Puerto Madryn

From Buenos Aires, we took an overnight bus ride of 1300 km to Puerto Madryn in the province of Chubut in northern Patagonia. The bus journey could have been wonderful, with a great thunderstorm in the sunset, but unfortunately, the bus's ventilation was broken, causing water to drip from the ceiling and all the windows to fog up completely. The poor air quality resulted in Freddy feeling unwell for a few days, but nothing serious.

We arrived on Christmas Eve and hurried to a large supermarket at the edge of town before closing time, hoping to prepare a lovely Christmas dinner. However, the offerings at the supermarket were disastrous (fruits and vegetables were moldy and everything was extremely expensive), leading to a dampened mood. Well, it didn't feel particularly festive here anyway, which was fine. Luckily, in the following days, we found better groceries at other stores that were also more affordable, and we managed to whip up some delicious meals. Peace secured!

Puerto Madryn is a nice little holiday resort, and most tourists (mainly Argentinians and other South Americans, as far as we can tell) come here for a beach vacation, and the beach was crowded in good weather. The wind is noticeably stronger here, but the beach in town is quite well protected by the nearby Valdes Peninsula.

Now we come to the highlights of the area, finally more nature! We rented a car for a few days and were able to visit both the Peninsula Valdes and Punta Tombo, and it was just amazing!

Punta Tombo is home to the world's largest breeding site for Magellanic penguins, with supposedly up to 1 million birds! We didn't count them, but there were a lot, and it was incredibly beautiful! You can watch the little guys waddling around, swimming, sleeping, pooping, grooming, cuddling, and napping for hours, and it never gets boring!

The Peninsula Valdes is especially known for being a breeding ground for the southern right whale, which comes to the warmer and calmer waters of the peninsula to mate, give birth and raise their young. However, we knew in advance that we would probably just miss them, and that turned out to be correct. Unfortunately, the orcas and dolphins didn’t show up that day either, but we are already accustomed to the fact that whales do not like to be watched by either of us. Instead, we saw many Guanacos, a few more penguins, sea lions, elephant seals (no males were present), birds, bugs, lizards, Cuis Chicos, running birds, and armadillos.

We are not nature photographers, and our amateur snapshots can only vaguely convey what we experienced. It was wonderful, and we celebrated every single animal.

Overall, it was quite a journey. The roads were generally better than expected, but one really has to concentrate on the gravel roads. The scenery is rather barren, but when you get out and walk through the dunes, you are surprised by the diversity of flora. The vastness of the land is hard to grasp when you're coming from Germany.

On the way to the nature reserves, we made a few stops in some towns, which were generally quite desolate. Supposed attractions were either inaccessible or closed, or turned out to be less spectacular than expected. Sometimes a road is closed, requiring long detours. Many villages seem half-abandoned. It was nice to have a car for more independence and range, but we were also relieved when we were back on the road.

During the rest of the time, we mostly relaxed and strolled along the beach in Puerto Madryn. New Year's Eve was very quiet, and since Marike stupidly stubbed her toe and it turned blue, we didn’t go out on the town either. Here, they managed to avoid those awful firecrackers, which was very pleasant!

What else we observed and seem to have learned: The financial cuts by the government are clearly noticeable, and we suspect that infrastructure and cultural offerings will massively decline from now on. On the way here, we saw many abandoned road construction sites, and in the area, there are many unfinished houses that apparently haven’t been worked on for a while. Also on Valdes, some roads and viewpoints were closed, and the open ones are in urgent need of renovation and might soon be inaccessible if no action is taken quickly. All the museums in the area that we wanted to visit were closed, which had nothing to do with Christmas. The doors have apparently been locked for some time, and there is no information on whether/when they will reopen. Somehow, we don’t have a good feeling that the current politics will lead to an improvement for the people, but rather that it will only decline from now on.

It was nice, let’s move on! Happy New Year!