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TRAVEL BLOG ENTRY
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“not 500 metres out in the ocean was a pair of Right whales, spouting and splashing and generally doing whale-type things” |
The bus down from Foz de Iguazu was probably the most comfortable bus ever; mind you, if you've read some of our other entries, you'll know that mightn't be saying much.
Newly installed in our seafront hostel, we wandered along the beach. Amazingly, not 500 metres out in the ocean was a pair of Right whales, spouting and splashing and generally doing whale-type things. We watched for a while, then headed off to find a bite to eat.
Puerto Madryn is fairly unremarkable; neat and tidy, but not terribly exciting. In the afternoon, it seemed like the entire population of the town was walking the promenade along the seafront, taking their kids to the playgrounds or walking their dogs.
The next morning the tour bus picked us up bright and early and we set off to visit the Valdez Peninsula. The main order of business was whale watching of course, but it took quite a long time to reach Puerto Piramides, the little village from where the boats set out.
Our boat trip lasted something over an hour and right from the start we were seeing whales. The whales here are Southern Right whales, which use the sheltered gulf to relax after the journey back from Antarctica, meet other whales and make little whales. Predictably, the whales are quite enormous, some of them 17 metres long. Apparently they can weigh over 25 metric tonnes.
The first few whale encounters were relatively tame. The whale (they were always by themselves) would swim along the surface, spouting, then after a few minutes dive underwater, lashing the surface with its huge tail fluke. At one point, a whale swam right under the boat.
However, things livened up when we saw whales breaching on the horizon, that is, leaping clear of the water. The boat set off towards them and before too long we were rewarded with the quite astonishing sight of a gigantic whale hurling itself out of the water and crashing back down with an almighty splash. We saw that twice.
After the boat trip, we took a drive around the rest of the peninsula, stopping to watch some elephant seals lazing on the beach. Later in the year, Orca hunt along this stretch of coast.
I can't recommend the whale watching highly enough, we both enjoyed it immensely. A little later in the season would be even better, from what the guides were saying there are far more whales then. As it was, we saw quite a few. We did, in fact, have a whale of a time. (groan)
Next stop, El Calafate to see something even bigger - the Perito Mereno glacier.
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