Contribution from a reporter at Doradillo Whale Pebble Beach Patagonia
Giant Silver Can Road / Path / Way / Trail Sighting
Beginning of Giant
"Strange things seem to be happening on the Doradillo Whale Pebble Beach at the entrance to the Peninsular Valdes.
This afternoon tourists looking down from the observation hut high on the nearby cliff top were enjoying a spectacular display of whale activity. Suddenly they were amazed by the appearance of what seemed to be a road or path coming out of the sea. The path seemed to be made of wooden hexagons and squares each containing upturned alumnium drink cans packed closely together.
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TOP
2002 August 3
Puerto Madryn Chubut
Silver Can road / way
Click photos to enlarge (60K)
Strange hexagonal sculptures
and whales
It was an unusually dull day and quite windy. The visibility was not very good but through binoculars it appeared that each square or hexagon contained exactly 169 cans. Later through the mist, the path semed to transform in to strange upright hexagonal structures which then disappeared.
A local Ranger had seen nothing like it before. Although the beach continued to attract tourists from all over the world and there was local concern regarding gravel extraction and local hotel development, this was a completely new phenomenon.
A little earlier a tourist had seen some people on the beach taken photographs of a poster sign with the whales in the background. He was not surpised because the whales here, just a few metres from the beach, would be an advertiser's dream. Now on recollection he thought that this too was a little strange and may have been connected. From a distance he thought that he had seen a happy round face with large bright eyes in the centre of the poster. But when he looked again the face had had disappeared leaving only a hole through which he could see the sea and whales spouting. There had been some writing on the sign but his hands were shaky because of the cold and he could not read it through his binoculars.
A clue to the sighting comes from excitement amongst local school children in the area following the appearance of a giant mathematical tree also made out of cans in the bus terminal in nearby Puerto Madryn at Xmas. This had resulted in a lot of interest in hexagons and an interesting pebble with a cleft into which a hexagonal nut fitted exactly, had been found on the beach.
There was also a report of a group of families being photographed by what appeared to be a giant honeycomb made out of hexagons of cans near the statue of the Indio at nearby Punta Cuevas a week ago.
It seems that in fact, this is all part of a learning project aimed at encouraging interest amongst children in the role of mathematics in design and engineering and in nature. At the same time, it is hoped that the Doradillo whale pebble beach will become the start of a "giant silver can trail / way / path or road" and of a virtual "Great Wall of Patagonia" which it is hoped will attract attention not only to the marvels of the area but also to the future of its children."