31 December - New Year's Eve

I got up and enjoyed the morning sunshine surrounded by vegetation in the long wide conservatory that runs down the side of Government House. However, for me this morning's highlight had to be being allowed to raise the Union Jack up the flag pole in the front garden at the start of the day while a small tourist bus stopped on the nearby road, people piled out and cameras clicked. Somewhere out there I am immortalised in the holiday snaps of holiday makers. 

A large part of today was taken up in the large, industrial kitchen of Government House as we all mucked in to get our New Year’s Eve dinner prepared. My job was to make bread, rolls and humous which took up the morning, a task made more difficult by being in both an unfamiliar and a large kitchen. I was hunting down food and equipment from amongst a main kitchen, a large pantry and a store room which between them had three large fridges and any number of draws and cupboards. By late afternoon I needed a break and headed off with Emma to yet another white sand beach on the peninsula to walk the dog. On my return I squeezed in a walk to the pub with Nigel's sister and nephew before throwing myself into the evening's festivities. 

Pub

Eight of us sat around the dining room table. In addition to myself and Nigel’s family a Falklands couple with their son were also invited as guests for the evening. The husband was an interesting man, having arrived in the islands while back-packing around South America and had not left.  He had had various jobs on sheep farms and his stories spoke of the basic lifestyle here that existed not so long ago.  He now owns the farm at Bluff Cove with the sideline in penguin trips for cruises and he holds some clear views on the islands political position which he was keen to share with Nigel at the expense of time spent talking to others. I enjoyed his stories more than his company but nothing detracted from a fine evening and we all saw in the New Year before alcohol and tiredness overtook us.

30 Dec - Black Shearwaters

Today we planned a boat trip to Kidney Island north of Stanley although this would be late in the day: the island's main attraction is seeing thousands of Sooty Shearwaters - Black slender winged sea birds - massing off the shore at dusk before heading to their nests on the island for the night.

Until then I had time to relax alone: Emma was working at Bluff Cove and Nigel was taking his sister and nephew to join her. I read in the conservatory, walked the dog and pottered in the kitchen before walking to the museum in town. It was obvious that a cruise ship was in: as I approached town a large number of people were milling around and I could hear any number of languages.

The museum was an eclectic mix of things Falklands: discovery, maritime and social history and natural history were all covered by lengthy narrative and an excess of exhibits. For me however the most interesting part was a visit to an original Stanley house from 1849.  I walked there with one of the museum guides, just the two of us since either no one else knew of it or else didn’t want to bother. The house sits on the slopes a few streets back from the water and was one of a handful sent over in kit form with some pensioned army families in an attempt to populate the islands. A small two up two down house, it was surprisingly high ceilinged and seemed spacious for one family for the time considering the housing available to workers in industrial cities back home. 

The day slipped by and the time to go to Kidney Island arrived. Sandwiches packed, we headed to the public jetty where the last few stragglers from the cruise ship were awaiting the final tender of the day. Nine of us boarded our boat, large enough to accommodate all of us under cover, and headed out into the harbour. Thirty minutes later we arrived at the island and were dropped off on a narrow sandy beach to explore.

Kidney Island is long and narrow and covered in tussock grass. Its tough long leaves grow up to six feet high from large root bowls.  The leaves largely obscure your view of anything in front and behind you and down to your boots unless you sweep them aside; you have to feel your way forward with your feet, trying to avoid the nest holes of the shearwaters burrowed in the ground.  In this manner we picked our way slowly uphill from the beach and to the other side of the island. 

After enjoying views from high up on the rocky north side of Kidney Island - rockhopper penguins with fat chicks on exposed outcrops, the sweeping panorama across the waters of a wide sound to the far hills of East Falkland - we headed back to the beach for the arrival of the Shearwaters. Seals bobbed slowly in the evening-calm waters, a sea lion basked lazily further along the beach and a quietness was settling across the island. We passed an hour on the beach enjoying the peace as the dipping sun marked its departure with an orange strip across sea and sky, sandwiching the horizon, while an ever increasing number of small black shapes darted across the purple dusk. The flapping Shearwaters slowly massed and although never a dense swarm the increasing numbers filled our field of view as they criss-crossed each other, swooping low over the water and the beach and at times our heads. For a while they circled around us until, at a point that only the birds and nature understood, small numbers started to break away from the rest and dart inland towards their nests.

It was well past nine as the last of the Shearwaters broke away from the remains of the mass. As they headed inland to their nests we boarded the tender to take us back to the boat, a thirty minute trip to Stanley and our own beds for the night.

29 December - West Falkland

Today I was to accompany Nigel to the Ram and Fleece Show at Fox Bay on West Falkland. This necessitated catching one of the small eight seat Islander aircraft that constitute the Falkland Island Government Air Service. 

The aircraft arrived and offloaded two or three people but the engineer decided he wanted to change the brakes before the aircraft left again. Nigel and I stood on the tarmac in the sunshine chatting with the pilot and head of fire section-cum-baggage handler; it is genuinely fascinating to hear the life stories of some of these people and it is also fascinating to experience the relaxed nature of things here compared with the more regulatory constrained approach back home.

We arrived at Stanley airport and checked in. In reality this meant walking into a tiny waiting room of a dozen chairs on one side and a wooden shelf on the other where arriving passengers collected their luggage. Oh, and we also had to be weighed. 

Thirty minutes later and we were off and climbing west. The colourful houses of Stanley, spaced along the blue of the harbour, slipped past quickly to our left and then we were over the rugged land immediately outside the small town. The mountains and battlefields I had seen on my last visit and on my first day here were to our left and right, craggy outcrops of granite lined the mountain ridges and black peaty ponds and rock pockmarked the valley floor. A number of those ponds were perfectly round: identical small black dots spread seemingly randomly but from this height obviously shell holes from the conflict, now part of the peat-pond landscape.  

Deep blue water and islands in the distance got closer as we flew over the deserted brown-green of the hills and valleys below us, occasionally marked by the thin and wrinkled path of a peat river, like a black vein across the landscape, or the occasional dark lake. It looked quite smooth terrain from up here but in reality was probably extremely rugged and impossible to cross by vehicle except by the roughest of tracks and only with difficulty by foot. Once I saw the red roof of an isolated house in the middle of nowhere, lost in the expanse, and could only assume a certain type of person would want to live there. Even as we flew over the tiny splash of red and white that was Goose Green I could not help but feel it was totally lost in the landscape of green and blue. 

We were only a thousand feet above the ground and I could clearly see the 'rock runs' across the landscape, fascinating features that are supposedly a bit of a mystery to geologists. They present as areas of rocks, some as large as a fridge, that give the impression of having flowed down from the hills. They look for all the world as water might, sometimes with small tributaries off the main flow. I was told during my first visit to these islands that the formations are particular to the Falklands and that the exact geological mechanism that creates them is unknown although the theories relate in some way to glaciation. 

It was fifty minutes before we landed on the small grass strip that served the community of Fox Bay which sits on either side of a wide inlet. We were driven to the show in the large barn that served the community’s sheep farming needs on the eastern side of the bay. I abandoned Nigel to the organisers while I went to find some locals to talk to. The event had the feel of a village fete, small in scope and limited in its offerings, crossed with the importance of a large town show; this was after all one of about only seven settlements with a total population of about two hundred souls located on West Falkland, an area almost as large as Devon and Cornwall combined. Everybody seemed to know each other, chatting together while we sat in groups on the grass, sun on our faces and food from a small barbecue in our hands. And then of course there were the rams and the fleeces. Those who wanted got walked around the animals and fleeces displayed in the main barn - fleeces on tables around the edge and animals in cages in the centre - a local sheep farmer highlighting what constitutes a good ram and a good fleece. Apparently when taking a fleece sample from a sheep you should take it from the left side of the animal as sheep tend to sleep on their right (something to do with internal organs) so the left side of a sheep tends to have slightly higher quality wool.

It was fascinating to speak to the locals about their history and their work. Some were Falklands born and bred, others immigrants from the UK. Some were from well-established Island families (and are keen to let you know). Some were sheep farmers, others were local government and some had small businesses. Mostly they were people from the settlement but some had travelled from Stanley and a small contingent had come in from Mount Pleasant for the event. It was an interesting mix and they shared interesting views as we sat on the grass in the sun sharing beer and conversation that ranged from global warming to things military and to life on the islands in general.

Eventually the time for the prize giving arrived. Nigel carried out his duties, announcing the winners and handing out the prizes of which there were a few and then it was time to depart. We drove back to the airfield and climbed aboard the aircraft for the return trip, again crossing that isolated landscape of green and blue although this time making a diversion to Bleaker Island – where I had failed to get to a few days ago – to collect a couple more passengers. It was then it was back to Stanley to collect the car and head back to Government House for a quiet night in after a long day out.

28 December - The Pembroke Peninsula

As I sat reading in the main sitting room this morning I could feel the tightness of sunburn on my face after yesterday's visit. Despite the weather not being overly hot the sun here is strong, even during the winter months, the time I had previously visited. I think it has something to do with cleanliness of the air here and it was something I had forgotten.  

Today I simply planned to enjoy the fresh air with a walk along the Pembroke peninsula on which Stanley is located. This would allow Emma to run Masataki to the airport while Nigel worked. I had also agreed to take their black Labrador Gibson with me.

   

Emma dropped Masataki in town for last minute shopping then took me along the road and track that led to the rust stained Pembroke lighthouse at the most easterly point on the islands. I had come here on my previous stay in the Falklands and remember going to the top on a still, dismal and grey day where pools of mercury from the floating bearing and broken glass from the reflector still lay around the floor, a consequence from the conflict five years before. Today the wind was blowing hard and the sun was out and I would have needed a key to open the lighthouse door (and would have had to pay ten pounds at the local museum for the privilege). After visiting the memorial to the sunk container ship Atlantic Conveyer, a massive propeller at the tip of the rocky peninsula just behind the lighthouse, it was time to head back towards Stanley.

I followed a route along the coastline, walking among tussock grass and dunes with Gibson running ahead and enjoying everything fresh air and nature had to offer a dog. The view of the shore - sometimes rocky and inaccessible, sometimes pebbled or sandy - came and went as my route took me down amongst dunes and then out again. I came across a small sandy bay of white sand and clear turquoise seas and enjoyed the scene while Gibson enjoyed the water then it was off again towards the west and Stanley with the wind directly against me.

After an hour the landscape had flattened somewhat to become more peaty with shrub and grass cut through by narrow, dark rivulets running through to the sea and dotted with the occasional small black pond inhabited by ducks. I crossed grassless patches of peat and waded through the ankle high, white flowered 'diddle dee' from which any number of ground nesting birds flew off as I approached. In the distance I could see the windsock of the small Stanley airport that sits in the centre of the peninsula and on my left a mile off I could look down on the full white arc of Surf Bay from where I was to be collected.

A short while later I was picking my way down through steep sandy slopes to get down to the Surf Bay beach. I walked along the water's edge under blue skies as the wind whipped up the powdery, dry white sand higher up the beach, swirling it around like mist. As I walked, Gibson played in the sea until we eventually reached the far end of the bay, climbed up onto the higher grass and awaited our pick up.

The afternoon was spent relaxing in the summer sunshine and helping with gardening chores. A rose bed and the gravel frontage to the offices at the back of Government House were both weeded and then it was time to relax while Nigel headed to Mount Pleasant to collect his sister and nephew. Once more we collected vegetables from the massive garden and communally prepared food for a dinner which was again enjoyed with drinks in the formal dining room. And so another Falkland Island evening slipped away.

Goose Green Then and Now

                            

                            

27 December - Darwin and Goose Green

Today we visit Darwin and Goose Green which are on the west side of East Falkland Island, the island on which Stanley is located. Goose Green was the site of the first real ground battle during the conflict of 1982, famous for the battle in which Col ‘H’ Jones was killed. 

I had been to these settlements before. Last time was during winter with snow on the ground and we had been flown in by helicopter. This time it was a clear and bright day, albeit windy, and we were going by car and it took nearly two hours of gravel track driving before we arrived. We first visited the small Argentinian cemetery just outside the settlement. Simple small white crosses, neat and uniform, are surrounded by a white piquet fence. I recall last time thinking how poignant the simplicity of it was then - made more so by those basic crosses being lit brightly by the sun while against the backdrop of a thunderous, black winter sky like some 'hope in death' symbology rendered by nature - and nothing of that simplicity has changed. Now however there are names on what had been largely anonymous graves; a recent initiative to DNA match the remains with families back in Argentina.

After visiting the monument to Colonel H Jones VC of the parachute regiment - with a walk over the ground and description from Nigel of the battle and circumstances behind his death - we moved on to Darwin, a handful of houses nestled by a small stretch of water. At this time of year it is a beautiful setting with its white houses with red and green roofs spaced amongst the green grass and against a backdrop of blue skies and blue water. We had tea and biscuits in Darwin House, a local residence cum guest house, and then headed a mile further along the road via the parachute Regiment memorial to Goose Green. The views brought back memories and apart from the weather nothing seemed to have really changed from three decades ago.

The red and white houses of Goose Green are spaced around a grassy isthmus and its ninety or so inhabitants make up the biggest population centre on the islands after Stanley. Again nothing much seemed to have changed. We wandered the length of the settlement, chatted to a local who was from Stanley at his weekend retreat - a tiny portacabin affair with an old bus attached and neatly converted into a wood lined conservatory - and then headed off. A brief stop at the nearby war grave of a naval pilot shot down during the battle, small and isolated but clearly tended for by the local community, and it was then time to return to Stanley.

That evening we walked to the second of the two restaurants in Stanley. Also the main hotel, it had the functional anonymity of many business hotels back home but on a small scale. I had tooth fish, some deep sea fish caught in these parts and termed 'fish gold'. It was like a not too tasty cod. Fishing makes up some sixty percent of the nation's GDP but interestingly fresh fish seems impossible to get hold of here; it all seems to be frozen for export.

We returned home and shared drinks and conversation while watching the film 'An Ungentlemanly Act' from 1992 with Ian Richardson which tells the story of the initial invasion in a style that is hard to characterise; certainly not comical but on the other hand neither a serious piece of high drama. 'That awful film' is how a local described it to me but it was fun to watch and, having been filmed on location, it was interesting to see the things that had and had not changed in Government House and around Stanley.

26 December - More Penguins

Today Falkland Island radio highlighted the wind chill on the islands and its effect on newly shorn sheep.

I got up early and wandered through the house, enjoyed the view from the conservatory and then settled in the sitting room to await the others.  

Today's plan had been to fly to Bleaker Island to the south on one of the small aircraft of the Falkland Island Government Air Service. FIGAS as it is known do not run schedules but plan their drop offs and pick-ups around the needs of its passengers each day. This can mean that you are dropped off at your destination only to be collected again two or three hours later which, when visiting an island to explore the wildlife, just isn’t long enough.

We fell into this trap today and so an alternative trip to Merrill Farm a short drive to the north of Stanley was arranged. I would be leaving at 12.30 with Masatake so I had time to go with Nigel to the Boxing Day races where Nigel was obliged to present some prizes and be interviewed by local radio. We arrived at the course - small and uneven and more of a rough field - and joined the small throng celebrating this key event in the Stanley calendar. The small grandstand and race office were both faded and peeling and had clearly seen better days although they suited the general character of the place. Two fast food vans and an ageing porta-cabin bar completed the picture and served the needs of the small crowd that was gathering. The feeling was more of a village point-to-point but the setting was magnificent with the mountains to the west forming the backdrop for the event.

After one race and a brief wander around I walked the ten minutes back to Government House and prepared for the short drive north to Merrill Farm, another place that now provided tourist services in addition to farming. My hope was to see Rock Hopper and maybe Macaroni penguins, only here in the islands during summer and so something I missed when last here.

It was a long, slow drive from the farmhouse to the coastline and the penguins; five miles off road and without tracks in the shadow of craggy, granite hills as Adrian our driver picked his way through the rough ground and around small, still ponds black with peat. We bumped over tussock grass and fern, had a smoother ride over the heather-like and white flowered 'diddle dee' and eventually arrived close to the smoother grass near the coast, patched red with sorrel.

We visited a colony of Magellan penguins that burrow into the peaty ground. We saw a colony of Gentoo nesting in the open near a beautiful stretch of white sandy beach, inaccessible to us because of land mines. And then finally we drove to the Rockhoppers who live on rocky outcrops on land often some distance from the sea and as their name implies waddle and hop around the rocks and between their nests and the sea.

It is entertaining watching penguins. Within a colony they will be hopping, running around, chasing each other, squawking, greeting each other noisily or just standing around seemingly oblivious to everything around them. It is easy to get transfixed by their antics, trying to see some sense or logic in their behaviour. Rockhoppers seem to be the most mischievous and noisy, Gentoo are less so but seem to be more smelly and the King, as its name might imply, stands around behaving in a more serious and regal manner. The Rockhopper is very distinctive with its small plume of yellow feathers above its red eyes. Amongst the second colony we also saw a Macaroni penguin, the fifth of the penguins native to the islands. To me it seemed like a Rockhopper with orange rather than yellow eye feathers.

As we drove around we had time to question Adrian on life in the Islands. Originally from Lymington, he had arrived here when his parents came out on a contract and had stayed. He told us of the education of his children, a travelling teacher would spend three weeks living with the family before moving to other isolated families to do the same before returning a few weeks later. He spoke of his cows which wandered his land, a small breeding herd but not used for commercial purposes. He would get milk from them and occasionally slaughter one at Christmas to share amongst his workers. And he spoke about his sheep which provided his income outset tourism. Falklands sheep are hardy beasts that require little looking after and produce a good quality of wool that requires little cleaning prior to use; there is little in the way of shrub and trees in the islands that can get snagged in the animal’s coat.  

The trip over, we were collected by Nigel and Emma and headed back to Stanley. Once again the evening was spent collecting food from the garden and communally preparing dinner in the large industrial style kitchen of the house. And once again it was a late night.

25 December - Christmas

It is Christmas Day and it is bright but very windy out there.  

Today many people are working in and around Stanley as two more cruise ships are here for the day: the museum is open; the restaurants are busy; and a steady stream of local Land Rovers are passing along the waterfront taking people to Bluff Cove and other sites for wildlife spotting.

Despite the activity around us our plan was for a slow and relaxed day. I quietly nursed my hangover in the large sitting room - lots of photographs of Royalty, luxurious red deep-pile carpet and the flags of the United Kingdom and the Falklands either side of the large fireplace - and waited for Emma and Nigel to surface. We headed off in the car to walk the dog before breakfast, our destination Surf Bay which is a beautiful long arc of white sand and turquoise-blue water only a few minutes drive along the peninsula from Stanley. We walked the length of the beach, watching dolphins swimming lazily past despite the rolling and breaking waves. We stopped and watched a family swimming in the sea, apparently a long standing tenth generation island family fulfilling a personal Christmas tradition. And as we walked back it struck me – as it had decades before on other Falkland beaches - that the whole scene could have been a picture from the Caribbean. Apart from the brisk wind, the blue sky, azure sea and white sands could have been from an island paradise postcard. I guess the three Typhoon aircraft from Mount Pleasant flying in formation overhead were also somewhat out of place.

We drove back via other sites of interest on the peninsula. York Bay, another stretch of bright white sands and surrounding tussock covered dunes was once the beach of choice for locals to visit but is now fenced off because of minefields. Mine clearance has been going on since the end of the conflict although the priority has been to clear the areas in the 'camp' thereby allowing use by farmers and hence helping the economy. There is a noticeable reduction in the number of minefields since my last visit here; at that time minefield warning signs were ubiquitous, hanging from barbed wire fencing along tracks and roadsides and throughout the countryside. It is planned to have all mines on the Islands cleared by next year so maybe the Islanders will get their beach back soon. As I walked along the track above the bay I passed a group of people from the liners huddled in a stone shelter having returned from walking to Gypsy Cove, another sandy bay further around the peninsula. The cruise ships visitors get everywhere.

We returned to Stanley, passing the Lady Elizabeth, the large three masted iron boat lying on the beach at the end of the harbour that has appeared in many iconic photographs of the islands. Her rusting hulk sits close to the shore looking complete and today, at low water, it looked like a couple of locals were trying to wade out to her. She is one of many victims over the years of the South Atlantic weather and one of many hulks in and around the harbour. 

We got back to Government House and set about digging up some potatoes and carrots for lunch from the extensive gardens, largely set over for growing flowers and food for the house. Nigel took some to an ageing woman who lived over the road, a member of the house staff who was serving at the time of the conflict and with many stories to tell. When he hadn’t appeared back 45 minutes later Emma and I went to get him and we too ended up chatting and drinking with her and her family. We eventually got back at 2pm to start our own celebrations.  

It was a relaxed afternoon. We chatted and drank and opened a few presents and then collectively prepared dinner. In the late afternoon Masatake, the son of a Japanese friend of Nigel's, arrived for a lightning three day visit and we closed our relatively informal celebrations with dinner in the main dining room surrounded by more royalty looking down upon us from the walls.