The next day was another day of long driving to Punta Arenas. We stopped on the way to tour Mylodon Cave.   Unlike other caves we’ve toured, this cave wasn’t protected until too late. Previous visitors have pretty much ransacked the place, so we could only be told about the fossils and stalactites that used to be there. Then I thought it funny how they had an iron statue of an extinct ground sloth that used to roam the land. But we were told it was inaccurate because it was 3 meters tall and they knew from the bones that these animals never exceeded 2 meters tall. The whole thing was just odd. I appreciate the preservation efforts that countries like New Zealand has even more now.

We also stopped for lunch at Puerto Natales. At lunch, Zapa expressed concern that our Penguin tour the following day would be cancelled. Apparently, the entire previous week of penguin island tours had been cancelled.

But we were lucky.

Punta Arenas is the southernmost city of South America. I was surprised the city had 100,000 citizens. Zapa told Peter (our techie in the group) that there was an Apple Store there. I got that Zapa was joking. Fred got that Zapa was joking. I thought the rest of the bus got that Zapa was joking. But Peter took him seriously.

The next morning, we were at the appointed dock before sunrise. Fred said he saw a fox in the grass as we made the last turn into the driveway. The sunrise over the Magellan Straight was so beautiful and we were all taking pictures. I realized something was moving in front of my view of the sunrise and initially, was a bit irritated by it. Then I remembered Fred’s comment about the fox and hastily snapped a photo. It’s blurry, but I was the only one with a photo of it.

The boat looked small, but held about 60 passengers. We circled around to Marta Island and went on deck to take pictures of the sea lion colony.

Then we continued on to Magdalena Island. There were hundreds of penguins on the shoreline and you could see the entire island was pockmarked with nests. There’s no foliage on the island, the nests are holes in the ground that the penguins dig. Both mom and dad share child-rearing duties and then when the juveniles are big enough, they head out to sea and swim to Brazil and mom and dad stay behind. Most all of the juveniles had left, but there were still a few there. The colony is huge – estimates are 30,000 to 50,000 penguins!

Fred forgot his camera, but had his older one in his pack. It was low on battery. I left all my gear on the boat and my camera’s battery died after 20 minutes. I still got about 30 photos as I walked to the lighthouse and back. I don’t think Fred went further than 50 yards from the boat. There was just too much cuteness! I think you’ll agree.

We had the afternoon free. It was Good Friday and the streets were very quiet downtown where our hotel was. Peter was eager to go the Apple Store (wink) and we dropped Zapa and half our group at a shopping center. Peter asked Jorge if we could go to the Apple Store and Jorge looked at him quizzically and said, “There’s no Apple Store!”

The jig was up.

Fred and I walked around outside for a little bit. It was rather cold and the constant wind was tiring. There were a lot of sculptures and a nice waterfront walkway, but it was just too uncomfortable to enjoy it.

After dinner, we said our goodbyes to most of the group and packed for our flight out in the morning.

I enjoyed the trip, but don’t think we’d go back. It is a long way to go and I think we saw everything we wanted to see. The glaciers there were stunning and the penguin colony was awesome.  The locals must be used to the constant wind.

We’re planning our next adventure to Ireland.  Stay tuned…