Time & Tide waits for no man (Whales & wales...)

400 kms of dirt roads, long, fast, straight, wide and leaving an impenetrable dust cloud in our wake from our blingmobile (we haven’t told you this so far but the hire car we picked up was not the macho 4 wheel drive pick up that everyone else was driving, but a rather budget low spec very gold family saloon which had zero street cred! Arrived by 10am to catch high tide at peak time for killer whale beach attacks on seal pups as made famous by David Attenborough at Punte Norte, Peninsular Valdes. We are not him, and needless to say we got bored waiting for them to appear after 30mins so spent the rest of the day driving in the Peninsular Valdes, a windswept South Atlantic Peninsular famous for its ocean life. Caught up with sea lions, seals, Magellanic Penguins, elephant seals, armadillos, cuanchos, and Latin American emu type birds. Got to Puerto Pyramides just in time to catch the last inflatable out to the bay and saw the magnificent Southern Right Whales and calves in all their glory – they put on quite a display this is Ant as Gill remains a wimp when it comes to water….).
By the way got no sleep in the budget hostel due to boy racers outside my window all night (and this is Gill) now I know why I prefer 5 star to no star. But joking apart, apart from the purple sheets (very clean…) and lime green coverlets (perhaps it’s a South American design statement…) it was fab, the bathroom with sandstone tiles was skintight but gorgeous! We are lovin’ Latin America – we returned tonight to el Classico bar (where else would we go….) to write this blog and were welcomed with a big kiss from the waitress and even larger glasses of wine than last night – heaven!
At Caleta Valdes, we learnt that Charles Darwin came here on the Beagle and asked the question “who on earth would choose to settle here “, even though he found the fauna and landscape mesmerising. We agree with him completely – the Welsh must have been mad. It’s high summer, and the gigantic elephant seals lounging on the beach don’t seem to feel the biting wind – but when it blows, the real issue is that the sand sticks to your lipgloss, and you are crunching sand for the rest of the day – not sure if Charles experienced this, but Gill sure did. But at the time, Ant did point out that in London, you would pay a fortune for such exfoliation….
This is Ant now “I’ve seen the whales, I’ve seen the penguins, I’ve every type of seal imaginable – why exactly am I going to Antarctica – and the shopping forecast there is even worse than it is here…) Keep reading this blog to find the answer….
Arriving back at the hostel was like a scene from a 70’s B movie – young people sitting in the garden, strumming guitars, speaking many languages of the world and smoking. When asked what was his drug of choice, Ant truthfully answered “a Lemsip”!
Shopping conditions – poor, shopping forecast – even worse