40 Below: An Antarctic Birthday Quest #3 (Stalked by a bird of prey)

 Monday February 28th, 2023

Falkland Islands - Day 1

We awoke to the sight of the Western Falkland Islands – West Point Island specifically. We ate a very early breakfast and got ready to do our first landing. All was a flurry of excitement. We have all been put into groups of about 40 people, each named after a different penguin. I’m in the “Chinstraps”. When it is your turn, you have to go down to the lower level of the boat where they have a marine platform they load you into the zodiacs from. But prior to arriving here, you have to be properly outfitted: waterproof jacket and pants, muck boots, PFD, and anything you’ll need for the shore excursion have to be on your person. AND they have to be donned in proper order or you have to do it all over again. Ask me how I know.

Before getting into the boat you walk through a disinfectant boot bath that kills all the bad germs you might be carrying to the delicate ecosystems we visit. Then you get loaded into the zodiacs one by one. If the seas are high, which they often are, this can be a harrowing experience requiring 3 – 4 crew members for every one guest to safely get into a boat. We have to scan ID cards when we go out, and scan them again when we come back in which is how they keep tabs on us. Then you take a zodiac ride a short distance to the shore landing site. We will also be doing just zodiac cruises at some points, especially in Antarctica. 

We did a jetty landing on West Point Island, which is owned by a family and is sparsely inhabited. The caretakers of the island do good trade hosting cruise ship groups in their home for tea and cakes (which were excellent!) whenever landings happen. Celery and Cucumber happened to know the caretakers of the island from when they all spent 18 months sailing around New Zealand together 20 years ago. Seriously, coolest couple ever. 

We hiked about one mile over the middle of the small island to the windward side, which is all cliffs, and visited a black-browed albatross colony there. My new friend Blueberry (a 60-ish year old man from New Jersey who now lives in Spokane and travels the world in the winter time in search of the best tango dancers out there) and I climbed a good sized hill above the colony to get a higher up perspective on the island, which was gorgeous.

West Point Island

At the top of the hill, I encountered an inquisitive striated caracara - a form of raptor, a bird of prey, that looks something like a hawk. These birds are very rare and only found in the Falkland Islands. But they are fairly common to spot on this particular island. And spot one I did. They are unafraid of humans, very curious, and, as I found out, quite tactile. The bird, probably about two feet tall with a 4-5 foot wingspan, hopped closer to be and eyed me with its head turned to one side. I had encountered one of these in Ushuaia as well and I had been told they were inquisitive, not aggressive, so I was not at all worried about how close it was. So I walked around, and it hopped around nearby me, never more than 10 feet away. Then I started to walk down the mountain again to see the rookery, and I saw it spread its wings nearby me and take off on the strong wind. I continued walking down the mountain but I heard its wings flap VERY close to my head, even over the rushing wind in my ears. I turned around and it was directly over me, hovering and following me down the hill. This alarmed me a little bit because it was very clearly following me. It didn’t feel like the bird was angry at me but I couldn’t think why it would be following me so closely. So I started jogging down the steep hill, trying not to trip, but also trying to get a little distance between me and the bird. This was absolute folly. The bird landed just in front of me to the right and I teetered past it over some rocks, and then it simply took off again and hovered right over me. 

The accused

I decided I should probably try to put my hood up because I could hear its wings flap just over my head, and even feel the air move around me from them. Suddenly, I feel the bird lightly grab my loose ponytail with its talons. It immediately released my hair, I gave a good yell, and I started running down the hill. It continued to follow me. It clearly had gotten what it wanted because it gave me a little more space after it grabbed my hair, but continued to follow me closely and land near me on my continued descent.

Don't believe this bird would really do that to little ol' me? I have proof. See bottom of post.  

Blueberry saw the whole thing happen from behind me on the hill. Some other people saw me running down the hill and how close the bird was from below. Blueberry caught up to me and started laughing and showed me the pictures. Quite an experience for my first shore landing! I did see some rockhopper penguins and some albatross in the bird rookery but after my close encounter with the caracara everything seemed a little toned down.

We loaded back up onto the zodiacs and shuttled back to the boat, disinfected again, and then retreated to the lounge to get hot drinks. I asked our bird expert crew member about what had happened and he said I was a really lucky customer to have been singled out by the caracara in such a way. He said it’s likely that the bird was a little fascinated by the color and texture of my hair and just wanted to see what it was like, so it did! He called it a “quite cheeky” bird, and that its behavior was simply a result of its inquisitive nature.

That afternoon we repositioned the boat during lunch to Saunders Island where we were supposed to do an afternoon landing. After all the suiting up was done and one zodiac was away to the island, the wind kicked up to unsafe speeds above 30 knots and we had to abort the landing. One group got to land on the beach for about 5 minutes and then immediately had to come back.

We spent the afternoon having a good happy hour, chatting away in the lounge, sailing around the northern edge of the Falkland Islands and beginning our easterly journey to Port Stanley. Dinner was again excellent. I sat with Blueberry, Yucca and Naranja, and we learned more about Blueberry’s tango dancing and his off-the-grid existence in Spokane.

I again retired almost immediately after dinner, skipping late night drinks in favor of more sleep.

See, told you. 

Stalking me. 

About to grab a talon-full of NOT DRY GRASS

"Quite cheeky" indeed