The ride up to Puerto Madryn was quite nice, we had a lovely squishy seat and a TV dinner of Milanese Beef and mashed potatoes. Well me being vegetarian, Steve had two, but it´s the thought that counts. We were a bit sparkled on arrival but managed to find our way to a campsite, 5km out of town, walking through the mid day heat and arrived in a heap. Met a jolly Belgian man along the way though and agreed to hire a car with him to go out to see Peninsula Valdes. Although famous for its Southern Right Whale, which come onto the beach to breast feed their young from June to December, we heard that around high tide in March or April, you can watch Orkas or killer whales swim up to the beach and snatch sea lions for tea. Think we maybe a bit sick but we really wanted to see it.
Unfortunately for us, we missed it by a day, It was a great day out though. The road up was unpaved so we were slipping and sliding all over the road. The Belgian man was terrified when I took over the driving as I nearly slid off the road twice and did a 180 turn another time when I applied the brakes. Cautious driver as I am, we rarely got over 10km per hour the whole time so no great danger there.
When we got to the beach we were greeted by a friendly Armadillo, who likes to have his back tickled. Really cute. Down on the sand there were hundreds of elephant seals and sea lions, all huddled together in a bid squidgy mess of blubber doing nothing much. When they did move it was only a few yards and in the most spectacularly ungainly manner, just wobbling along.
Further along we saw loads of penguins, all nesting on the banks of a sand dune, We got really close to them and one stood happily posing for photos. Ace.
