West Point Island, Falklands, Thursday 27th October

West Point Island, Falklands, Thursday 27th October

Today we were going for a boat trip across the water from Carcass Island, named after HMS Carcass which visited here in the eighteenth century and West Point Island situated near a peninsular off the northwest part of West Falklands. There was Fran and myself, Mallory, Leslie and Sarah that we had met on Saunders Island and had flown with to Carcass Island. Also with us were three more teachers on contract to Falklands, Kate, Karen and Rachel. 

I was waiting at the jetty as a small yellow trawler came around the point and moored at the jetty. These was to be our boat for the day. It was captained by Shane who had Kiki from Sweden as his crew that day. 

We got on and started the hour long crossing from one island to the other. In the sheltered water between the two islands there was a swell but not bad enough to cause any seasickness.

We entered a charming sheltered bay on the east of the island where the farmstead was located. There were a few trees, a farmhouse, a guest house, a shearing shed (the first building to be erected in 1879; the house followed in 1880) and a number of buildings. 

There was a well designed garden that once had been carefully tended but it was now overgrown. The new occupier only moved in a month ago and recognised that it would take a lot of work to get it back to its full potential. There was also an overgrown vegetable patch that showed signs that work had already started on its rehabilitation to grow vegetables rather than just vegetables gone to seed and weeds.

We got a lift to the far side of the island to see a mixed Rockhopper and Black Browed Albatross Colony. They seemed to be very tolerant of each other although there were a few pecking incidences when Rockhoppers got to near to an Albatross’s nest. Also the much smaller Rockhoppers would go to peck the much larger albatross if one wandered too near to their nest. Fran and I stayed over an hour watching the birds and were the last to leave.

We wandered back over the hill to the farmhouse. On a slope over looking Cat Cove, we caught up Sarah and Kate who had stopped to check that they were going in the right direction. We had a packed lunch sitting on the grass overlooking the bay and the yellow trawler. 

We reboarded the trawler and headed off around Woolly Gut Point towards the mainland. We pulled in near a beach and there on the beach were two Leopard Seals. Breeding seals would be on the pack ice a lot further south but these were juveniles resting on the beach and taking advantage of the abundant local supply of food. Not far from them up the slope was a Rockhopper colony and a string of penguins hopping in a line between the sea and the colony, despite the presence of the Leopard Seals.

The weather had turned and the crossing back home was going to be rough. Karen and Leslie who both suffer from seasickness, moved to the wheelhouse which was in the centre of the boat and probably the best place to be. 

Fran, Mallory, Rachel and and Kate stayed on deck by the base of the mast set just back from the bows. The rest of us stayed in the main cabin. As we rounded the Point and reached open water the swell got worse and the wind picked up. After a short while Mallory joined us in the main cabin but the three others stayed out on deck.

Fran was fine as she had her waterproofs on. But the sea got rougher and we were hitting the prevailing waves at an angle. The little boat began to pitch and yaw. Each time the boat plunged downwards into an approaching wave, great clouds of spray were thrown up and across the bows and foredeck. The girls on deck were getting drenched. 

Rachel and Kate were wearing jeans and they were soaked through. There was too much movement of the deck every which way so they decided to hang on to the relative safety of the ropes around the mast and stay where they were rather than risk the perilous and uncertain journey along the deck and back to the cabin.

In the lee of Carcass Island, the swell subsided and we were nearly home. Rachel and Kate rushed along the shoreline to get home and out of their sodden clothes and into a hot shower. Rachel’s shoes squelched  as she walked as her shoes were full of water.

After getting warm and dry we had tea and cakes in the farmhouse and all agreed it had been another fun day with the natural fauna and flora of West Point Island and so ended another day.