One of the sales pitches we used to inspire Quinn and Jack to follow us to Buenos Aires is that we would arrive in winter and soon after take a trip to see snow (one of the other pitches was that Dad would donate his store of United miles to upgrade to business class and the lie-flat seats, which [full disclosure] is really one of the sales pitches said Dad uses to get the family to allow me to travel so much to referee, but you should see the cool, gray socks you get in the goody bags - Erin's a sucker for anything that keeps her toes warm!). Alas, when we arrived we realized that a trip to see snow wouldn't be great schedule-wise, somewhat because of the school schedule, but also because - of course - I went on another referee trip to Australia in August, not four or so weeks after we arrived. So we turned our sights toward a trip planned later in the school year for the boys.
So turning our sights away from snow, we planned a trip in the fall to Peninsula Valdes in Patagonia. If you've ever seen those Discovery Channel videos of orcas surfing waves onto the beach to chomp baby seals you were seeing Peninsula Valdes. It's the only place in the world where the orcas use this specific feeding strategy. The peninsula juts out from the mainland but then curls back around on both sides toward the mainland, forming two large bays, one on the north side, Golfo San José, and another on the south side of the peninsula, Golfo Nuevo, both of which have narrow openings to the Atlantic Ocean. It was listed as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1999 and there is much wildlife and flora protected there.
Our adventure began with a 6:05am Aerolinas Argentinas flight out of Aeroparque Jorge Newberry, the domestic airport that is, thankfully, only a 10 minute taxi ride from our apartment. After sitting in an airport cafe and waking up with café con leche and some medialunas dulces, we boarded our flight and took off to Trelew. 1 1/2 hours later we landed in stiff, cold winds whipping along the arid, low-bush dotted Patagonian landscape in Trelew. From there we boarded a bus for drive to Puerto Madryn, along the shore of Golfo Nuevo.
We had booked a room at a hotel on the outskirts of town, on the beach, with a view of the gulf through our main and bathroom windows. Since we didn't have any tours planned for the first day, knowing the early wake-up time was going to leave us exhausted, we took a long nap and then headed into town to book a trip on our last day to Punta Tombo to see commerson's dolphins and magellanic penguins, and to make sure our tour the next morning was led by a bi-lingual guide. Once we had taken care of those appointments we wandered into a pharmacy. I had (have) been having lower back tightness/pain (undoubtedly caused by the stress of four work-less months in Argentina) and wanted to 
purchase something that would get me through the next day's tour; however, once we got in there, Erin smartly asked if we could purchase some antibiotics that would cure Jack's frequent ear infections and other flu attacks on the rest of us. No doctor's prescription, no worries; we walked out of there with medicine for my back and an armful of antibiotics that should last us until the end of 2013! After a stop for fruit smoothies and my daily doble in a mini-mall we had pizza and pasta dinner while watching the first of the Chilean miners ride to safety, then headed back to our hotel to sleep.Our first day-long tour began at 8:00am with a few loops through town
to pick up all the other tourists before we headed out of Puerto Madryn and along the shore of Golfo Nuevo toward Puerto Piramides and the Southern Right whale boat tour. The Patagonian landscape on the peninsula is mostly flat, filled with low bushes that hide maras, small rat/guinea-pig rodents that perch on their hind legs; guanacos, relatives of llamas; and rheas, big brown birds that resemble ostriches. The ride took a couple hours, but while we drove the guide told us about the history of the area and pointed out wildlife hiding in the bushes (and running when we stopped to take the blurry pictures we've included). 
The shoreline became elevated, so when we arrived at Puerto Piramides we descended to the small beach town in an arroyo between sandy cliffs and stopped near the water's edge. We were outfitted in life preservers, led to the beached boat, pushed backward into the water by a tractor much like an airplane being driven backward from the gate, and after the captain spun us 180º we motored out to the whales.
It didn't take long before we were seeing whale spouts in several places. The captain steered us toward a mother and her calf, and soon we pulled up right next to our first southern right whales. The most prominent feature of the whale are the callouses on their heads,
and we got super close-up looks at the barnacle covered whales. The whales surfaced near the boat, posed calmly for pictures, and then dove, sometimes gliding just under us and over the other side. The whales were so peaceful that I had to squash the urge to jump in the water and swim with them by reminding myself that the water was freezing cold. Sometimes both mother and calf would offer a tail or a fluke for photos, but mostly they tolerated our presence, with the mothers being careful to stay between their babies and our boat.We were on the water for about an hour or so before turning back to shore to shed our life preservers and board the bus and drive toward lunch and the elephant seals.
The tour company wisely breaks up the long driving day with stops
along the way every hour-and-a-half or so. Lunch came at an estancia far out on the peninsula, where lamb seemed to be the featured offering, but after seeing so many sheep grazing alongside alcortas and maras Quinn and I opted for beef dishes so we didn't have to encounter relatives of our meal when we took off toward the elephant seals (every once in a while Jack expresses his sadness that animals have to die for us to eat, but soon the ol' "out of sight, out of mind" saying kicks in and we all eat guilt free).
By the time we reached the beach where the elephant seals sunbathe it was roughly 3pm. The beach lay below some pretty steep sand/clay cliffs, which we traversed by following a switchback trail three quarters of the way down. Jack was freaked out since it felt like we were clinging to the face of a cliff (which we kinda were, though for some reason it was perfectly safe) so I ended up carrying him down until we hit a spot where everyone could sit and observe the crowd of sleepy walrus-looking seals and their pups. Most of the animals lay motionless on the wet sand, conserving their energy after long swims from 
wherever it is they come. My understanding is that when they get hungry they have to swim miles for food, and there was a constant trickle of elephant seals surfing in to the beach to waddle through and sometimes over the other sunbathers, which elicited loud grunts and snorts of consternation but little actual effort to retaliate or move out of the way. They seemed to know that we were watching them from above - sometimes one would open an eye and peer up at us, but for the most part they couldn't have cared less. Conservation of energy, I guess.
With so much bus riding to do my concern was expenditure of energy, the boys' energy. So once back on top of the cliffs I set the boys off on laps around and through the bushes near the bus, timing them with exactitude that kept inspiring a subsequent effort, as each time they ran their times reflected a miraculous improvement, sometimes by tenths of a second. Amazing! After a pee break that included a lesson in aiming with and not into the stiff winds we were back on the bus for our last observation, a small colony of magellanic penguins. Since we saw a much larger colony the next day at Punta Tombo, I'm saving the penguins for the next post.
By the time we returned to Puerto Madryn we were tired but filled with chatter about all the wildlife we had seen. Opting for dinner at the hotel so we could shower the boys right away and fold them into bed, Erin and I cracked our books for only a few minutes before we, too, crashed hard like two worn and wasted elefantos marinos.
The tour company wisely breaks up the long driving day with stops
along the way every hour-and-a-half or so. Lunch came at an estancia far out on the peninsula, where lamb seemed to be the featured offering, but after seeing so many sheep grazing alongside alcortas and maras Quinn and I opted for beef dishes so we didn't have to encounter relatives of our meal when we took off toward the elephant seals (every once in a while Jack expresses his sadness that animals have to die for us to eat, but soon the ol' "out of sight, out of mind" saying kicks in and we all eat guilt free).
By the time we reached the beach where the elephant seals sunbathe it was roughly 3pm. The beach lay below some pretty steep sand/clay cliffs, which we traversed by following a switchback trail three quarters of the way down. Jack was freaked out since it felt like we were clinging to the face of a cliff (which we kinda were, though for some reason it was perfectly safe) so I ended up carrying him down until we hit a spot where everyone could sit and observe the crowd of sleepy walrus-looking seals and their pups. Most of the animals lay motionless on the wet sand, conserving their energy after long swims from 
wherever it is they come. My understanding is that when they get hungry they have to swim miles for food, and there was a constant trickle of elephant seals surfing in to the beach to waddle through and sometimes over the other sunbathers, which elicited loud grunts and snorts of consternation but little actual effort to retaliate or move out of the way. They seemed to know that we were watching them from above - sometimes one would open an eye and peer up at us, but for the most part they couldn't have cared less. Conservation of energy, I guess.With so much bus riding to do my concern was expenditure of energy, the boys' energy. So once back on top of the cliffs I set the boys off on laps around and through the bushes near the bus, timing them with exactitude that kept inspiring a subsequent effort, as each time they ran their times reflected a miraculous improvement, sometimes by tenths of a second. Amazing! After a pee break that included a lesson in aiming with and not into the stiff winds we were back on the bus for our last observation, a small colony of magellanic penguins. Since we saw a much larger colony the next day at Punta Tombo, I'm saving the penguins for the next post.
By the time we returned to Puerto Madryn we were tired but filled with chatter about all the wildlife we had seen. Opting for dinner at the hotel so we could shower the boys right away and fold them into bed, Erin and I cracked our books for only a few minutes before we, too, crashed hard like two worn and wasted elefantos marinos.
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