Falklands - Sea Lion Island, day 3 - Orcas!

We only had until about 3pm before we were due to fly back to Stanley. We decided to spend the time we had on the two main beaches closest to the lodge, enjoying the penguins and seeing what else we could find.   

To get to the north beach we had to walk through a mixed colony of Gentoo and Magellanic penguins. The Gentoos are particularly inquisitive and will come up and say hi.

Once at the beach we plotted up somewhere comfortable and just enjoyed our surroundings for a couple of hours. I managed really good views of a number of Snowy Sheathbill, a weird pigeon type looking seabird. There were hundreds of penguins, mostly Gentoo, on the beach, plus lots of Black Browed Albatross and Giant Petrels.  

Snowy Sheathbill

 

Gentoos in the surf

Black Footed Albatross

We then gave south beach a go, said hi to the Elephant Seals again, and it was then we stumbled across a large skeleton on the beach. Initially we thought it was a cetacean and said we'd take some fellow guests to the beach to show them after lunch.    

It was actually an Elephant Seal skeleton, minus the skull

Back at the lodge, we were informed that Lars, a Danish guest, had seen an Orca distantly off south beach this morning. Damn! We'd already planned to go back to look at the skeleton so the plan was to plot up in the dunes with a great view of the sea and keep out fingers crossed. Julia sat up in the dunes and I went to show the skeleton. I left the other guests looking at it and headed back to Julia. As soon as I got back Julia says that she thinks she's seen a large fin distantly. We keep scanning and boom!

Initially there were distant 

Two orcas initially distantly (1/2 mile) off shore. Over the next 20-30 minutes they steadily appeared to be getting closer to the shore, and as they got closer more fins appeared, there were 5 of them. They cruised just off shore, around 50 metres out providing superb views for the next hour.   

 

We we having so much fun that time had ran away with us and we had to make a hasty retreat back to the lodge as our plane was due in 30 minutes to take us back to Stanley. Our short stop over on Sea Lion Island had been truly magical. A must be anyone visiting The Falklands. 

 

Birds added to the trip list on Sea Lion Island were: 45. Snowy Sheathbill; 46. Magellanic Snipe;       47. Sooty Shearwater; 48. South American Tern and 49. Brown Hooded Gull  

Falklands, Sea Lion Island - day 2

Mickey, our host and a keen birder, took us out in a 4x4 for an orientation tour of the far of the island, so we could decide where we wanted to visit with the remainder of our time on the island.  On our morning travels we added Magellanic Snipe, Brown Hooded Gull, Sooty Shearwater and South American Tern, before a visit to a Rockhopper colony.

 

Magellanic Snipe

We also stopped off to see some Sea Lions which involved leaning over the edge of a cliff which isn't my cup of tea, so a quick look and back to the lodge for lunch. 

In the afternoon it was back out to the main beaches by the lodge, getting up close and personal with the Elephant Seals, the penguins, and a couple of other birds, thrown in for good measure.  

Black Chinned Siskin - common around the lodge

Dolphin Gull - very smart

Peregrine 

Gentoos

Giant Southern Petrel

South American Tern - always distant

Black Throated Finch - seen mainly scuttling around on the ground

 

Falklands, Sea Lion Island - day 1

On to Sea Lion Island. Sea Lion is a very small island with the wildlife within minutes of the front door. The lodge itself was absolute quality. I cannot recommend this place highly enough. 

We arrived late in the day after not leaving Carcass until 3.30pm and then having to fly back to Stanley (50 mins) to refuel and then onto Pebble (30 mins). I had just about time to get out and get my bearings before dinner. There were literally 1000s of penguins, Gentoo (my favs) and Magellanic, within a few minutes walk of the settlement. 

We were really looking forward to a full day out the next day to explore properly

Falklands, Carcass Island

After 3 wonderful days on Pebble Island it was time to move onto Carcass Island. I'd been really looking forward to this as we had a pre planned/pre-paid trip to West Point, to visit the Black Browed Albatross colony. I wont spend any time going into the ins and outs of why it didn't happen, but let's just say, we were very disappointed we didn't get to West Point, that and a number of other issues somewhat spoiled our time spent on the island. But rather than write a negative post about our stay here, which I quite easily could, I'll concentrate on the good stuff, the birds mainly.

We occasionally bumped into a Magellanic Penguin when walking around the settlement

Juvenile Elephant Seal

Johnny Rooks (Striated Caracara) were common 

Giant Petrel

Johnny Rook

Kelp Gull

Yellow Billed Teal

Kelp Goose (f) 

Kelp Goose (m)

Falkland Thrush

Ruddy Headed Goose

Juvenile Black Crowned Night Heron

Dark Faced Ground Tyrant

The star of the show, the endemic Cobb's Wren

Cobb's Wren were relatively common around the settlement

Tussock Bird

We ended up staying almost 4 days on Carcass Island. I would have much rather spent more time at our next stop, Sea Lion Island, but it is what it is. I did manage to add another 4 birds to the trip list:         41. Tussock Bird; 42. Cobb's Wren; 43. Short Eared Owl and 44. Great Grebe.