Author Archives: Steve Walker

About Steve Walker

Once a tech in-house PR type, now professional photo/videographer and recreational drone pilot. Violinist. Flautist. Occasional conductor. Oenophile.

Falkland Islands 2 – Carcass

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Sunday 10 March 2024 (pm) – The stabilisers on Hondius did a good job of countering the waves as the ship was carefully navigated around to Carcass Island, also off West Falkland; the wind was still strong, but the landing area looked calm enough.

We landed near a settlement and – praise be! – there was a jetty.

Mind you, because of the state of the tide and the slime at the foot of the jetty, we had to disembark part way up, which was a bit of a step up.

There were, broadly speaking, two options for the afternoon: stay near the landing area and drop into the settlement for tea and cakes; or go for a longish walk before dropping into the settlement for tea and cakes. I suppose there might have been an option which didn’t include tea and cakes, but no-one seemed interested in that one.

On the path to the settlement, a tussac bird checked us out.

(I assume that the “tussac” in the name of this bird means the same as the more familiar “tussock”. On several occasions we have had to deal with tussock grass, which, believe me, is not just grass growing in tussocks, oh dear me no. In the Falklands and South Georgia it is a specific plant, Poa Flabbelata, as any fule kno, whose growth builds an ever-increasing pedestal which supports its leaves and can grow up to the height of a man. This provides shelter for animals and a major trip hazard for humans. For example, one passenger on Hondius had been medevacked on his first attempt to do this trip because the tussock grass concealed a hole which caused his ankle to break in spectacular fashion.)

So, off we went on the walk along a track normally used by local 4x4s.

The info we’d been given asserted that this walk was a chance to see local wildlife, and I suppose it was, provided what you wanted to see was upland geese. There were loads of them,

but for most of the walk out, very little else. Jane spotted a dark-faced ground tyrant and I managed to catch it before it buggered off,

but apart from that and a few kelp geese spotted in the distance

there was nothing on offer on a long and, frankly, dull walk.

After a couple of wildlifeless kilometres, we decided to turn back, and discovered that what was dull became tedious in the extreme, as we had to stumble back against the infamous Falkland Island wind. It really was hard work, with the only photographic reward being the spotting by Jane of a couple of magellanic penguins standing guard on their burrows.

I guess I’m being a bit harsh in describing the walk as dull – under other circumstances a bracing walk through the countryside in streaming sunshine would be a pleasure. But I felt that an expedition-style outing should have a bit more pith and moment – or just make it a brief stop for tea, cakes and a look at the wildlife around the landing area.

Having struggled back against the wind, it was nice to get into the house where the tea and cakes were on offer (we had to take off our Muck boots before hand, which is not too surprising, as there was a certain amount of mud around on the paths). It was an impressive spread

and the tea was very welcome. Everyone rhapsodised about the how wonderful the baked goods were, but actually I wasn’t as impressed as they were; I thought the chocolate stuff wasn’t chocolatey enough, the shortbread wasn’t quite as sweet as I like, and the macaroons were nice enough but not quite the melt-in-the-mouth treat that a proper macaroon can be. They had ginger biscuits, which were nice, and Jane gave the mince pies the thumbs-up; and it was nice to have a rest after struggling along against that relentless wind.

It was less fun to discover, when I got outside, that someone had taken one of my boots and left one of theirs which was slightly, but tellingly, smaller. It wasn’t a disaster, but it didn’t help my mood having to hobble back to the landing area with one painful foot. Not even seeing an austral thrush could lift my spirits much.

The tea house had effectively a pet caracara which entertained the guests for food,

and we had further entertainment at the boot-scrubbing party which was a necessary precursor to getting the Zodiac back to Hondius.

After this somewhat dull interval, the day finished with a flourish, though. Our one-time Stanley resident, Martin, had extolled the beauties of Falkland Islands sunset, and as we headed out of the bay towards our next rendezvous, we were treated to a great display.

The next day, we were due to visit another West Falkland Island, New Island, which also held the promise of seeing some more albatross action – if the conditions allowed. But the wind was rising, and we would have to wait until the following morning to see what was possible.

Falkland Islands 1 – Saunders

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Sunday 10 March 2024 – During yesterday evening’s recap and the briefing for today, Pippa warned us that it might be a bit blowy as we made our way from Stanley, on East Falklands, around the north to Saunders Island, off the coast of West Falkland.

She was right. It was very blowy. Hondius did her best, and I suppose it could have been worse; we sailed into the teeth of a westerly of some 50 knots, so the motion was just pitching, rather both pitching and rolling. But sleep was difficult during the night as we discovered all the bits of the cabin that creaked and rattled as they were shaken up. However, having arrived at a part of Saunders called The Neck

all appeared to be calm and the sun appeared to be about to rise. So the landing was On.

The attraction for Saunders was the possibility of seeing a black-browed albatross colony, which would include chicks, something we hadn’t seen before, When we landed, there were, of course, penguins

and also a reception committee in the form of the owners who turned up in a Land Rover laden with possible goodies for us punters to buy.

We didn’t take up on the offer, but instead set off in search of the albatrosses, past an old try pot, as would have been used by sealers in the Good Old Days

and masses of gentoo penguins, who were moulting, and therefore not all that active.

They were using a considerable breeze to help in the process, and the feathers were everywhere.

Some penguins were building nests, which largely involved stealing building materials from other nest builders

and this was happening all around a variable hawk

which appeared to be eating the remains of a dead penguin. As with the skua at St. Andrews Bay, the penguins didn’t appear to be too affected by this,

and just carried on moulting around the hawk.

The route we followed to the albatross colony (marked out, as ever, by red poles placed by our guides) led past a uniquely Falkland Islands scene.

Observant readers will note that these penguins are not gentoos, but actually king penguins; there were a few of these around also, some with their fur-coated chicks,

and not, it would seem, in the best of moods at times. Our track led us past what we assume is an art installation

since it was rather far inland for a whale to have stranded itself on its own – and then have a dolphin land on top of it. The path led up a hill, past the inevitable uplands geese,

peaty soil

and evidence of a penguin variety we were meeting for the first time – magellanic penguins,

who nest in burrows. We even found one with a chick in it

and Jane managed to capture a shot that included another inhabitant of that burrow

which we think might have been the mother. The penguins and their burrows dotted the landscape

to the extent that one had to be a bit careful not to stumble into one as we walked.

Because stumbling became the standard method of progress; as we climbed the hill and rounded the headland

the wind increased enormously, to the point where it was at times difficult to keep one’s balance. Burrowing suddenly seemed to be quite a good survival strategy.

Shortly after I took the shot above, we passed another penguin colony,

and these were of, again, a variety new to us – rockhoppers.

You can see how impressed they are with the wind. The colony also includes cormorants

which give the rockhoppers added protection, since a skua won’t take on a cormorant.

Finally, in the teeth of a really, really strong wind, we reached the albatross colony, with the chicks clearly visible. Albatross nests are tall mud structures with a concave top, wherein sits first the egg and then the growing chick, which only leaves its “throne” when it is fledged and flies. The nests get taller each year.

This is what the punter had really come to see.

I divided my time between trying not to fall over and watching the behaviour of the parents and chicks. The chicks were hungry, and pestered the parent for food

which was occasionally dispensed in traditional fashion.

When the parent had dispensed all the food it had brought, it walked away from the chick, faced into wind and

simply flew away. Yes, I have video….

After a while of watching this we started the journey back to the landing area, which was a little less tiresome as the wind was behind us. We retraced our steps to find that a few striated caracaras had arrived.

These are birds of a curious disposition, also known as Johnny Rooks, and unafraid of humans – I nearly got a shot of the arse end one which was dive bombing me; and someone else nearly had a hat taken off his head.

We got back to the landing area, where we could see magellanic oystercatchers fossicking about

alongside flightless steamer ducks

kelp gulls and, of course, penguins.

So ended the morning, and we splashed our way back in very gusty winds to Hondius on a Zodiac and headed for lunch. The afternoon promised a visit to another island and the possibility of tea and cakes, which sounded quite appealing. Watch this space to see how it turned out.

Stanley – nice.

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Saturday 9 March 2024 – One of our guides on Hondius, Martin, once lived in Stanley, and served as a policeman in the Royal Falkland Police Force for a couple of years. I was looking forward to visiting Stanley even before he gave a lecture about his time there; his talk added more background, describing it as a very close, honest and welcoming community. We arrived in Stanley at about midday, and that morning Martin, who is also the main birder and photographer among the guides, also gave us a talk about the birds we could expect to see. Our unusually fine weather stayed with us during the morning, and there were birds around the ship so I could get more practice at photographing them in flight.

Black-browed albatrosses predominated, but (first picture) there was a wandering albatross to photograph, too.

The entrance to Stanley Harbour is through a narrow passage called, imaginatively, The Narrows,

where one catches the first glimpse of Stanley itself. It takes some navigational skill to get a ship like Hondius through. Our captain managed it, and on the way in we passed a couple of instances which were less successful.

I heard a comment from another of our guides that the Falklands was used in bygone days as an area for dumping ships in order to collect on the insurance; whether that was the case for either of these hulks, I don’t know.

Remaining outside The Narrows was a Viking cruise liner which was too big to go in; we learned later that the windy conditions also meant that its passengers couldn’t go ashore because of the difficulty of navigation of their tenders – they use the ship’s lifeboats, apparently, and previous experience teaches me that it’s very difficult to steer those things with any great accuracy. One wonders how impressed the passengers were to get this far and not be able to visit; but overall, of course, it played in our favour, since it meant that there were 800 fewer punters wandering the streets of Stanley at the same time as us.

We did, however, pass one other expedition-style ship which had made it in,

and we were soon parked up a short Zodiac ride from the shore.

One could see Tumbledown Hill, the site of one of the final battles in the Falklands War of 1982.

We had a swift lunch on board and then were ferried in so that we could have a look round.

Stanley has a population of around 2,500 (the Falklands Islands overall about 3,50), so you can imagine that that 800 extra punters would have made quite an impact; as it was it was fairly quiet as we walked around.

It’s a nice place.

It helped that the sun shone, something that always makes a place look nicer; and the wind blew as is, we were told, almost always the case. (I had heard, well before we even envisaged going on this trip, that the wind always blows in the Falklands, and I can now vouch for this; I found the constant wind wherever we were to be quite oppressive, actually, although I suppose one might get used to it eventually.)

Immediately we landed, we got to see some of the local bird life.

Black-browed night heron

Male (flightless) steamer duck

Turkey vulture in flight

Turkey vulture doing yoga

Female uplands gose

Male Uplands goose

Kelp gulls, imperial cormorants, rock shags (aka magellanic cormorants)

Practically the first thing one passes in wandering along the front is the cathedral, Christ Church, with a very distinctive whalebone arch outside it.

The whalebone arch dates from 1933 and commemorates the centenary of the colony as a British possession. It remains a British Overseas Territory to this day, despite the efforts of Argentina, who lay claim to Las Islas Malvinas, as they call them.

The bricks to build the cathedral were on a boat which sank on arrival, apparently. The bricks were retrieved and the cathedral built, but salt water and bricks don’t necessarily go together well, as can be seen in places inside.

It’s a handsome building, outside and inside,

with nice stained glass

and a serious nod to the military history of the islands.

Looking over the water from the front, one can see further evidence of this, in the form of the names, picked out in stones, of naval protection vessels which have served in the Falklands.

Near the cathedral is the supermarket

which also demonstrates the islands’ UK heritage.

Inside, much of the clothing is actually under the F&F label used by Tesco in the UK, and the fresh produce is, as one would expect, very expensive, since it all has to be imported, and not from Argentina.

As I had expected, there were many more reminders of the UK heritage

and the whole place has the air of a well-maintained English seaside town of a few decades ago.

(The mast is from SS Great Britain, Brunel’s boat, by the way)

There are pubs, one of which, the Victory Bar, is a pretty convincing replica of an English pub on the inside

although less so from the outside.

There’s a local newspaper

and a determination to observe British roots.

The Dockyard Museum

is thoroughly worth a visit. Some exhibits are emphatically drawing, once again, on British roots

while others show that it’s a more exotic location,

with a unique history, which, of course, includes the 1982 war against Argentina.

Ah, yes; the war.

The Falkland Islands have had a disputatious history ever since the uninhabited islands were first discovered in the late 18^th Century. France, Spain, Argentina and Britain have all claimed the islands, but there’s been a British colony here since 1833.

The latest dispute ran from April – June 1982; or March – June 1982 if you include South Georgia. In March 1982, some 50 Argentinians landed unannounced on South Georgia, ostensibly to collect scrap metal. But on April 2, the same day as Argentina attacked Stanley, Argentine ships sailed into Cumberland Bay (where Grytviken and the HQ of the British Antarctic Survey are, you’ll remember, of course). By 25 April, the Royal Navy had turned up to South Georgia and their bombardment forced an Argentinian surrender; following that, South Georgia was used as a base to support the British recapture of the Falklands. Reading about this reminds me that both Canberra (on which I have sailed) and Queen Elizabeth 2 (on which I have not) were pressed into service during the war.

In the museum there’s a short film consisting of narrative from residents who were children during the period describing how it felt from their point of view. It’s quite moving. It’s all too easy for us Brits to brag that we gave those Argies a bloody nose; but for the inhabitants at the time it was terrifying, and there’s a feeling that there are still emotional problems among some residents hanging over from those times.

And, of course, there’s a war memorial

with, beside it, a bust of the UK Prime Minister in 1982, Margaret Thatcher.

It’s somewhat ironic that a war which, some say, was started as a vehicle for the Argentinian president, Galtieri, to shore up his public image, ended up as one which did just that for Thatcher.

Anyhoo.

It was pleasant to wander about for a couple of hours, although I was disappointed that the island’s infrastructure was unable to provide any meaningful internet access. The local provider, Sure, has enabled some hotspots, but only at glacial speeds; even Hondius gives faster access.

Most people know that Stanley is the capital of the Falkland Islands. Perhaps fewer would know that it is on the eastern side of the more easterly of the two major islands in the group: East Falklands and a more western major island, called, yes, you guessed it, West Falklands. Fewer still, and that number would have included me before this trip, will know that there are some 750 islands in the Falklands, although many of these are smallish bits of uninhabited rock.

What we did know was that, weather permitting, we had two further days to explore some of the lesser islands in the archipelago before we had to head off back to Ushuaia and the end of our trip. The forecast was – yes, you’ll probably have guessed this, too – windy. We would find out in due course what this meant for our passage and the possibility of further expeditions.