PATAGONIA
A mythical place at the end of the world. A land of struggle and survival.
Exactly what is Patagonia?
Patagonia is a tableland region of southern Argentina and Chile extending from the Río Colorado in Argentina down to the Strait of Magellan, and from the Pacific to the Atlantic Ocean. (The End of the Earth poster courtesy of pangaea.org.)
Sparsely populated except for sheep, Patagonia
is a vast wilderness of spectacular terrain, flora, and wildlife. A
mecca for nature travelers and outdoor adventurers, it's also a magnet for
photographers and documentary filmmakers from around the world.
Patagonia is my stomping grounds, the land I know and treasure above all. A place so wild and pristine it's where you go to recalibrate your soul and put life back into perspective.
Experiencing Patagonia
Years ago,
standing on a cliff overlooking the
Valdes Peninsula watching an orca take a sea lion, I
decided to get into documentary filmmaking. While
transitioning to my new career I
persuaded Questers Worldwide Nature Tours
to offer a Patagonia wildlife trip. During film school I led
naturalists and birders throughout the region, plus Tierra del Fuego and
the Falkland Islands. Having grown up in Argentina for ten years, my
intimate knowledge of the language, people, and customs enabled me to get
us into places where others had rarely gone.
For a month we traveled the length of the Patagonia. Starting at the marine mammal sanctuary of the Valdes Peninsula, we witnessed southern right whales and huge harems of elephant seal and sea lions, and the patrolling packs of orcas that attack their young.
Drifting south past the sprawling rookeries of
Magellanic penguins at Punta Tombo, we cut west to the towering ice walls
of the Perito Moreno glacier. Here giant ice slabs the size of
20-story buildings calve into
Lake Argentina, sending tidal waves and ice shrapnel slamming into the
shoreline. Every few years a dam forms when ice touches
land. Pressure builds, and becomes intolerable. The ice-dam
explodes with cataclysmic force.
After a quick foray to the Straits of Magellan which have claimed many a sailors' lives, we hop over to the Falkland Islands, known as the Islas Malvinas in Argentina, on a vintage Fokker turboprop.
Fearless of man, the Falklands' teeming birdlife boggles the mind and sends photographers into a clicking frenzy. Stately black-browed albatross. Marauding skuas. Rockhopper penguins by the thousands. All so tame you can click away just out of pecking range. And the abandoned New Island whaling station is a rusting reminder of bloodier days in the southern seas.
But this is only the tip of the iceberg. Thousands of 35mm images document the entire region.
Filming Patagonia
For over two decades I have returned to Patagonia, and my contacts in the region are extensive. Many have become lifetime friends, resulting in an active network of cooperative park administrators, tourism and consulate officials, wildlife experts, and landowners eager to support future filming efforts.
Most recently, I was associate producer of The Giants of Patagonia, an episode of Digging for the Truth on the History Channel. Prior to that I was the location scout for Andean aerials for a Chevy-Tahoe SUV commercial filmed at the spectacular Torres del Paine National Park in southern Chile. Flying over remnants of the last ice-age in a tiny plane, with sharp peaks stabbing up at us, was enthralling and unnerving. Engine failure over this forbidding ice field would have been fatal.
But
my biggest and most exhilarating project was as associate producer on a one-hour
PBS wildlife documentary,
The Living Edens Patagonia. Nine
months of filming were preceded by a six-week reconnaissance trip. I
did a comprehensive survey of all wildlife, with
charts on optimal times to film. Permit and barter deals were negotiated
with national parks and provincial wildlife reserves in Argentina and Chile.
In this logistically challenged area of the world, all arrangements were
made for land transportation, film shipments, Stateside communication, planes and
helicopters, money transfers, immigration permits, and importation of gear
through sticky Argentine customs. Every step of the way I had to
ensure that things stayed on track, and cajoled wavering officials back into line when they
threatened to change
our deal in midstream. During the filming our three-man team traversed
Patagonia repeatedly, racking up 57,000 kilometers on our van and shredding
a dozen tires on the unforgiving gravel roads.
What We Filmed
Patagonia's three regions each have their own thriving ecosystem. The western Andean cordillera comprises jagged mountains, remnants of the southern ice field, dense rainforests, and grinding glaciers.
Based at Torres del Paine
park, we concentrated on the capricious llama-like guanaco during the tumultuous
height of the breeding season. By following circling condors to puma kills we
captured their entire life cycle. A cacophany of mating waterfowl echoed
from reed ponds visited by black-necked and Coscoroba swans, Chilean flamingos,
and myriad squabbling ducks.
Andean
foothills give way to the arid steppe of central Patagonia. This is the domain of the comical
rhea, wiley foxes, hardy insects, lizards, tarantulas, and armadillos.
Spiky scrub dots the land, traversed by only a few rivers with awesome
waterfalls. Simmering volcanoes give out to the flatlands. Saline
lakes shrill with waterfowl. Despite its bleakness, the steppe throbs with
life.
The last region, the Atlantic coast, is the
enthralling and gut-wrenching heart of Patagonia. Compared to life in the
steppe and mountains, the struggle for survival here is visceral and merciless.
Bloody battles among bull elephant seals and sea lions wreak havoc among harems
and newborn. Orcas recklessly hurl themselves onto beaches to devour the
pups. Only the antics of nest-robbing Magellanic penguins provides us
comic relief, but look out for those beaks!
Assignment Patagonia
Ever willing to return to Patagonia, I'm open to any project. Ideally, this would be guiding natural history or photography tours, structuring special wildlife or adventure trips, location scouting, film location management, and photography on assignment, either topside or underwater. To inquire about any of these, or for references, please contact me. For tour information definitely check out International Expeditions and Country Walkers.
