For The Love of Travel

The temperature is balmy during the day but has dropped at night – no longer just a sheet to cover me, need a couple of blankets!

45 mins by boat through the Straits of Magellan, and we arrive at Magdalena Island (Los Pinguinos National Park)…..one of the isles that was used by navigators and explorers such as Francis Drake, Pedro Sarmiento de Gamboa, Ferdinand Magellan and Charles Darwin, and aarrhh! pirates, to get their bearings. 

The lighthouse established in 1903 was a boon to local fisherman, who would come to the island to hunt penguins and use them as bait to catch crab! Poor pengies! 

The Magellanic penguin (Spheniscus magellanicus) is named in honour of the maritime explorer Ferdinand Magellan, who first recorded it during an expedition in 1519. 

It is definitely a delightful penguin-centric experience on the island, with approx 150,000 pengies in the community that you walk around and occasionally, they cross your path to get to the sea. We made sure we didn’t disrupt the flow of their hectic lives, which move according to a well-established order and structure apparently…lining their burrows with seaweed or grass tufts; seeking food for their chicks; going for a swim; braying (similar to donkey noise) to signal a territorial dispute or seeking a mate. 

From Nov to April, the penguins breed and moult their feathers in preparation for returning to the sea. The newly-fledged juvenile chicks and adults then spend May to August following the northward movements to warmer climes (Peru and South Brazil), of anchovies – their preferred prey.
They will also eat other fish, squid and crustaceans. 

A day to forget, really!

It did not start well.  I walked into town to get Argentinian pesos to pay for my accommodation. A simple enough transaction, or so I thought. Stood in a long line at the Cambio for half an hour, only to be told they only exchanged cash for cash, no cards.

Visited 5 banks – all with ATM’s that only serve customers of the particular bank. Went to 2 tourist info sites who couldn’t tell me where to get cash for MasterCard.

Decided to walk into a hotel, any hotel….very helpful concierge who told me to go to HSBC a few blocks away. Success finally. Apparently its one of the few banks with a credit facility for foreigners. Will have to plan better when I go to Buenos Aires in a month’s time.

I set off to the bus terminal looking forward to a 6 hour bus ride back from Bariloche starting at 13.30 across the Andes to the Chilean side (Puerto Varas) – what a lovely thing to do. WELL!  The bus was an hour late – no explanations and requiring regular visits to the bus company’s office at the bus terminal (Andesmar), to get an update. The baggage handler/loader was a local contractor to the bus company that relied on tips from passengers for his wage – helped out a trio of gals from Switzerland who had spent all their pesos and would have struggled to throw their packs into the high luggage section. A ‘paying it forward’ moment.

Then a couple of hours later at the Argentinian border, (gorgeous) customs dogs picked up something suspicious in a bus traveller’s bag….an hour’s delay until that was sorted. THEN…

At the Chilean border, we were delayed 2 hours – more issues with travellers bags! Oy Vay!!!!!! I spoke with another passenger who told me the border crossings in Peru and Bolivia were much worse. I can’t image how. Anyway…we finally got away…..

The air-con clapped out after another hour…got to 31C inside before I got the attendant to open the windows to allow for some breeze.

We got to the Puerto Varas bus stop at 23.30. It was pitch black in the streets. No taxi’s to be seen. The bus was 4 hours late after all. Another 15 mins wait and a taxi materialised heading into the town centre…and stopped to pick me up. Yay!!!!! A stiff drink at the other end to send me to sleep quickly.

Note to self: never do a border crossing in South America by bus! EVER!

But, a great story.