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Published: February 24th 2017
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Falkland Islands
Tender heading to pier from the Crown Princess Hello from the Falkland Islands in the southeast Atlantic Ocean. We arrived this morning and it was a nice sunny day. Apparently they can get rain in a hurry, so they told us to bring raingear on our excursion, but we had a dry day. It was a bit cool and breezy but sunshine most of the day.
We got up early and had breakfast sandwiches in the cabin. That’s because we had to be in the Wheelhouse Lounge before 8:00. They moved us to our group in the Princess Theater and we only had to wait a short time before they called our tour to leave on the tender. The ride to shore takes about 20 minutes since the ship has to anchor quite a distance from town. We got on our bus and the tour left right on schedule at 9:00 AM from the dockside.
The Falklands are actually a collection of 778 islands with only 2 of them being significant in size (East Island and West Island). Stanley is built on East Island on a large bay but which has a narrow/shallow inlet, so the bay is sheltered from any real rough
waves. That was one of the reasons the island has been desired over the years. Initially the French tried to build a community here, but later they sold the island to Spain. Eventually the Spanish pulled out and the British took over in 1883. For a time it was a British Colony but now it is a British Overseas Territory.
This set of islands has always had significant strategic value. Before the Panama Canal was opened, this was a natural waypoint for ships coming from Europe preparing to try to Round the Horn into the Pacific. Even after the canal opened, it was still a chokepoint for the British military to control shipping going between oceans during WWI and WWII. The strategic location was part of the reason for the 1982 Falkland War between UK and Argentina. Of course British nationalism was an equally important reason for the Brits resisting the invasion by Argentina. The Falkland Islands became a natural point to launch expeditions to Antarctica. Now they have discovered oil deposits within the territorial waters of the Falklands, but the price of oil needs to come up to at least $70 per barrel for it to
be profitable to drill/pump.
The three main activities on the islands are (1) farming, (2) fishing, and (3) tourism. They grow a wide variety of vegetables but no fruits. Our port lecturer had previously explained that there are no bees or flying insects to cross pollinate the fruit blossoms. The biggest fishing “crop” is squid. They export a lot of Calamari to many places around the world.
When our ship arrived today, the residents of Stanley officially declared this to be “cruise ship day”. That is because we outnumbered the residents. During their last census there were 2490 residents of Stanley with 364 others living elsewhere on the islands. There is also a detachment of UK military people who are not included in the numbers. There are somewhere between 150-175 grade school students. Our 3080 passengers “came in peace” with dollar bills in our hands, so they felt they could tolerate this short-term visit and not have to call Britain to repel our invasion. Our guide on the bus said he had actually rented his 4x4 vehicle to a tour company today so they could take other tourists into the more distant locations on
the islands. The 4700 square miles of area is roughly equivalent to the size of Connecticut, so it on average less than one person per square mile.
We started with a tour of some of the sights around the town and finished with a visit to a museum. We stopped at several places for photo-ops. Some of them were his way of making fun of themselves – like the “yacht club” which was little more than a place to leave broken down boats. We stopped at the Lady Elizabeth Shipwreck, which had been a 3-masted iron-hulled sailing ship that sailed these waters until it sank in the harbor. Our guide explained that many areas of the island (especially along some of the beaches) are fenced off because there still are landmines from the 1982 war. Fortunately for the penguins which are quite abundant along these shores, they do not weigh enough to set off the mines.
There is a considerable amount of heating down in the houses using peat. There is a plant which grows a highly dense and tangled root system, which he called diddle-dee. Over years these plants grow on top of
Model of Sailing Ship
in the Maritime Museum each other, thereby compressing the earlier roots even more tightly together. After a time, they are able to harvest the roots and dry them for a month until they can be burned in the “peat stove”. About 60 cubic meters of peat can heat the house for a year. Since it grows on common land, the residents can harvest and use it for free. There is a solar wind farm here too which creates about 40% of their electricity needs, with the remainder coming from petroleum-driven generating stations.
One of our stops was at the monument they erected to their war dead from the 1982 war. There is also a bust of Margaret Thatcher who led the fight to reclaim the islands. They also planted a tree in the name of each person who dies then, which they call the Memorial Woods. Since trees do not grow here very easily (only about 30 inches of rain per year, and usually shallow soil) these trees require a lot of attention by the citizens.
Unemployment is virtually zero on the island. They actually have more jobs to be done than people, so immigrants have started coming
Anglican Cathedral
Stanley, Falkland Islands to the Falklands to live. “Native born” residents get preferential hiring and there are several hoops for foreigners to jump through to come and work, but they are slowly growing their population. Our guide said that children received partially subsidized college education in England, but even after seeing elsewhere in the world, many of them come back here to live and work.
The Maritime Museum was interesting but was basically a 2-story cottage with a collection of items from the island gathered over the year. There were a lot of nautical items, including models of sailing ships, but also included a mixture of other items from the island. One that really caught Janet’s eye was a set of fancy dresses from that era. Then we went past two churches. One is the most southerly Anglican Church in the world and the other a nice Catholic Church.
The other possible excursions from Princess offered a tour of the battlefields, a visit to a working farm on the island, and 3 different choices of excursions to various penguin colonies on private land where the land mines have been cleared. We were happy with our choice of
Some of the Houses
(English Style) facing the port in Stanley tour, but don’t really feel there is an urgency to come back to the Falklands again any time soon.
Back on the ship after a ride in the tender, we went to lunch in the Horizon Court. It was comparatively empty with so many people still being on tours. There were no crowds and plenty of empty tables, which is something of a novelty. Then Janet went to our cabin to watch a little TV and do some needlework, followed by a nap. David went to the theater and watched a Tarzan movie. About 4:00 we went down to the internet café and did some computer chores before getting Janet a new “coffee card”. She got a double chocolate mocha frappe latte thing, or something like that.
We went up to Deck-18 for appetizers. Today’s feature was a Guacamole with Tortilla Chips. We both had the special of the day – a fruity margarita. Then we went to dinner and all 6 of us were there. Janet had the Shrimp Cocktail and then a Mushroom Broth. David had Goat Cheese Soufflé and Fettuccini Alfredo. Then for our main course Janet had the Diver Scallops
Janet and others
waiting to return to the ship and David had the Trilogy of Meats (lamb, veal, & chicken). We shared a slice of cheesecake for dessert (one bite for Janet and the rest for David).
We went to the theater to watch a pianist playing a variety of styles. The show was called “Rockin’ the Legends”. He began with classical from 3 centuries ago and then played samples of music for each decade thru the 1900’s up to a current song. He was very good at playing although we wouldn’t necessarily agree with his selection of the best song from each decade. But it was entertaining and he certainly was talented.
That’s all for tonight.
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