Alexander von Humboldt... and his penguins

Thursday evening I went to the second showing of the five-part series of  cine alemán (German theater/movies) this semester - "Die Besteigung des Chimborazo" (El ascenso al Chimborazo - I don't think it even has a title in English). It was about Alexander von Humboldt and his journey up the unsummited Chimborazo, in Ecuador (shoutout to Abby - you should totally do this).

I liked the film. It was in German with spanish subtitles, and I found (for the second time) that being able to read the subtitles was actually much easier than movies in Spanish without subtitles (reading has no accent, I suppose). But I still didn't understand everything. Humboldt's expedition never made it to the top, ending in a dramatic scene of everybody with frostbite and severe altitude sickness about to die (... have fun, Ab!). I don't think they did die - well, I know Humboldt didn't - but the movie ended with that small detail left ambiguous.

Learning about Alexander von Humboldt was especially interest since on Saturday I went with three students from the Middlebury in Chile program and our program director + his wife to the Reserva Nacional Pingüino de Humboldt. We first went to Punta de Choros, a small fishing village about two hours north of La Serena, where the tour started.

Guanacos, seen en route to Punta de Choros 

Punta de Choros

Punta de Choros was a relatively small town, quiet this Saturday morning. There were some fisherman up and about, but I didn't see many people in general, despite the fact that it was almost 11am.

We set off on boat and toured the coast of Isla Choros, with our guide pointing out various features of the island as well as the wildlife there. Punta de Choros is known for its biodiversity - especially for its concentration of Humboldt penguins - so it was really nice to have a guide to describe what we were seeing.

Humboldt penguins hanging out next to Isla Damas

You aren't allowed to land on Isla de Choros, but Isla Damas is open to visitors, so we alighted there. In order to preserve its biodiversity, visits are limited to one hour. That allowed just enough time to walk a loop of the island, which was beautiful and absolutely teeming with birds.

From the shores of Isla Damas 

As the one-hour limit approached, our tour guide hurried the group back onto the boat. A pod of bottlenose dolphins was approaching, and if we hurried we would be able to follow them. We managed to stay with the dolphins for about 15 minutes, I'd guess. They were playful - some coming right up to the boat and jumping alongside, or swimming under. 

Dolphins! off the coast of Isla Damas

 After the dolphin pod headed in a different direction, our boat turned back towards the mainland. We had a delicious lunch (I'm in love with all of the jugos naturales offered in Chile) and then drove back to La Serena.