* * *
I made it - smooth trips, no problems. It's cold, windy, and dusty down here, and there's still snow on all the mountaintops, but that's about what you'd expect for the summertime. So far everything is good to go - I went over to the Centro Austral de Investigaciones Cientificas (hereafter referred to as 'CADIC') today and met my colleagues for the study - Adri�n Schiavini and Andrea Raya Rey, with whom I�m tagging along on the expedition. They�re studying the colony of rockhopper penguins on the bay at the eastern end of Isla de los Estados (which has the English name, would you believe it, of Staten Island), and I�ll be walking around near there looking for nests of Striated Caracaras, which they say are munching on penguins eggs and chicks right and left. We should be there in time to see 500,000 penguin chicks hatching, which I imagine will be quite a sight. My GPS seems to be working fine, so I can�t get lost, right?
I�m also becoming more confident that I will be able to get a blood sample from some of the birds, so that the folks at the American Museum can finally reclassify these things and get them out of the Falcon family and into their own family where they belong. It�s hard to imagine a group of species that are less falcon-like. Yesterday I hiked up into the mountains near town to a glacial lake and watched a crested caracara (carancho) walking around on the ground, looking for all the world like a bloody turkey. There�s something mythological about them - I think they�re probably as close to a gryphon as you could get.
We�re supposed to leave for the island on Thursday, weather permitting, and as long as the helicopter is working (apparently its tail rotor was broken last week and they had to wait for a part to be sent down from Buenos Aires). As I type, I�m sitting here in my friend Monika�s house with her cat, Nikki, on my lap. Monika is off teaching history at the local university this evening, and I�m here at her home with her teenage daughter Maya, who is in her bedroom with the door closed. And her boyfriend, who came in through the window. Every once in a while I hear a muffled a cough or a giggle through the thin walls, when the wind isn�t rattling the roof.
The hierba mat� is brewing in the cup next to me, and all�s right with the world.
Hasta pronto,
J.
21 Nov 01
Ushuaia, Argentina
Everything�s still set to go tomorrow. We�re loading our stuff into the helicopter this afternoon, and they�re taking out the seats so that they can cram us and all our equipment in. I bought myself a small tent down on avenida San Mart�n yesterday so that I can stray away from the base camp for a couple of days if I have to.
I�m nearly finished with The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, and I�ve been totally enchanted by it. Because I�m greedy, I also started The Voyage of the Beagle already, and skipped right to the part where Darwin describes (rather uncharitably, but accurately) the Striated Caracara. Mira:
�Another species is the Polyborus Nova Zelandia, which is exceedingly common in the Falkland Islands. These birds in many respects resemble in their habits the Carranchas [Crested Caracaras]. They live on the flesh of dead animals and of marine productions, and on the Ramirez rocks their whole sustenance must depend on the sea. They are extraordinarily tame and fearless, and haunt the neighborhood of houses for offal. If a hunting party kills an animal, a number soon collect and patiently await, standing on the ground on all sides. After eating, their uncovered craws are largely protruded, giving them a disgusting appearance. They readily attack wounded birds: a cormorant in this state having taken to the shore, was immediately seized on by several, and its death hastened by their blows. The Beagle was at the Falklands only during the summer, but the officers of the Adventure, who were there in the winter, mention many extraordinary instances of the boldness and rapacity of these birds. They actually pounced on a dog that was lying fast asleep close by one of the party; and the sportsmen had difficulty in preventing the wounded geese from being seized before their eyes. It is said that several together (in this respect resembling the Carranchas) wait at the mouth of a rabbit-hole, and together seize on the animal when it comes out. They were constantly flying on board the vessel when in the harbour, and it was necessary to keep a good look out to prevent the leather being torn from the rigging, and the meat or game from the stern. These birds are very mischievous and inquisitive; they will pick up almost anything from the ground; a large black glazed hat was carried nearly a mile, as was a pair of the heavy balls used in catching cattle. Mr. Usborne experienced during the survey a more severe loss, in their stealing a small Kater�s compass in a red morocco leather case, which was never recovered. These birds are, moreover, quarrelsome and very passionate, tearing up the grass with their bills from rage. They are not truly gregarious, they do not soar, and their flight is heavy and clumsy; on the ground they run extremely fast, very much like pheasants. They are noisy, uttering several harsh cries, one of which is like that of the English rook; hence the sealers always call them rooks. It is a curious circumstance that, when crying out, they throw their heads upwards and backwards, after the same manner as the Carrancha. They build their nests in the rocky cliffs of the sea-coast, but only on the small adjoining islets, and not on the two main islands: this is a singular precaution in so tame and fearless a bird. The sealers say that the flesh of these birds, when cooked, is quite white, and very good eating, but bold must be the man who attempts such a meal.�
Let�s hope that man doesn�t turn out to be me!
J.
22 November 01 (Thanksgiving Day)
Ushuaia, Argentina
Hot fun in the summertime. Right now it�s really pouring � freezing rain mixed with sleet � and outside my window the Beagle Channel and the mountains have disappeared. And this is about as good as the weather gets. I�m sitting in Monika�s house again, waiting for the weather to clear so that the pilot can call CADIC and tell them that he feels like flying today. At any rate, I�m not keen for him to fly us into a mountain, so he can take as long as he likes. My bags are packed and I can be out the door in five minutes. But until they call, I�m like Toru Okada [from The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle] in the bottom of the well. Waiting.
Not that it�s particularly unpleasant. In fact, I find myself identifying with Toru in the small pleasures he takes in sitting around the house, waiting for something to happen � making lunch, brewing coffee, doing household chores. Things I didn�t have much time for in the frantic weeks leading up to this trip. It�s a good time to read and meditate and relax, though I also know that within a few days I�ll probably be doing one of the hardest things I�ve ever done, physically, and I�m a little nervous. I made photocopies of the big aerial photos yesterday at the CADIC and bought the last of my odds and ends for the trip � flashlights (2), sunscreen, pencils, a sharpener, and a gum eraser for the map, and a trout net for going �caracara fishing.� There�s going to be some cliff-scaling involved, and I hope I�m in good enough shape that I don�t have to stop too often to rest. Adri�n assures me that there are plenty of paths through the tussac grass worn away by the introduced goats and deer on the island. (At least there�s one good thing about exotic species. In the Falklands in �97, making it through dense bogs of tussac that were thousands of years old and 12-13 feet high was no picnic. It involved jumping from the top of one bog to another, and often falling down into holes between the bogs. Once you sweat inside your raingear you�re doomed to a very moist experience for a while, and tussac-wrestling is a quick way to get there.)
I finished The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle today, and I was sorry to turn the final page. I finished reading it while sitting in the same chair I was sitting in last year when I finished The Master and Margarita. It�s strange to be reading these surreal books in such a surreal place, where the mountains seem to approach and withdraw without warning, where it snows in the summer, where penguins and caracaras and giant woodpeckers aren�t unusual. It�s almost as if my trips down here are some kind of recurring dream, since everything that happens here is so completely disconnected from my life in Austin. Sometimes I hear myself speaking Spanish with my friends here and I don�t quite recognize myself, either.
Today I finally got in touch with Ricardo Rozzi, a Chilean scientist over on the other side of the Channel who�s been working with White-Throated Caracaras (Phalcoboenus albogularis, a close relative of the Johnny Rooks). It sounds like we�ll be able to meet up in Punta Arenas, or possibly even on Navarino island if we get back from Estados on the icebreaker in time. My seasickness tablets are still in my pack from last year. I checked.
Everyone is talking about Menem being released from house arrest today, and no one is happy about it. Now he can�t be prosecuted any further for his past crimes (arms dealing, etc). It looks like the road has been cleared for him to become President for a third time � meaning that the cycles of corruption and debt that are crippling the economy here are likely to get worse. Down here in Ushuaia there�s much more money than there is in most of the rest of the country, so it�s much like I remember it � residents call it �Fantasy Island� - but apparently in Buenos Aires things have taken a turn for the worse. Monika�s ex-husband called from there yesterday and said that people are afraid to go out of their houses at night, since crime has increased to an almost incredible degree. The government is trying to shed its debts by privatizing most of its social services and placing them in the hands of their wealthy cronies � welfare, social security, the post office, the airline, the telephone system, the power companies, everything. Monika thinks that the country is probably headed for another military-style dictatorship within a few years. Here in Ushuaia they recently cut teachers� salaries by 40 percent, while the governor of the province has ordered himself a $15 million Lear jet with public funds.
They�re flying it down here from Texas next week.
Here�s Darwin again, on the landscape of Tierra del Fuego:
�Tierra del Fuego may be described as a mountainous land, partly submerged in the sea, so that deep inlets and bays occupy the place where valleys should exist. The mountain sides, except on the exposed western coast, are covered from the water�s edge upwards by one great forest. The trees reach to an elevation of between 1000 and 1500 feet, and are succeeded by a band of peat, with minute alpine plants, and this again is succeeded by a line of perpetual snow, which according to Captain King, in the Strait of Magellan descends to between 3000 and 4000 feet. To find an acre of level land in any part of the country is most rare. I recollect only one little flat piece near Port Famine, and another of rather larger extent near Goeree Road. In both places, and everywhere else, the surface is covered by a thick bed of swampy peat. Even within the forest, the ground is concealed by a mass of slowly putrefying vegetable matter, which, from being soaked with water, yields to the foot.
�Finding it nearly hopeless to push my way through the wood, I followed the course of a mountain torrent. At first, from the waterfalls and the number of dead trees, I could hardly crawl along, but the bed of the stream soon became a little more open, from the floods having swept the sides. I continued slowly to advance for an hour along the broken and rocky banks, and was amply repaid by the grandeur of the scene. The gloomy depth of the ravine well accorded with the universal signs of violence. On every side were lying irregular masses of rock and torn-up trees; other trees, though still erect, were decayed to the heart and ready to fall. The entangled mass of the thriving and the fallen reminded me of the forests within the tropics- yet there was a difference: for in these still solitudes, Death, instead of Life, seemed the predominant spirit...the whole landscape has a sombre, dull appearance, nor is it often enlivened by the rays of the sun.�
A few of those rays would be most welcome right now. But until then, hay que esperar.
J.
24 November 01
Ushuaia, Argentina
The call came in at 3:00 this afternoon, just as Monika and I were sitting down to lunch. �They�re ready to go,� said Adri�n, �get here as fast as you can.� The weather had cleared a little bit, and we were going to make a break for it while the clouds had lifted slightly off the channel. So I jumped up from the table, dashed across the room to my bags, checked everything to make sure it was in place, then changed into my sub-Antarctic bad-weather gear: wool socks, rubber boots, shorts, long underwear, trousers, waterproof trousers, t-shirt, long-sleeve thermal shirt, polar fleece 1, polar fleece 2, hat, gloves, parka. Monika called the radio taxi while I loaded a new roll of film into the camera and checked to make sure I had the syringes and buffer fluid for the blood samples. I hugged Monika goodbye, my heart pounding, and within 7 minutes I was across town in CADIC, helping Adri�n and Andrea load the rest of the gear and the fresh food (there�s already a tent and dry goods set up on the island � hope the rats haven�t gotten into them too badly) into the back of a van to drive the half-mile to the old military airport. When we got there, the helicopter was warming up on the pad, and we loaded our gear into it in about three minutes. Adri�n�s wife (a geomorphologist) was there to take pictures of us, and I snapped a good slide or two of the helicopter � a nice Bell 222 from the mid-80s that looked kind of like Airwolf, painted orange and red.
(It was strange to think that the thing was built a few miles from my old high school, at the Bell plant in Hurst, Texas.) Like I mentioned yesterday, they�d taken the seats out so that we�d have more room, and there weren�t enough seat belts to go around, so I sat in the middle of the floor clutching my camera, hoping that I wasn�t in for too many big jolts.
As it turned out, the liftoff was smooth as could be, and the flight was spectacular � less than 100 feet above the tops of the trees on the Argentine side of the Beagle channel, where it was snowing in the beech forests and the white-capped mountains loomed tall and majestic. My heart was in my throat. We were actually going to do it. We were going to Estados. Glacial lakes, pastures, bogs, forests, rocky coastlines, tussac-covered islands and clear blue water passed below us. It was calm as could be, with fat snowflakes and freezing rain whizzing past the windows at 140 knots.
Unfortunately, we kept creeping lower and lower as the cloudbase kept coming further down. The two pilots were gesturing to each other and looked a little nervous. On the Chilean side the weather was clear, but on the Argentine side (where we had to remain, or face the wrath of the Armada Chilena) the clouds were spilling over the mountains and blocking our way. Just north of Isla Picton, where our ill-fated expedition was forced back by bad weather last year, visibility dropped to zero and the pilots turned the helicopter around and headed back for Ushuaia. We were less than 40 km from Estados, but there was just no way we were going to make it. Not with a combination of weather and politics working against us.
After we had landed again and helped the crew push the helicopter into the hangar, we trudged back into CADIC with our gear, feeling sheepish and defeated. Andrea accidentally dropped a bag with a bottle of lemon liqueur that Adrian had brought for special occasions on the floor, and we spent fifteen minutes mopping up the sticky mess. I tried calling Monika�s house, but she was gone and the phone answered with the fax tone. Adri�n�s wife had gone to the movies with his two daughters, and he didn�t have their car or the key to the house nearby. We shuffled around in Adri�n�s lab for about half an hour, shucking off layers, packing the food back into the walk-in refrigerator (next to several aquaria full of various experiments with clams, fish, and algae), and looking up the forecast for the next few days on the net. What we need is for the wind to come around to the northwest. Right now it�s blowing from the south, and as long as that continues there�ll be no relief from the low clouds. The pilot said that he�d be willing to try again on Sunday or Monday. If those don�t work, we have to wait until next Friday. At this rate, a boat would have been faster. But there�s still a possibility that they could call tomorrow, so I don�t have much choice but to stay here in the house, waiting for the phone to ring. It�s a little like being under house arrest. They let Menem out, they put me in.
Monika was surprised to see me, but also happy, especially since I�d thought to buy some empanadas and Coke on the walk back up from CADIC. I�m still ready to go at a moment�s notice, but I may be waiting a while longer. My biggest fear at this point is that we won�t be able to get to the island in time at all, and all of this travel will have been for nothing, more or less � just a paid trip to Ushuaia to sit in Monika�s house and eat junk food and watch movies. How would I explain this to the department? Adri�n, for his part, was nearly despondent. �I should have decided to study a species that lives in my backyard,� he said. �Next time, it�s going to be finches or upland geese.� I had to remind myself that there are reasons why no one has studied these populations, with or without a helicopter.
Yours ever, I remain J.
24 November 01
Ushuaia, Argentina
Movie popcorn is flavored with sugar here, not salt. Not so much as caramel corn � just enough to make it slightly sweet. It�s very pleasant.
Monika and I just came back from a trip to the local cinema, where we saw The Others, with Spanish subtitles. The movie theater is new since last year. It has one screen and was constructed on the naval base, across from the spooky old prison (now a museum, with a strange restaurant in the middle where the waiters dress in the old purple-and-yellow striped uniforms of the prisoners). I went into the museum once, four years ago, and have had no urge to go back � it has the feeling of a genuinely evil place where genuinely evil people suffered and died.
In any case, I enjoyed seeing the movie again, since its trick ending makes a second viewing a totally different experience. Monika fell for it hook, line, and sinker, and it was great fun to watch her reactions � like watching The Sting with somebody for the first time. (I used to think, when I was 8 or 9 and had learned about MTV from my baby-sitter, that The Sting was a movie starring Sting.) The director of the movie was Chilean, and from Punta Arenas, where I arrived a week and a half ago. I remember reading in an interview that he had originally wanted to film the movie in Chile at one of the old mansions of the wool barons just north of Punta Arenas on the plains, possibly at San Gregorio. There�s a very creepy house there rising out of the steppe that gives me a shiver every time I pass it in the bus to Ushuaia.
As you�ve guessed by now, today came and went without a peep from the helicopter pilots. I wish I could tell you that it was on account of the miserable weather � which we are, in fact, having now � there�s rain beating against the window and a howling wind coming down from the mountains. But all day it was sunny, calm. Infuriatingly perfect flying weather. Adrian kept trying to get in touch with the pilots, but they were nowhere to be found � out enjoying the day racing boats on Lago Fagnano, a deep, dark Loch about an hour north of here on Route 3. The use of the helicopter, I�ve discovered, is at the whim of the governor, and so we�re not much of a priority. If we�d left in a boat three days ago, we�d have reached the island in calm seas by now. There�s nothing to be done about it, but it certainly is frustrating. At this rate, Adri�n and Andrea will probably miss the hatching of the penguins, which was important for their field work, and each day that goes by cuts into our field time.
I spent the day sleeping off a slight fever in the morning and waiting anxiously by the phone, then running errands with Monika in the afternoon after it became clear that we weren�t leaving today. Bright spots: I visited the (stuffed) bird collection at the old Museo Maritimo (my favorite in town � dusty and charming), which they have recently restored. The collection, not the museum. I was pleased with myself when I managed to identify nearly all the species (with the exception of three shorebirds and a mysterious duck) without help, as they haven�t put up any signs yet, and it really is an exceptional collection. (They even have a white-tufted grebe, which Robin thinks is totally distinct from the Falkland form and is basically a new species waiting to be described.) After that, Monika drove me a little ways along the new coast road, where I took some nice slides of a firebush in bloom, and then back to the city dump. The dump is a real treat if you like caracaras � there were three species there in considerable numbers � the Crested Caracara (Polyborus plancus), the White-Throated Caracara (Phalcoboenus albogularis), and the Chimango Caracara (Milvago Chimango). They were all burrowing around in the trash together, and were really an amazing sight � a third of the species of caracara in the world, representing three of the four genera, all right next to each other. That probably doesn�t happen at very many places on earth. I took some video that I hope will be of interest to somebody.
It occurred to me, after we tipped the guard at the gate on our way out, that if this whole Estados thing falls through, maybe I can get something done by trapping some of the birds at the dump or doing a behavioral study of them for several days. It wouldn�t be glamorous, but at least it would be something. I�d hate to come back from all this empty-handed, but it�s beginning to become a possibility.
As I write, Monika is sitting in her rocking chair a few feet away, watching a lovingly restored, letterboxed, and dubbed version of To Kill a Mockingbird, in German. How she manages to keep three languages straight in her head all day long I have no idea � she uses them all, every day. My brain would turn to jelly. The dubbing job is amazing to me � they spent so much time and effort on the sound design that it Gregory Peck really does sound like himself, speaking in German, and all the actors� mouths seem to have re-formed themselves around a new language. I�m off to bed now, I guess � another day of waiting tomorrow. The pilot did seem to be a little more committed to flying on Sunday, so we�ll just hope that the weather decides that today was good enough to repeat. Not likely.
Gregory Peck just killed a dog with one shot.
J.
25 November 01
Ushuaia, Argentina
Nothing new to report today, really. I read some more Darwin � what a funny guy! (His description of a cloud sitting on top of a mountain exactly matches an experience I had on Elephant Jason back in �97) �, went for a walk with Graciela, waited for a call that never came again. Once again, the weather was perfect, calm with a slight wind from the North. Tonight it rained but then cleared up, and I can even see some stars out the windows of the porch. It�s bitterly cold. The pilots were out racing their boats on Lago Fagnano again today, and Adrian seems even less optimistic. I did, however, get to watch 15 minutes of film shot by Sewall Pettingill on a blurry videotape in Monika�s collection � rockhoppers and gentoos in the Falklands, probably from the 1950s during his first trip. I wonder if they were shots from Kidney Island. Strange to think that Robin�s over in the Islands right now, only a few hundred miles from where I�m sitting. At least the planes in the FI actually show up when you want them to, even if they are piloted by crazies like �Ever-ready� Eddy Anderson.
God, I hope we get to the island. I thought more about sitting in the dump to do a study of the white-throated caracaras, and it was just depressing.
J.
26 November 01
Ushuaia, Argentina
It�s about 11:00 AM, and no word so far. Monika is getting fed up with the situation (not with me being in the house - I hope! - but with the pilots etc.), and so called one of the pilots � a former student of hers � to try to find out why we�re not going anywhere, when the weather seems to be perfect once again. High clouds, spots of blue, gentle wind from the north. It turns out that the helicopter was in Rio Grande, in the northern part of Isla Grande, this morning, so we wouldn�t have been flying in it at any rate. They say that they�re waiting for some satellite photos of Estados in order to determine whether they MIGHT be able to go there tomorrow. After that, we�ll have to wait for the next four days while the pilot goes up to Tucson, Arizona (not Texas, as it turns out) to retrieve the Lear Jet for the governor. In the meantime, however, he said that we�re just standing by, and so I should call and check in every hour to make sure they haven�t changed their minds. More house arrest. Adri�n said, when I talked to him earlier this morning, that the only thing that was comforting him at this point was that even if we had elected to use a boat to get to the island, the boat couldn�t have left until today, and so the earliest we would have gotten there would have been tomorrow.
Martha, who cleans Monika�s house for her twice a week, is here this morning and so is straightening everything, putting new sheets on the bed, washing the dishes, mopping the tile floors, etc. It�s a small house, so it turns into a disaster very quickly. I�ve been getting up early the past few days to beat Monika to the dishes, which she does every morning if I don�t stop her. She certainly is an interesting character � the most laid-back German I�ve ever met, I think; she says that when she was 12 years old she knew that she wouldn�t be able to stay in Germany for the rest of her life � too rigid � but the German efficiency does come out in her every once in a while, and she gets a wrinkle in her forehead when too many things are out of order.
The tops of the mountains got blanketed with snow again last night. I sleep next to one of the Orbis Calorama gas heaters, and so the air around my bed gets so dry that I often wake up with nosebleeds. Yesterday morning I woke up at 6:30 and found that my pillowcase was caked with blood. An icky way to start the day. I spent fifteen minutes washing it out in the sink and then drying it by the same heater, before turning it back over and falling into a fitful sleep for the next few hours. I�ve taken to sleeping for a couple of hours in the middle of the day, too, just as a way of disappearing without leaving the house. There�s nothing worse than the feeling that you�re overstaying your welcome. I haven�t done it yet, but it could happen before too many more days go by, I�m afraid. Monika has things of her own to do, and though I know she understands my predicament, I also know that she wasn�t planning on having a houseguest for a month, even if I am her �hijo perdido.�
26 November 01
Ushuaia, Argentina
Call number 2 came in an hour ago. We�re off again at 3 this afternoon. I�m not holding my breath this time, but the weather looks good. If you don�t hear from me tomorrow, then we finally made it.
J.
11 December 01
Ushuaia, Argentina
We made it, and we�re back. A Dutch sailboat, the Sara Worwerd, coming back from the Falklands, retrieved us from Bahia Franklin two days ago and deposited us here in Ushuaia yesterday afternoon. The load-out from the island was nerve-wracking, not because the weather was nasty � on the contrary, it was the best morning we�d seen in two weeks, calm and sunny � but because we knew that the weather could change drastically in five minutes and start blowing a gale. Last year Adri�n had to abort the take-out after all the equipment had made it on to the ship because a southwesterly gale was blowing, whipping up huge waves in the bay and carrying gusts of ice and snow. He and the three other scientists (Andrea and two students from Buenos Aires) had to spend the night huddled together on the ground in an ice storm, without tent or sleeping bags, and then walk eight hours through bogs the next day to reach a more sheltered bay to which the boat had retreated. Although that was a particularly unlucky experience, it wasn�t impossible that it might happen all over again this year, so we hauled the mountain of equipment and supplies that they�d left on the island earlier in November down to the landing place (about a mile from the campsite) as fast as we could in one trip. In addition to my bags, the folding table, part of the tent, the spare gas bottle, and a water jug, I was also carrying two giant antlers from one of the red deer on the island, which Adri�n wanted to take back to CADIC for study, slung across my chest. I must have looked like a real barbarian. None of us relaxed until we were safely out of the dinghy and on the deck of the boat, a small (15m) sailboat painted a cheerful red. And sure enough, no sooner had we lashed down our equipment on the deck when the wind started up from the northwest, and a cloud began advancing down from the mountains behind our camp site. We left Bahia Franklin and set sails to cross the infamous La Maire strait. The stories about how nasty this stretch of water can be rival the Drake Passage � huge waves, ferocious currents. I�d chewed two seasickness tablets earlier but I was still frightened, and prepared to crawl into my bunk and hug the rails.
But again, we were lucky. The wind dropped, and the sky cleared to the point where we could stay on deck and soak up some sun, and though the boat was rolling a bit, it was nothing like what it could have been. Giant Royal Albatrosses and delicate Cape Petrels circled the boat, and though we were crawling against the current (about 3 knots), it was pleasant, and exciting. The mountainous tip of Isla Grande loomed closer and closer as the hours went by, and within 20 hours we were back in the shelter of the Beagle Channel and headed for home.
I guess I�m getting ahead of myself, though. Did I find the caracaras? Yes. Many. I was unable to catch one for DNA sampling, but I did get some pellets, feathers, and a sample of nest material that may yield some genetic information. I found five nests, three of which had chicks, and two of which had eggs, so we can make some educated guesses about their breeding cycle. I mapped about 20 breeding pairs according to the criteria of the Falklands survey. And I was able to make some interesting behavioral observations that will help me a great deal as I write my thesis. So from a scientific standpoint, it was a success.
What was the island like? My god. It was certainly dramatic. There were 800-foot cliffs rising on either side of the inlet where we camped, with subantarctic Nothofagus forest carpeting the hillsides. There were Andean Condors, Black-Chested Buzzard-Eagles, Imperial Shags, and 160,000 pairs of Rockhopper Penguins, some of which were nesting in trees (!). Our campsite was tucked away in relative shelter in some giant grey sand dunes that were swallowing the forest at the mouth of the inlet, though 100km+ winds often lashed the tent at night and made such a racket that it was difficult to sleep. My work meant that I had to climb over the mountain south of camp every day (an exhausting 2-hour climb through the forest) to reach the largest of the penguin colonies � I certainly got my exercise. And it�s more than likely that I walked through some places where no one has ever been. Adri�n and Andrea were working in a smaller colony about a mile and a half from camp, which wasn�t a bad walk as long as the wind wasn�t blowing too hard. If it was, it turned the inlet into a sandstorm through which walking was nearly impossible. The weather changed so drastically and so often that I wouldn�t have believed it if I hadn�t been there to experience it. In one day it was possible to have bright sunshine, rain, fog, a gale, an ice storm, and sunshine again in the space of about two or three hours.
Try dressing for that. During the day I kept in touch with A&A every two hours by radio, which was fun � I was �Carancho,� and they were �Los Pinguinos,� and climbing to the top of a ridge, turning on the handset, and pressing the �transmit� key always made me feel absurdly official, somehow.
What about the helicopter ride? Fantastic. Clouds were rolling in over the mountains as we left Ushuaia, and I was sure we were in for a repeat of the first attempt, but the Channel was clear as we headed east, and after about 90 minutes (during which I had some spectacular views of the Cape Horn archipelago, as well as Picton Island where we had to give up last year), we approached Staten Island (which Darwin only mentions, with a shudder, as �The rugged and inhospitable cliffs of Statenland�) and landed in a boggy meadow about a mile from the camp. I will never forget the sight of the helicopter lifting off over our heads while we cowered in the grass beneath it, the giant red cross painted on the bottom of it zooming up and away, and suddenly gone, leaving us utterly alone.
I filled more than 50 pages of my field notebook with notes and random accounts � sometimes writing just to keep my mind occupied � and I�ll send some excerpts from that later. But for now, I�m still trying to get used to the fact that I�m in a building with solid walls, and that I�m actually warm from my head to my toes, and not equal parts freezing and burning up, as was usual in the tent. I know it was only a two week trip, but it felt much, much longer, and though I know this sounds silly I feel like a slightly different person than I was when I left. When I finally staggered in to Monika�s house yesterday I couldn�t remember ever having been so tired. It was wonderful to shower and shave, and strange to feel my mind re-adjusting to a completely different set of circumstances again. There are still 10 days left before I�m set to get on the plane from Punta Arenas back home, and I�m not sure what I�m going to do with them, as I�m essentially broke.
At this point I�m just ready to go. There are a few loose ends to tie up at CADIC, and Adri�n is threatening to cook an asado for all of us later this week, as are the Jofr�s down the street. Maybe I should just make it a goal to gain back the weight I lost on the island before I return.
More soon. I miss you all and can�t wait to see you again soon. Monika is giving a German lesson to one of her adult students over at the kitchen table, and I�m starving. Time to toast some bread and put on the kettle.
J.