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The Falklands
If you’re on a social media account remotely connected to any of mine or have seen me in person at any point in the last 3 months, the news that I went to the Falklands in March would no doubt have been pretty inescable. As you can tell by my complete failure to do so, it was pretty tough not to tell literally everyone I knew about this as it was such a bizarre, amazing and frankly mind boggling experience. Seemingly not content with hearing me rant about it at any given opportunity a lot of people have been asking me what it was like, so I figured I could use a blog post to kill two birds with one stone; write a little bit about it while sharing a few of the hundreds of photos I naturally took of such a rarely visited place. So if you’re at all interested or just want to see some quite nice photos of an absolutely stunning location, keep reading.
For those not in the know; my friend Joe and I got approached by an agency at the start of the year with a proposition to take our slightly absurd country duo to the Falklands for a 40th anniversary party of Consolidated Fisheries: a fishing company based there. As we later found out they were (direct quote) ‘looking for someone crazy enough to make that journey for a show.’ Obviously that was us. We got back to them straight away saying yes, and after a couple of months of thinking we hadn’t got it, we received the big email… We were going to the Falklands!
Now like most people we had only really heard of the Falklands in connection with the conflict there in the 80’s, and I don’t think either of us fully appreciated just how far away and remote it is. It’s an 18 hour flight and is only accessible via an RAF flight from an airbase in the Cotswolds. On the way you stop to refuel at Ascension Island; another mind numbingly remote island smack bang in the middle of the Atlantic ocean about 1000 miles from the nearest significant land mass (Africa). It’s also a military base and American space program site, so unfortunately our hour long stay there had to remain completely undocumented, as photography is illegal there. However if your vibe is going to places not many people on earth have been, I’d certainly recommend it.
7 hours later and there we were, landing in the Falklands being greeted by lot of big men in military uniforms and our lovely host Sharon, who was not only responsible for making the whole thing happen but would also spend the next 6 days driving us round, providing us with everything we needed and in general just taking fantastic care of us, in keeping with the amazing Falklands hospitality we soon discovered was everywhere on the Islands. Let the adventure begin.
So what is it like there? Well as you can see, it’s beautiful. Absolutely insane landscapes, white beaches, shipwrecks and stunning wildlife are all around you as soon as you leave Stanley, which is where we were staying. Then there’s Stanley itself which is a super cute, colourful and quaint little place which is the capital city of the islands. Only about 3000 people live there, so it’s really not big and as you can imagine is pretty oozing with history, both from the war but also the preceeding 150ish years of colonial history there. It’s also windy… in fact it’s hard to convey just how windy. It’s basically as close as you can get to the Antarctic without actually being in the Antarctic, and the wind sure makes you realise that. I got specifically warned not to spend too long out in the wind, because ‘it’ll tire you out’. It did. Thankfully after about 4 hours of walking around Stanley I think I’d seen (and photographed) most of the town, and some of the highlights are pictured above and below.
And then there’s the penguins… did I mention the penguins? If I wrote a blog about the Falklands without mentioning the penguins I’d probably tick off a few of the locals somewhat, as penguins are basically the national symbol of the Falklands. It’s a wonder they’re not on the flag, and this is hardly surprising considering apparently there’s about a million of them on the islands. That’s about 283 penguins per person that lives there. Can you imagine anything better?
I didn’t manage to get too many photos of these little chillers as I went out with a wide angle lens on and didn’t want to get too close so as not to scare them, but the few I got are below. It was on the beach pictured where one of many ‘what the hell is going on and how has learning Nirvana on my mum’s old guitar when I was 14 lead me here?’ moments on the trip struck me. Needless to say, standing a couple of metres away from wild penguins on a pristine white beach 8000 miles away from home has a way of generating a certain feeling of wonder in a person.
So enough about the place, how was the whole experience? Well at risk of getting too gushing, it was incredible. Obviously we were there first and foremost to play shows, and I’d say they were among the best we’ve ever done, especially the first night. If you’re interested you can see some footage of these here. I don’t think I’m too out of line to say that things like this don’t happen too often in the Falklands, and you could really tell this by the level of energy and all out joy the crowd brought to both shows. They pretty much started dancing right out the gate, and let me tell you, people in Stanley can really dance! I’m talking ballroom dance. It was quite a bizarre moment when we started playing a slower number only to see everyone couple up and literally start waltzing around the dance floor, complete with spins and twists. It was also great to get off stage and meet the locals, all of whom were just lovely. There was a slightly hairy moment when we went to play the matinee show on Sunday afternoon only to discover that both of us had almost completely lost our voices, but even this was met with nothing but warmth from everyone in the place. One phrase that really sticks in my mind was ‘If you make any kind of noise at all we’ll count that as a success,’ and that sure is how it felt.
It also feels hard to do the trip justice without mentioning the chaps in the photos below. Up until about 3 weeks before the trip we thought we were the only band crazy enough to be making the journey, but we then discovered some guys called ‘Pat Winn and the Western Stars’ would also be playing. We also didn’t realise we’d be sharing a house with the guys, which I guess could end up being less than ideal if you didn’t get along, but thankfully from the word go that wasn’t really something we had to worry about. All absolutely lovely guys, phenomenal musicians and would you believe it, they liked a few beers just as much as us. We ended up getting on like a house on fire and having some very funny times, and it was great to get to dance to some proper country music played fantastically by great musicians. Thanks for a great trip fellas, hope you’re all well!
And that’s it! I’m sure I’ve missed out a lot. It turns out summarising 6 mindblowing days of surreal fun in a single blog post is a little trickier than I thought, but hopefully the photos can give you some idea of what the place is like. Suffice to say, we had an absolute blast. There’s not much better than travelling to exciting new places and playing music you love with great friends by night and walking around taking photos by day, so this really checked all the boxes. Huge thanks to Sharon, Trish and everyone at Consolidated Fisheries for getting us over there, singing along and looking after us so fantastically well. The same goes to all the people of Stanely we met who made us feel so welcome and had a great laugh with us. I know we said it a lot while we were there, but this really was a once in a lifetime experience for us so it really means a lot. And of course to Joe, Pat, Glen, Dave and Stu for such a blinder of a time! This wont be a trip I’ll forget any time soon!
