February 4 – Port Stanley, Falkland Islands

February 4, 2017 – Port Stanley, Falkland Islands
I had arranged a tour for four of us to see penguins before I left home. We were told to try to be on the first tender. We met in the Showroom at 7am. At 7:30am they gave us tickets for the 2nd tender. The first tender was used for an excursion that the ship arranged. The sea was rough and it took the tender 3 tries to tie up to the ship. After the tender was loaded, we headed toward town. It was so rough that water was pouring in the doorways. We finally got into town at 8:20am. We met the tour leader and he assigned us to Michael for our tour. The 4 of us got into t Michael’s 4x4s and we were off. We drove for 1 1/2 hours across the island to Bertha’s Cove. During the drive we learned about life on the island and the war with Argentina. There were 6 4x4s in our caravan that were all contracted through the same company. The beach they took us too was large with many Gentoo penguins. We were told that occasionally 2 King Penguins will be there but none were there today. We spent an hour wandering through the penguins. It was very windy and cold. A few times it rained. At the end of the hour we got hot coffee and cookies. We headed back toward Port Stanley. On the way we stopped and saw a black necked white swan. Near town there was a walk near Magellanic penguins. We started the walk and the wind got worse and there was icy rain. We saw some penguins in their burrows. Down on a beach below the walkway were a group of Gentoos. They looked frozen in place.
Michael took us on tour of Port Stanley and showed us some of the sunken ship’s that are sitting in the harbor. He dropped us at the penguin gift shop at the end of the tour.
The ride back to the ship was calm in comparison to the morning ride.
Tomorrow is a sea day and there will be special events for the Super Bowl including a tail gate party. On Monday we will be in Puerto Madrona Argentina.
The pictures from today are for the penguin lovers.