Whales!

Hello Everyone!
Thanks for my bday texts/emails! I had a lovely day on my bday - we hired a car with a couple of guys we met at the hostel, and took a day trip to Penisular Valdes National Park to try to glimpse some weird and wonderful animals. We managed to see some guanacoes (kind of llamas), a grey fox, patagonian hares, and some other animals and birds that we don´t know what they were... But most exciting were on the beaches and cliffs of the park where we saw Elephant seals and Southern sealions. There were a few different colonies, and they were so noisy, making kind of barking noises like fat dogs! And all they seemed to do was rest and fight...

We got dropped off in Puerto Piramides where we spent my birthday night just eating my cake and lazing around.

We had stayed in Puerto Piramides with the intention of whale watching, cos even though it was slightly out of season (they normally arrive in June), we had been told they had already been sighted! I was well excited! So we went on the only boat trip that seemed to be running (and there were only 8 people on, including a toddler and a baby!) where we had to wear extremely attractive outfits.

The boat ride was quite bumpy, but we saw more seals and sealions close-up, and Gaz even managed to spot an out-of-season penguin! When it was almost time to turn the boat round and go back to the small port, we got our first sighting of a whale´s back in the distance. It didn´t come up again. But then we saw the air spurt (or whatever it´s called) of a whale pretty close, and then it´s tail came out of the water, so close. Maybe only 20m from the boat! And we could see the massive shape of the whale underneath the dark water - it was amazing!!! (Sadly no photos as I was too busy just gaping, and Gaz was busy holding on to the rocking boat.)

After Puerto Piramides and Madryn, we headed to Cordoba, with a quick stop in Bahia Blanca to break up the journey. In Bahia Blanca the only exciting thing we did was go to a small musuem about the european immigrants to the port, where it was all in spanish, so we could only look at the pictures and eat the amazing (possibly welsh-influenced?) cake!

After another overnight bus journey the involved a baby repeatedly being sick (nice!) and a broken down bus, we arrived in a scorching Cordoba! (sunshine at last!) That night was the celebrations for Argentian independence day (from Spain), so there was a party atmosphere in the streets, and musicians playing on a big stage in the square and on the streets.

Cordoba is a big student city, and we spent a couple of days there looking at the beautiful uni buildings and churches and just relaxing.

Aiming for Puerto Iguazu, our next stop to break up the journey was Resistencia, a city where the streets are filled with sculptures! Although it was rainy, I had a lovely time exploring the streets for beautiful sculptures, and went to a really cool exhibition too. Gaz has got an achey knee, so sadly he mostly just rested that day.

We´re currently in Puerto Iguazu, and are planning to go see the spectacular falls tomorrow!

(Sorry about the number of photos of me, and lack of ones of Gaz - I´m not this vain, but Gaz loves taking photos lots more than I do!)

Lots of love xxx