Argentina

November 6-29, 2009

November 12: Punta Ninfas: Punta Ninfas

As we headed down the long dirt road towards Punta Ninfas, we could see a dust cloud up ahead from another vehicle. We lost them for a bit and when the lighthouse finally came in sight, we still couldn't see the van. Strangely enough, although we could see the lighthouse, we couldn't see the ocean. Dirt car tracks ran here and there so we decided to follow one a ways and then spotted the parked van. So we figured we must be close to where there was something to see and got out. We seemed to be atop a cliff and now we could see over the ocean. Along the cliff there was a tiny post sticking out of the ground and when we went to investigate we found a rope to help get down the cliff and we could see the group of people who had made it there ahead of us, some already at the bottom. And so... down we went!

As we took the 'path' down we climbed over layers and layers of rocks with fossils, millions of years old. The view was breathtaking and as we got to the bottom, not only were there elephant seals everywhere, but lots of geological treasures all around.

A geologic history:

Approximately 10 million years ago, the sea covered this area and large expanses of continental Argentina. A few million years later, when the waters receded, the sea bottom was exposed to the sunlight and many invertebrate species that couldn't migrate were doomed. Now you can see these ancient beaches lying several hundreds of meters above sea level.
In more recent times, between 3 and 1.2 million years ago, rivers carried large amounts of rocks from the Andes to the sea. They are currently known by the name of Patagonian Floats and could have been originated by the action of the glaciers that covered the Andes. Glaciations made the sea level drop even further, causing the Nuevo and San Jose Gulfs to be eroded by the wind and starting to hollow out the present Grande and Chica salt pan depressions. Several thousand years ago the waters once again reached the present sea level.

Atop the cliffs at Punta Ninfas with a very strong wind. Where did the people go?

Look, here's a "path"!

Fossilized marine life at the top of the cliffs indicate how high the sea level used to be.
Sam even found what looked like a barnacle!

Rubby and Christopher pausing to check out fossils...

... and the amazing view!

Some beautiful flowers have managed to adapt to the harsh conditions and are able to grow along the cliffs.

A third day of penguins spotting! ok, this one was not so nice.

Some coral and bones on the beach among the rocks.

Sam declared this bone her spaghetti measurer. Hmmm, are those meatballs in the background? ;-)

At Punta Ninfas you can get as close to the elephant seals as you dare...
only up close do you realize the massive size of these creatures!

The seals are pretty lazy so when they start to follow you with their eyes or turn their heads,
you know you've reached the limit of how close you should get.

Sammy the "elephant" seal.

Layers and layers of geological history.

Waves have rounded the small rocks and made interesting shapes of others.

Some of the rocks had a marble like pattern that was very pretty.

Sammy riding a rock seal.

A field of interesting weathered rocks... this rocky formation would probably help protect the seals from hungry orcas who otherwise have learned to 'surf' along the shores for seal pups.

Samantha points out some fossils that remind us of the tree fossils we saw at Joggins Cliff in Nova Scotia.

Tracks along the beach where the seals have moved down towards the water.

More fossils embedded in the cliffs.

It looked like a rock at first but turned out to be really light... not sure what it was.

More of what look like giant plant/tree fossils.

Wind and water erosion create cool patterns in the sandy cliffs.

Sammy holding one of the 'tree trunk' fossils.

More weathering/erosion patterns.

It was amazing to see the elephant seals up close like this.

A little crab shell.

Samantha sitting on a giant boulder full of marine fossils.

Hey, there's even a "pearl" in this one!

Christopher is enjoying this... it's not raining but the suit is for wind/sun protection!

A seal making its way up onto the beach. Way in the background you can see the other group of people who seemed to be scientists or researches checking out stuff among the rock pools.

Can you make out the people at the top of the cliffs?

We had to be careful not to overlook the seals as we strolled along the beach... this one was higher up on the beach and with its fur starting to fall off, it blended in with all the rocky surroundings.

Samantha finds more interesting fossils along the shore.

We're not sure what they were fossils of, but the patterns were very interesting!

It looked like they were tree trunks and branches again.

Lots of these brittle 'branches' lying around.

Algae and seaweed in the water.

Samantha was having fun jumping from rock to rock.

Time to go fishing with her bones.

Seaweed on the beach.

Rubby wants to know why Samantha can take along the bone she found, but he can't do the same with this one. ;-)

We assumed this was a whale bone...?!

Lazy seals waiting for the tide to come back in.

These seals just look like more rocks!

These looked like regular shells to us and there were tons all over the beach, but from what we've read, these are all fossils embedded in the cliffs. Either way, Samantha collected a whole bunch from the beach to bring back for her friends at school.