Whales, seals, penguins, all in a day at Peninsula Valdes

Just a few minutes out from shore and we’re surrounded. All around us are families of Southern Right Whales. From babies (that are still massive) to super long mothers.

These whales bob up and down, spray water and then decide to have a bit of a play slamming their fins down on the water – even from a few hundred meters away the sound is so loud and incredible.

One even decided to venture under our boat, giving an upclose view from just under the water surface.

From time to time they dive down and you get plenty of shots of their tails above water.

They have these barnacles around their head and back which make them look a bit funny, but given that I’d never seen whales before, I was amazed.

We even saw a few jump up in the air and slam down on their backs and sides. They never land on their stomach because of the way their ribs are so they don’t hurt themselves.

While the whales at Puerto Piramids were the highlight, the rest of the day was spent driving around the coast checking out sites of Magellanic penguins, elephant seals and sea lions.

Unfortunately we didn’t see any adult male elephant seals, so they didn’t have their trunk nose bit yet – they have to be 8 years old before that forms. However, the seals were various ages so they were a multitude of colours!

Peninsula Valdes is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and as usual it did not disappoint. The day started at 8am and finished at 9pm with lots of sunshine, dry air, wildlife and ocean.

I booked this day tour with my hostel – El Gualicho as all the tour companies around Puerto Madryn cost the same. The tour guide was super informative. Highly recommend doing it – it has a wide range of wildlife, even armadillos can be spotted!

I was aiming to do a boat tour with the black and white dolphins at Playa Union the next day, but opted for a lazy day in Puerto Madryn. Seems the lack of sleep on night buses and late nights and full days are finally catching up with me (it’s taken 3 coffees to wake me up today). Puerto Madyrn is a nice little seaside town with lots of lovely cafes, restaurants and with a nice beach and pier to walk along, so not a bad spot for a lazy day of blog writing and photo processing.

Next stop is El Calafate and El Chalten leading up to Christmas! Finally flying this time to avoid the long buses (briefly) – I’ll be back to those after Christmas and will learn to wear even more layers of clothes and bring my own food since Andesmar totally disappointed me on the last cams-class bus ride!

P.S. If you love the armadillo, here’s a little video of how intrigued it was of my GoPro camera! Worth watching in HD.