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Published: October 6th 2009
Whilst on Scuba Diving trip
Photo taken by Josef. See more of his photos at www.jnphoto.smugmug.comI arrived in Puerto Madryn at 1.30pm on Wednesday 9 September after an 18 hour bus journey from Buenos Aires. After checking into El Gualicho hostel, I went for a walk. Within a couple of minutes I was at the beach and immediately saw a few whales quite close to the shore. It was a spectacular sight and a vast contrast from the big city that I had just left behind. The sun was shining and I was witness to these huge Southern Right Whales as they come to these shores at this time of year to breed and be with their young. The England Vs Croatia game was on at 4pm so I had to find a bar in this small town. Eventually I found a café with a TV but they were showing the news. I asked them (in my best Spanish) if they had ESPN and not only did they change the channel for me but they also turned off the music in the café and put the commentary on. After lunch and a couple of beers (and a 5-1 victory for England) I returned to the hostel a happy man. In the evening I went to a
Whilst on Scuba Diving trip
Photo taken by Josef. See more of his photos at www.jnphoto.smugmug.com pizza restaurant for dinner and to watch Paraguay Vs Argentina. Following my long overnight bus trip I was looking forward to a good sleep but unfortunately there were two guys in my 4 bed dorm room who decided to be really noisy all night, in and out of the room and turning the light on and off - the joys of hostel rooms!! I woke up at 7am on Thursday as I was going on an all day tour of Peninsular Valdes. The minibus picked me up at 8am and we set off on what was to be a 400km round trip. Our first stop was a stretch of beach 16km from Puerto Madryn. We saw a number of whales unbelievably close to the shore; a couple were literally just 20-30 metres out. We continued along the gravel road until we reached the entry point to Peninsular Valdes and the National Park. At this point the gravel road was closed as they were resurfacing it (a 2 year project) so we had to take the slower, temporary dirt road that run alongside. Once we arrived at Punta Piramide, we each got a life jacket and boarded a boat for a
90 minute whale watching trip. For the first hour there wasn’t a lot of action and I wondered why we needed to go on a boat when we could see the whales from the shore. Then we had a few sightings and because we were in deeper waters, we got to see the huge tail of the whale as it descended. Just as we prepared to return to shore, we noticed a whale under the surface of the water directly alongside our boat. You could just make out the outline and all of a sudden our boat felt small. When the whale surfaced we saw its head close up. Covering one third of its body, the head is covered in parasites which give the colour and distinct features. Being this close to the whale made the 90 minute boat trip worthwhile. After lunch in Punta Piramide, we got back on the bus and drove through the barren peninsular land. We passed a couple of salt lakes, one pink in colour due to the minerals it contained. At Punta Cantor, we walked a couple of small trails that overlooked a sloping beach where elephant seals come to settle. One trail also
gave a complete view of Caleta Valdes, a 30km creek. Another 110km of driving took us back to the entrance of the Park where we spent 20 minutes looking around the Visitors Centre which displayed the skeleton of a whale that had beached in the local area some years ago. Our final stop for the day brought us back to the same stretch of beach where we saw the whales so close to the shore in the morning. Although the sky was rich in colour due to the sun setting, there were no whales to be seen so we headed back to town. On the tour, I made friends with Josef and Mona, a young Austrian couple who, like me, were keen to go scuba diving. Puerto Madryn is one of the few places in the world where you can dive with sea lions but you have to be a certified diver. We each had our certificate so we got dropped off at the diving shop and booked a trip for the next morning. Then we went to a nice local restaurant where I had a tasty cut of lamb with potatoes. After a much needed good sleep, I met
Josef and Mona at the dive shop at 10am on Friday. There was another young English couple and a Spanish couple that would be joining us on the trip. We all changed into our dive suits and walked to the beach and into our boat. We were supposed to do a shipwreck dive first and then dive with sea lions but due to the high tide it made more sense to go straight to the seal colony where we would see more action. As an unexpected bonus, we saw lots of close up activity from the whales as we made our way to the seal colony. One whale just repeatedly kept jumping out of the water. Another kept bashing its tail against the surface of the water. As we approached the seal colony we began to put all our diving equipment on. I had not dived in the 2 years since passing my PADI diving course and so I was quickly trying to remember all the essential procedures to ensure a safe and fun dive. When the boat stopped at the colony we were immediately surrounded by seals. I did a backwards roll of the side of the boat and
within seconds I had seals all around me. After a couple of failed descents (due to my mask flooding and basically me just forgetting what to do) I eventually made my way down the 9 metres to the sea bed. It was so cool (no pun intended) to be underwater with these seals in their natural habitat. I will never forget being nose to nose with a seal staring into its eyes. They were really playful and liked to bite/nip at your head, arms, legs etc... Their teeth looked quite big and sharp but you could put your fist in their mouth (I guess like when playing with a dog). After about half an hour underwater, we spent another 10 minutes on the surface playing around but the water was so cold that my body was starting to freeze up so we all got back on the boat. We had some hot chocolate and cookies on our way to the shipwreck. It wasn’t long before we were back in the water and exploring this old ship. The shell of the ship was fragile and covered in coral and other sea life. However, the bronze propeller was still solid and shiny,
although also covered in sea life. Back on the boat it was a case of trying to warm up again as we returned to shore. On the way back, we stopped to watch a whale slowly making its way towards our boat. It was easily the biggest whale I had seen and even the diving instructors said it was huge. Probably twice the size of our boat, it slowly got closer and closer to us before veering off in another direction. So in summary, the dive trip was amazing with the sea lions, the shipwreck and of course the whales. We all had a late lunch and beers at a restaurant on the beach and then the Spanish couple offered to drive me, Josef and Mona to a beach 100km away where you can get close to elephant seals. By the time we got there (7pm) the sun was almost down and light was beginning to fade. We parked the car at the top of the cliffs and looked for a way down to the beach. There were not any stairs so we found our own pathway down to the stony beach. However, the elephant seals were nowhere to be
Scuba Diving with Sea Lions
Photo taken by Josef. See more of his photos at www.jnphoto.smugmug.com seen. Everyone sat on the beach but I decided to go exploring and managed to find 2 elephant seals hiding around the corner on a raised mound of stones. We were able to get within a few metres to take some pictures and then decided to leave them alone. Darkness soon fell and on the drive back, we stopped to admire the stars. We were in the middle of nowhere with no buildings, streetlights or light of any source so the stars were some of the best I had ever seen. Back at the hostel, I had a lovely shower and then met Jo and Mona at Margarita Bar at 10.30pm. We enjoyed dinner, beers and a few bottles of red wine before going to a club called La Frontera. After a couple of Bacardi and Cokes and some disco dancing, I eventually got home at 6am. WOW!! What a day. Surprisingly I felt OK when I woke up at 11.30am on Saturday. I met Jo and Mona for lunch and then we went to sit on the beach for the afternoon. It was actually quite warm and so was nice to lie on the beach relaxing and just having
Whale wathching boat tour
Photo taken by Josef. See more of his photos at www.jnphoto.smugmug.com a lazy day. In the evening, we were deciding where to go next on our separate travels. After checking out a few options, I booked a bus for the following day to El Calafate. We all went for a pizza dinner before Jo and Mona left for Bariloche. On Sunday morning I walked to the end of the pier in Puerto Madryn to get some final views of the whales. Then I treated myself to a nice steak lunch before catching my 3.30pm bus to get to El Calafate. After 16 hours, the bus terminated at Rio Gallegos. Luckily there was only a 1 hour wait for a connecting bus for the remaining 4 hours to El Calafate.
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