There are over 700 islands that make up the Falklands. Thankfully we are only stopping at three of them. East Falkland is the biggest of them all and has the largest two towns of all the islands. The first is Port Stanley, where we have docked.

The zodiacs drop us off right here:

We are told we are in the middle of town which at first sight isn’t encouraging. At second sight it isn’t encouraging either.

The most recent census counted a grand total of 3008 people living in Port Stanley. That might sound like a small town to you, but to the Falklanders it is a major metropolis when compared to the next largest town. That town goes by the evocative and rather charming name of Goose Green, which might give you a clue as to its population. It has hundreds of geese, but just 41 inhabitants. These population figures may seem extraordinarily precise but at that size every warm body counts.

Not that the bodies are warm. The climate doesn’t allow that. The summers are cold, windy and wet and the winters are colder, windier and snowy. The skies are almost always grey, the humidity is almost always high, and the winds are almost always strong. The islanders like to joke that everyone has the same hairstyle – windblown. That’s what passes for a sense of humour in the Falklands.

The total area of all these islands is surprisingly small, equaling just half the area of Wales, or Connecticut, depending on your country of choice, while the total population is only 3,700. That is just one person for every 2 square miles. Over crowding is not a problem! But boredom may well be and the weather most certainly is. Trees have given up trying to survive in such a windy climate which is why you will not see one on the island outside of Port Stanley. Maybe people should do the same.

Most people have a car but why? Until a few years ago, there were no paved roads outside of town. Now there are a few, but they are deserted, mainly because they don’t go anywhere, and there is nothing to see.

Nobody would call the island picturesque. The main feature of the landscape is the so called stone runs.

No one knows how they were formed, and very few care. They have curiosity value, but little else, and they make country walks almost impossible.

So people rarely leave town. And what they do in Port Stanley? Being English, gardening is one choice. However the weather doesn’t allow for the typical English garden with carefully trimmed lawns and well tended flower beds. Undeterred, the Falklanders find other ways to bring colour to their back garden.

When the weather makes gardening too unpleasant (which is most of the time), the locals turn their attention to another pastime that the English are particularly good at. Drinking. To support this hobby, there are 7 pubs all within stumbling distance of each other. This is the most popular

The publicans don’t waste money on making their pubs look attractive. They don’t have to. They serve alcohol, and that’s all people need to know. The only curb appeal needed is a large sign with the opening hours

If the pubs are ever closed the island’s only supermarket is a pretty good second choice where the wines and spirits seem to fill at least half of the available shelf space.

All of this may make you wonder why Argentina is so anxious to claim the Falklands as theirs and why the UK is determined to prevent them from having them. The islands do after all lie off the coast of Argentina which is just about as far away from the UK as is possible. But the islands have been British for centuries and, damn it, they want to stay that way. In the last referendum there were only two inhabitants who voted to become Argentinian, and one of them claimed he voted that way because he didn’t want the vote to be a complete landslide. And if that isn’t a shining example of English eccentricity, nothing is!

But in the end it may all come down to the almighty dollar, or in this case the almighty pound. The waters around the islands are one of the most nutrient rich waters in the world and nearly all the squid (or calamari to you) that is eaten world wide comes from this area. To fish these waters you need a yearly permit from the Falklands. The permits are not cheap and the income from them represents 60% of the islands income. Argentina wants that money and claims that the waters, the fishing rights and the money belongs to them, but the UK is not letting go of the purse strings .

Let the squid games begin.

But now it seems there is oil beneath those waters.

Might the squid games be about to turn into the oil wars?

The future is uncertain, but the United Kingdom offers this advice: