Falkland Islands

I am very much looking forward to going to Falkland Islands, but on a ship even if it is scheduled you still spend the days before wondering whether or not the ship can make it into the Falklands. The Falklands is a tender port with notoriously bad weather. It is not usual for the weather to stop all tender operations, people have been known to go in by tender then find the tender processes has been stopped and they have to spend a day or two on the the Falklands before the tenderrs can pick them up.

Then of course there is tension between Britain and Argentina, it seems everytime there is political trouble in Argentina (or a politician in
trouble) they try to deflect the trouble by stirring up nationalism on the issue of the Falklands.

A few days after we were there there was an official national referendum of Falklanders asking what they wanted. 98% wanted to be or remain British, 1% didnt care, 1% was split between Self Governing (so no allegance to either place) and being Argentinian.. But Argentina doesnt
accept the poll as valid of course.

Stanley was used as a port of call by sealers and whalers until the late 19th century.
Fishing has always been the major industry of the Falkland Islands but in recent years there has been oil exploration in its waters, this coincidentally started just before the Argentina reclaiming started again.

In the weeks before our visit cruise ships had been turned away by the Argentina Navy and this is always a possibilty.

Stanley was occupied by Argentine troops for about ten weeks during the Falklands War in 1982.
 Stanley suffered considerable damage during the war, from both the Argentine occupation and the British naval shelling of the town, which
killed three civilians. After the British secured the high ground around the town the Argentines surrendered with no fighting in the town itself.

 As we started the day ,the wind was there but medium to low, the sun was out and the sky was blue.
We were on a tender to Port Stanley. After being in Antarctica is beginning to warm up a little It was a beautiful day, 

Stanley (population approximately 2000) is the main town on the islands and the hub of East Falkland’s road network. Attractions include the Falkland Islands Museum, Government House, built in 1845 and home to the Governor of the Falkland Islands
There are three churches including the Anglican Christ Church Cathedral the southernmost cathedral in the world. The cathedral makes tiny Stanley a city.  The whalebone arch outside the church was constructed in 1933 to commemorate a century of British rule - the arch consists of massive jawbones from two blue whales.

The police station also contains the islands’ only prison, with a capacity of thirteen in the cells. In a glass vestibule there is a great collection
of police memomabelia, including Brith police "bobbies" helmets.

We started off walking around the town,the whale bone park, the war memorials including the WW1 (against Germany) and 1982 (against Argentina) Falklands War Memorials and Government House. The churches and Cathederal.
We stopped at the offices of the Penguin News and at the Visitors’ Center.And of course we visited some souvenir shops.

The traditional colourful buildings are constructed from wood with corrugated iron roofs, the light weight of which makes them the most practical to import - almost everything is imported into the Falkland Islands.

The ship wrecks around town were very photogenic


Then we took a taxi out to Gypsy Cove to view all the penguins.

 The beaches and land around Falkland Islands were heavily mined during the British conflict with Argentina in 1982 and some areas remain
marked minefields.  There are large areas of surrounding beach land which are fenced off with warning signs about mine fields.The upside of this is the penguin colonies are rarely disturbed because they are surrounded by minefeilds so the pengiun numbers have thrived.

I took hundreds of penguin photos, they are natural models. Their curiosity and lack of fear of man makes them easy subjects to photograph.

There are 850,000 breeding pairs of the little 15 inch high crested Rockhopper, scattered between the islands of the Southern Ocean - please don't ask me how they get those numbers, just trust the researchers!


This is the Skua, a conspicuous bird in sub-Antarctic penguin colonies actively seeking eggs and chicks for a meal. Adult penguins have nothing to fear but chicks, once no longer needing to be guarded by an adult, are often attacked and taken.


Pearlwort is the only flowering plant (other than hair grass) that occurs in Antarctica and is found mainly around penguin colonies.......more than 260 species of brilliantly colored lichens adorn rocky outcrops.

By the end of the day the wind had picked up it had become very, very windy.
We were a bit concerned over the tenders but they were still opperating We had a rough ride in the tender and it took
longer than it normally would have because we were bouncing around so much.


It may sound odd but I rated the Falklands as one of the nicest places on this trip, I could live there very easily.  I am not just saying this because it was nice to find somewhere that spoke English after a month of Spanish, or the houses and gardens that looked so British, or the shops that sold weetbix and other English/Australian food staples.

It was genuinly a nice place with very nice people.