Sea Lions!

 

Sea lions! On the beach! In the surf! Everywhere.

The second destination du jour for the ferry-boat was Isla Marta, an even smaller speck of rock north of Isla Magdalena in the Straits of Magellan.

How small of a speck?

That small.

Another ferry-boat beat us to the island.

We did not "stop" and disembark on Isla Marta. Sea lions are not penguins, for one thing.

These are better to observe at a safe distance.

Fortunately, my camera had "zoom," in the old sense of a "zoom" lens, not in the modern sense of interactive computer meeting software where someone forgets to mute their microphone and lots of people have fake backgrounds that cause parts of their body to disappear from the viewing screen. Not that "zoom." 20th Century zoom.

A very large kelp "forest" surrounds the island. It's visible in this picture.

This is as much of a close-up zoom as I could zoom from the offshore distance.

The beach, at least, was lousy with sea lions.

Some were swimming, as one would expect mammals to do at a beach.

The kelp is waiting to be devoured.

Soon it was time to fly.

And time for the ferry-boat to motor its way back to Punta Arenas.

Besides, it was time for lunch.

I chose a sandwich restaurant: Lomito's.

There are no fast food chain restaurants in Punta Arenas. Nor were there any on Isla de Pascua. There weren't even that many in Santiago, just the occasional KFC. I don't even think I've seen a McDonald's in this country.

I ordered the "Lomito con queso," a pork sandwich with lots and lots of cheese. Washed down by a "shop" of Austral. "Shop" is the local term for "draft." I had the Calafate (the one with the hint of wild blueberries) instead of my "usual" Yagan dark ale.

 

It hit the spot. Now I needed a nap after these two very-early starting days.

Penguins!

Magellanic penguin getting in his morning stretches. Good for his health.

Friday I did the tour to Penguin Island.

We caught the boat to Penguin Island very early in the morning. Although, compared to the 5:15 a.m. departure for the full day trip to Torres del Paine -- and when they said "full day" they really meant "full day" -- the 6:00 a.m. start for the tour allowed me to sleep in, relatively speaking.

Luckily we had a sunny day and the winds were actually, by Punta Arenas, standards, quite calm.

I call this picture of walking on the dock to the ferry-boat: To the light!

The boat was ready to transport us to the penguins.

Technically, the place to which we were being ferried is known as Isla Magdalena. Not, in the official records, Penguin Island. But if you tell people around these parts that you are going to Penguin Island, they know where you are talking about.

The trip down the Straits of Magellan lasted about an hour, I guess. And soon we were disembarking on the shores of Penguin Island.

The penguins (disappointingly) did not rush to come greet us. But the place was packed with penguins and other sea birds.

I can pretend this is a penguin running down the beach to greet me.

It'd be a lie, but I'll stick to me pretend world.

A penguin and a lighthouse.

The lighthouse's official name Faro Isla Magdalena -- the Isla Magdalena lighthouse. We can call it the Penguin Island lighthouse and they'll know what we're taking about.

This is a penguin and a tern.

 

It is nesting season for the penguins. Penguins are known for mating for life. They pair-bond intensely. During nesting season, eggs are laid in burrows. One half of the penguin couple stays with the eggs in the nest. The other goes off to hunt (and eat) for a few days. The absentee parent-to-be then returns and the penguin that had been home on the nest then leaves on a four day bender, hunting and eating.

There are holes all over the island which were once burrows used by a penguin couple but the homestead has been vacated.

Penguins on the beach:

Penguins on the beach. Now with kelp.

So there were no penguin babies -- or baby penguins, if you prefer. The eggs hatch in late December. So the early months of the year are when you will see the cuddly penguin babies. That you are not allowed to cuddle.

I tried to take a selfie with a penguin at least somewhere in the background. I was not successful.

I'm guessing the gulls use the same burrows for nests, but they don't tell us these things. This was not a tour to Sea Gull Island. This is Penguin Island. Monumento Natural Los Pingüinos.

And, yes, penguins are so cool -- no pun intended -- that the Spanish name for penguins -- pengüinos -- is officially spelled with umlauts. Like the rock stars that they are.

Here is a sea of gulls:

Back to the star attraction of this island:

Well, I couldn't manage a selfie with a penguin, but I did manage one with the lighthouse.

The lighthouse not only was bigger, it was stationary. Much easier for selfie-taking.

Not sure what's going on in this mosh pit.

The gaviota can only stare at it, at a safe distance.

These penguins are officially known as Magellanic penguins. You may know them better by their less-flattering name: jackass penguins.

Yes, they also are known as jackass penguins, seriously. They make a braying sound like a donkey. The braying served many purposes. One of which is a trez romantic call out to its life-partner penguin, so that its mate-for-life can find its soulmate in the crowd of penguin lookalikes. 

Now come on. Does this guy (or gal) (hard to tell with penguins) look like a jackass to you?

Or this one?

He's not a jackass!

This is not a jackass either. It could be a kelp goose, but, again, we weren't focused on seeing and classifying any non-penguin birds.

Another boatload of tourists are heading for Isla Magdalena for their designated hour of cavorting with penguins.

THis one, however, looks in no mood to cavort.

Their eggs that need a-hatchin'.

And this is the penguin to do it.

Someone forgot to tell him that penguins were flightless birds.

But, then again, he's a jackass.

Yes, Isla Magdalena was lousy with penguins. They were everywhere.

The hour for cavorting with penguins is drawing to a close.

Time to scurry back to the ferry-boat.

The island was worth the visit. It didn't smell of fish. The all-you-can-eat sardine buffet is held out in the waters, not on the island, where the penguin staying at home is fasting. But Isla Magdalena was not the only boat adventure destination out here today on the Straits of Magellan.