelling through the countryside, looking very much like we were in the Orkneys.

We started off on a paved road that was in excellent condition, but we soon turned off and continued driving along a very dusty dirt road. I thought I could see why we needed the 4 wheel drive vehicles.

At Port Louis there was a brief comfort stop, and that was where the road ended. From here on we had to drive through a farm on a muddy track.

It started off well, but rapidly deteriorated, and all of the vehicles struggled to get through. Then the inevitable happened. One of the vehicles got stuck in the mud. It felt just like being on safari again. No sooner had that vehicle been extracted than it got stuck again. Our progress towards Volunteer Point was going very slowly, but we were moving in the right direction. And then we were the ones who got stuck and had to be pulled out of the mud.

Things were going well again, but then we had to cross a stream. We needed to put planks down in order to do this, so that was another delay.

Finally, Volunteer Point was in sight!

Before we could go and see the penguins we had to walk through a trough of disinfectant, and listen to a talk on how to behave around the penguins, then finally we were free to go and enjoy watching them.

First we saw the king penguins.

They were a very noisy lot, and seemed to be very busy doing nothing. I was so happy to finally be among the penguins. The wait was totally worthwhile. They were amazing, and seemed to be totally unfazed by us being there.

We had been told to keep our distance, but of course someone tried to grab one. I know it was tempting, but sometimes you just have to follow the rules.

After watching the king penguins we walked down to the beach to see the Magellanic penguins. The sand was the whitest sand I have ever seen.

The wind was blowing the sand everywhere, but the penguins didn’t seem to mind at all.

Our time with the penguins was fleeting, so we left the Magellenics and headed to see the gentoos. They were much quieter and it seemed to be penguin nap time.

There were little white feathers flying everywhere, the penguins were molting!

Then all too soon it was time to return to our Land Rover.

It had taken us 3 and a half hours to get here, and we began our drive back to Stanley at 1:30. With the last tender leaving at 5:00 I must say I was quite anxious about getting there in time. We asked John if people on the tour had ever missed the boat. He replied that it had happened, and the people stayed overnight in Stanley. Their ship came back to pick them up the next morning. Hmmmmm. I can’t see the Sapphire Princess coming back to pick us up. Now I was really worried. What if the other cars got stuck in the mud? What if we got stuck in the mud? What if we had to build another bridge? Well. There was no use worrying. I had seen penguins. I was happy.

The drive back was just as slow and muddy, but apparently we were given permission to use a route less traveled which wasn’t quite as boggy. One of the vehicles still got stuck, but that didn’t slow us down much, and the drive along the coast, (and on the beach!) was really lovely.

We were back in Stanley in good time!

We were able to take a photo of the church, and visit the supermarket to replenish my supply of British chocolates. No Cadbury Dairy Milk or Flakes, but there were Smarties and peppermint Aeros so life was good. I was also able to get some McVities chocolate digestive biscuits so all was well.

I had really wanted a penguin T shirt from the Falklands, but being the end of the season, there were none left, so I had to make do with penguin socks and a Falklands T towel.

The tender ride back to the ship was relatively smooth. Although it was cold and windy at Volunteer Point, it was sunny and dry, so no complaints about the weather. We have been so lucky.

We had our last glimpse of penguins as we sailed out of the bay. It has been a really good day.