The Long Windy Walk, Bleaker Island, The Falklands, Wednesday, 2nd November

It was so nice to be able to have a lie in as we didn't need to get up early to see Orca's chasing seals, Elephant Seals fighting or the sun come up as we had seen several of these just recently...although I was still awake early.

Our first target was Pebbly Bay, just a short walk from the settlement but there was no sign of either the Sea Lion or the Leopard Seal that were alleged to frequent this bay occasionally. Therefore the first photo of the day was the whale bona on the foreshore of the settlement.

 The we left the settlement bay and followed the coast with an aim of walking north some eight kilometres to skirt some petrel colonies (skirt and not to get too close as they are easily scared off their high tide mark nests and may not return). An interesting little stack on the beach before we saw one of our target birds.

 A Black Necked Swan...a shy bird which usually needs 200 metres distance before it feels threatened but this single bird was at sea and being driven towards land by the prevailing wind so we benefitted from the bad weather.

A black headed tern.

We reached the airstrip just as a plane was landing. It was bringing some cruise ship passengers from Stanley to spend three hours on the island to look at penguins. and wildlife. We needed to walk across the strip as there was a Southern Giant Petrel nesting on the beach right next to the far end of the runway.

Unfortunately he was facing the wrong way so I could only get a back view.

We walked up the hill to see the Gentoo colonies and at this particular one everyone was lying down on their eggs except this one standing guard.

 They need to on guard as the Skua's will steal unprotected eggs such as this one who forced the penguin off its nest, picked up the egg in its beak and flew off a short distance.

 It pecked at the egg and dropped it  few times but it resisted breaking. There were several eggshells lying in the grass but also some unbroken eggs where the Skua has given up trying to break it open. The second Skua seen here gave up waiting for the first bird to break the egg and flew off to harry another penguin on the edge of a colony.

We walked along the cost to The First Neck and onto the Second Neck although there was not much to see except for several Southern giant Petrel nests that we avoided. We crossed the island to the far shore which at least put us in the lee of the isle so the wind was less fierce. There was a little more wildlife in the lee such as a pair of Brown Hooded Gulls.

 A Southern Giant Petrel

We reached the end of Long Beach which was where the penguins preferred to get in and out of the water. We sat for a long time taking photos and deleting those that were just too early or too late.

 This is the sort of action shot that I was looking for.

We walked along Long Beach and cut across country under a blue sky with ointerresting clouds to reach Big Pond

 A White Tufted Grebe on Big Pond.

  A view looking down the length of Big Pond with curious tufts of grass growing like towers out of the water's edge.

We headed back via Pebbly Beach to sit on the water's edge in a vain attempt to see some seals that weren't there and got mobbed by a goose and a pair of Oyster Catchers as they thought we were too close to their nests.

The day finished with a walk along the beach, past a derelict side of a boat and the shearing shed to see the remains of a pier and on the shore line, two herons.