What a difference

We left Buenos Aires on a hot Tuesday morning to fly to Trelew to start our visit to peninsula Valdes, in north-east of Patagonia. We have left behind the bustle and noise of a big city (14 meg), very green with lots of mature trees and many parks, surrounded by super-modern high-rises,  and found ourselves on a large, flat, desert-like peninsula, with very few inhabitants and lots of different animals - a Unesco world heritage natural reserve. On the way in our rented red little Fiat we saw lamas, sheep and horses.

 The next morning we drove to spots by the ocean - a colony of Magellanic penguins, the young ones basking in the sun on the cliffs, the adults by the ocean, going in and out of the water where they swim fast like torpedoes hunting their (and my) favorite food, anchovies, which they follow to Brazil in the winter.

After we went to visit a big colony of sea lions - huge mature males with lion-like manes,  young males challenging them for some females from their harem, much smaller females cuddling with their imposing males or taking care of the babies. The sea-lions, heavy and awkward on land are agile and graceful in the water. Around them a variety of sea birds which apparently feed on the placentas in the calving season.

We missed the season of the orcas, which after the sea-lions calving season hunt the babies by swimming full speed onto the beach to catch one, then hop back into the ocean. On our way back to Puerto Piramides we saw flocks of lamas bouncing away gracefully when we approached to take pictures. I'm writing this on the front porch of our little hotel El Nomade Ecologico, run by two lovely young women who bake all the breads and cakes for tomorrow's breakfast. The smells are so tempting that we had to go to sit outside. They also make their own yogurt, so we can have our favorite breakfast.

It is wonderfully calm here. Annice and Esther went to find out about other activities (kayaking, cycling, trekking). David had his nap and is reading his kindle book, and I (Simon) write this blog and hope to post it soon, but the internet connection here is very slow, so I may not be able to attach all the pictures I want.

For those who like exceptional travel blogs, here's the link to a blog by a couple we met in the local campground with their fully loaded motorcycle which took them from California to the very south of Patagonia, and now on their way back to the US: pretirement2012.blogspot.com