The Penguins of Bluff Cove

We are just back from a Viking cruise around the toe of South America – the South America and Chilean Fjords cruise. I’ll write more articles in the future, but as I was working through my 2700 images, I decided to focus on one part of the voyage – the tour to Bluff Cove on the Falkland Islands (Las Malvinas as far as Argentina is concerned). The Falklands Islands are actually much more interesting than I expected and like a little slice of Britain in the South Atlantic, but Bluff Cove is perhaps best known for its penguins – both Gentoo and King Penguins. The farm hosting the trip is now pretty well connected to Stanley and each group of 20 people or so is taken by bus to the coast. Even though there were perhaps 60 people there for the two-hour visit, there is so much room (and so many penguins) that very few of my photos actually have a person in them!

I haven’t uploaded any of these photos to my two Print on Demand partner sites yet. They will be there, but please contact me if you have any interest in any of the images.

The penguins were naturally found in this area of the islands, and they are pretty much unperturbed by the humans milling around. Their nesting areas are off-limits but are very close to the paths and so in late January, we were able to see small chicks of the King penguins, as well as somewhat larger Gentoo chicks that were just about to lose their “baby feathers”. Flying around are birds eager to catch a young chick away from its parent and the penguins themselves are sometimes lost at sea when they swim out for food for themselves and the chicks. The small chicks are protected under the heavy warmth of the skin and feathers of the parent as shown with this King penguin:

The Gentoo chicks were presumably older and many still covered with their young feathers:

And around the groups were the birds looking for an opportunity!

Also walking around, we found Ruddy-headed geese, and the flightless Falkland Steamer duck:

But back to the penguins – there were so many opportunities to photograph them that I ended up with 50 images that I selected out of 200 or so photos. Who can resist a penguin? The Gentoo were the ones that seemed to visit the ocean while we were there and had to make a long trek from their nesting area, around a lake, over a rocky rise and across a very windswept beach to reach the sea.

Some penguins seem to prefer a solitary walk to the ocean, others prefer to travel in a group:

Finally, they approach the water’s edge, take a few steps into the water and then dive under the waves:

I don’t think I saw any penguins return from the ocean – I understand they swim a long way out to sea, so perhaps the return is in the afternoon?

The beach itself is full of intriguing patterns that are revealed and then hidden by the blowing sand:

An intriguing abstract piece of art perhaps!

I’ll finish this story with two more images – one of grown King Penguin chicks finally losing that warm set of feathers to reveal their true colors and then two Gentoo penguins saying goodbye to the visitors to their home as we returned to Stanley.