Valdes Peninsula — Attraction in Chubut Province

Review of Peninsula Valdes

These are important notes on the current situation in Pen. Valdes in Patagonia. These are particularly for non-Spanish speaking visitors, where you won’t understand fully the guidance you are being given.

We visited on 24th and 25th October 2024.

The coast road from Puerto Madryn to Playa Doradillo is closed on a 17km section. You cannot access Playa Doradillo from the south. You can take Route 2 and turn off towards the coast and work your way back to Playa Canteras. You can’t go any further south. Whales were viewable from the various beaches that were accessible.

High tide is the time to go.

Continuing into Pen. Valdes, you next meet the park gate where you pay for your ticket. A$30,000 per person and A$1,700 for a private car. You can get your tickets stamped at this location on the way out and you can access the park again within the next 7 days for free the 2nd time. You still need to pay the A$1,700 for the car each day.

After the main entry, there is an information centre about 20kms further along where there are toilets, exhibitions and an information desk.

The one main road is paved all the way to Puerto Piramides. All other roads are unpaved gravel roads, of different levels of condition. The car can travel as slowly as 30kms per hour for some parts and as high as 70kms per hour on others. There are many iron grids at very regular intervals that you need to slow down to 40kms per hour to go over. Drive carefully throughout.

The lighthouse at Punta Delgado is currently closed “temporarily”. It is not clear when it will reopen. Based on this there is no reason to drive this road. There are NO access points to the beaches or cliffs anywhere on this road, all the way around to Caleta Valdes. You would be better off driving directly to Caleta Valdes and save time. There is a penguin viewing point at Caleta which gets you very close to the penguins and further south 5kms is a good centre with toilets and aa cafe to see elephant seals, although they are about 50-100 metres away.

The road from Caleta to Punta Norte is also fully closed, so you need to track back inland to get the road to the North.

We went the 2nd day to the Punta Norte and had good views of elephant seals and seals. Didn’t see any orcas, although they are in the area. It’s pure chance if you see some.

It takes over an hour to get from one place to another - the distances are very long. There’s a lot of time spent focusing on the road and seeing nothing but sheep (10 times more sheep than guanacos!).

Puerto Piramides is a nice small village. All whale watching boats leave from here. The trips are weather dependent and I got to go out in the afternoon due to high winds in the morning. The rangers at the ticket gate warned us up front that the morning sailings weren’t happening, which was helpful.

There is a good viewing spot for seal lions just outside of P. Piramides, with a sign saying “Mirador Balaena”. We did not see any whales from this location.

Separately, if you’re staying in Puerto Madryn, there is a good spot to see sea lions about 15kms south of P. Madryn, with an information centre. The last 5kms is a gravel road.

The amount of road closures and weather dependent activities means you should plan your trip carefully. If Delgado is still closed, you are far better off skipping that whole...

Península Valdés in Patagonia is a site of global significance for the conservation of marine mammals. It is home to an important breeding population of the endangered southern right whale as well as important breeding populations of southern elephant seals and southern sea lions. The orcas in this area have developed a unique hunting strategy to adapt to local coastal conditions.

Peninsula Valdes is located in the Argentinean Province of Chubut. The peninsula of approximately 360,000 hectares reaches more than 100 kilometres eastwards into the South Atlantic Ocean. Its roughly 400 kilometres of shoreline include a series of gulfs, including the extensive Golfo San Matias to the North and Golfo Nuevo to the South, both covering several thousand square kilometres. The dynamic coastal zone features rocky cliffs of up to 100 metres in height, shallow bays and shifting coastal lagoons with extensive mudflats, sandy and pebble beaches, active sand dunes, and small islands. The wetlands, some of them today also recognized as a Wetland of International Importance under the Ramsar Convention, are associated with the tidal areas of the Peninsula and provide significant nesting and resting sites for numerous migratory shorebirds. The diverse terrestrial, coastal and marine ecosystems of Peninsula Valdes contain natural habitats of extraordinary value from both a scientific and a conservation...

RECOMENDAMOS UNA EXCURSIÓN DE DIA COMPLETO A ESTE PARAISO DECLARADO PATRIMONIO DE LA HUMANIDAD La excursión incluye una navegación para avistaje de ballenas (extraordinaria) y una visita a un enorme apostadero de leones y elefantes marinos en Caleta Valdés La hicimos a través de una agencia aunque se puede hacer perfectamente con un coche alquilado, coordinando muy bien los horarios de salida de los barcos para ver ballenas. Todo fue perfecto. Salimos de Puerto Madryn, donde nos habíamos alojado, y nos recogieron puntualmente en el hotel y junto con otros turistas nos dirigimos a nuestro destino. La excursión dura aproximadamente 8 horas y recorrimos casi casi 400 km, por la estepa patagónica, en gran parte por carreteras de grava o ripio. El paisaje es precioso, con una vegetación de arbustos y muy llano, y vamos viendo continuamente guanacos y todo tipo de aves, de presa y otras. Este incomparable entorno ha sido declarado Patrimonio de la Humanidad por la Unesco por la importancia de su hábitat natural para la biodiversidad. Es un paraíso para la observación de animales terrestres, como el emblemático guanaco, un mamífero endémico de estos lugares de aspecto parecido a la llama andina pero entroncado con el camello, aves de todo tipo, incluyendo la lechuza diurna y otras de presa, y, sobre todo, pingüinos y mamíferos marinos como la ballena franca, los elefantes marinos, las orcas y los lobos marinos, que casi se pueden tocar con la mano. Y todo ello en un entorno de naturaleza virgen, con un paisaje de estepa patagónica, donde no hay agua dulce (las norias extraen del subsuelo agua salobre que solo los guanacos, adaptados, pueden beber) que debe ser suministrada a las estancias con camiones cisterna, y donde no hay internet (!!!). Además de las actividades de observación de pingüinos y mamíferos marinos, puedes desarrollar un sinfín de deportes de aventura y bucear con lobos marinos. A la hora de comer te llevan a un restaurante próximo a Caleta Valdés, donde se come un excelente...