Located near Antarctica off the tip of South America, the Falkland Islands are home to a growing women's hockey community with hopes for more in the future.

Situated nearly 500km off the tip of South America, and roughly 1200km north of Cape Dubouzet at the northern tip of Antarctica sits the Falkland Islands. With less than 4000 people residing on the remote islands, hockey has emerged as the most popular sport.

"We're the smallest and remotest national ice hockey in the world and our players are so dedicated and determined to give it their all, play their hearts out," said Marvis Chipunza, a women's hockey player in the Falkland Islands.

"For a population so small it is honestly the biggest sport on the islands."

The Falkland Islands Hockey Association features 22 teams, including two women's teams, the Valkyries and Kraken, in the women's DEK hockey league. More girls participate in the super elite, elite, junior, rookie, and peewee teams, as well as in the Senior Inline League and men's DEK league. When the league is playing at the Stanley Leisure Centre in Stanley, the Falklands' capital and largest town, home to roughly 2500 people, it's the most popular show on the Islands. 

"It's crazy to see, it's such a small league, but the turnout when there's a game going on is just incredible," said Chipunza.

Although there is no arena in the Falkland Islands, they hope to one day have one, and the Falkland Islands have sent a national team, the Stanley Penguins, with a logo  emblazoned with an image of the Southern rockhopper penguin to the Amerigol LATAM Cup in Miami, and they plan to continue that growth. The Islands are home to colonies of several penguin species, giving meaning to the logo.

Born in Zimbabwe, Chipunza immigrated to the Falkland Islands in 2012 after her father took a job removing land mines following the implementation by the British government of the Ottawa Treaty in 1998, requiring the removal of all mines in the Falkland Islands. Chipunza's father took a job in the demining industry to remove the roughly 30,000 land mines laid by Argentinian forces during their invasion of the Islands in 1982 in what became the Falklands War. Today, it's believe no mines remain.

Since then, Chipunza, and the rest of the Falkland Islands have fallen in love with hockey, which was brought to the Islands in 2006 by Grant Budd, an ex-professional player in Great Britain.

"We'd go and watch the games and it just looked really interesting and looked really fun, so me and some of my friends joined and we're still going," explained Chipunza of getting into the sport.

Chipunza plays for the Valkyries in the women's league, Ducks in the Senior Inline League, and Oilers in the men's DEK league. She also coaches the Dragons, a youth team.

The Hockey News spoke to Chipunza while she was traveling with a delegation from the Falkland Islands through North America to participate in the Special Committee on Decolonization, or C-24, established by the United Nations to granting independence to colonial countries and peoples.

She hopes her travels also includes the opportunity to not only advocate for the self-determination of the Falkland Islands, but also to build connections in the hockey world.

"We'd love to be able to play more regularly or visit other countries. We'd love to send a team to Canada if the opportunity presented itself," she said.

Not only has the nation sent players to compete overseas, but their Falkland Island teams have competed in the LATAM Cup, and other ice hockey events in Chila, Costa Rica, and hope build an ice rink and to continue to develop their ice hockey programming, including for women and girls. 

As the Falkland Islands Hockey Association website says, "Hockey is not just a sport, it is a global community of amazing individuals and organisations. We are privileged to be a part of that – and want to welcome anyone to join that community."