... and ... Killer Whales!

We saw this!

OK ... so this isn't actually one of our pictures - I got it off Google images. BUT we did see this. And had we sat there for four hours with the camera trained to the exact right spot of beach, and if we had a very expensive camera with an incredible zoom, and if we had shelled out the extra 1200 USD for a couple of permits to the extra-special-closer-to-the-action photographer zone ... then we could have got a shot like this too.

First the backstory: After the success of renting a car to get to Punta Tombo, we decided to push our luck, rent another vehicle and drive to Peninsula Valdes (about 200km north of Punta Tombo).

Originally we were going to the Peninsula just to see the sea lion and elephant seal colonies. The Lonely Planet gave us a 3% chance of seeing Killer Whales so we didn't get our expectations too high. That was until the night before we went, when a man in our hostel told us he'd seen them and recommended that we get to Punta Norte (the best area for whale watching on the Peninsula) by 10am the next morning.

So, on the day in question, we got up ridiculously early for the 3 hour drive, and arrived at Punta Norte bang on 9.30 ....... only to be told by some Scandanavians that the whales had just left and we'd missed a full on beach attack by half-an-hour. They said we should have got there at 7am - high tide. There would be another high tide at around 7pm, when the whales might come back ... if they weren't too full. Grrrrr...

We decided therefore to explore the rest of Peninsula Valdes and come back later. Good choice. Here is a list of the animals we saw in chronological order: sheep, llama, armadillo, sea lions, rhea (a cross between an ostrich and an emu), megallanic penguins and elephant seals.

The seal lions were great - there were hundreds of them lying on the beaches making hilarious groaning noises, and there were loads of young seal pups playing in the surf. Here's a picture of them - one we actually did take ourselves - promise!


The elephant seals were comedy as well. They are very fat and their tiny flippers are useless on land, so they found it nearly impossible to haul themselves up and down the beach. They would wobble a few feet then just sit there, exhausted. Best trivia: Male elephant seals sport an enormous proboscis that resembles an elephant's trunk. Dominant males are known as "beachmasters" and can control hareems of up to 100 females, but must constantly fight off challenges from other bachelors.

We got back to the whale watching area around 2.30 (just in case we'd been fed more incorrect information) and lo and behold, within a couple of hours two whales had arrived. They started off by playing a way off-shore, but before long they started to make passes nearer to the beach. The larger male whale treated us to one slow pass very close to where we were standing.

Again this picture is ours - promise. Finally, after about four hours of larking about, they began to circle near where the sea lions were playing in the surf. Then suddenly, incredibly, we saw the big male actually beach itself trying to catch a seal! It was too far away to see if he had caught anything, but one of the rangers closer to the action called in and said he'd caught one. Absolutely amazing!

Oh and there was an armadillo in the car park too: