Windhorse Sailing

Day: 16
Position: 55 south, 65 west
Airtemp: 36 F
Weather: Cold, rainy and sleet
Seas: Calm

We’ve had an amazingly fast 24 hours. Luke took watch just past 2 a.m. and brought us to the mouth of the Le Maire Straits two hours before a very bleak and ominous gray dawn with strong winds, gusting to 40 knots but with relatively calm seas as Tierra Del Fuego was keeping the fetch of the seas to a minimum, though we could not yet make out the Land of Fire. I took the watch and simply tacked back and forth for a few hours, waiting for high tide, which would provide a much smoother passage through the Straits. Sleet and rain, freezing wind and these mean, dark walls of cumulonimbus clouds, combined with a barometer that has been on a nosedive since last night would usually have me feeling little but dread. But I don’t. In fact today, the gloomiest yet on the passage has me in very high spirits indeed, but in high spirits that also leave me a bit disappointed. We’ve sailed over 1900 miles in the last 16 days, 1900 miles to cover what a bird could in 1100. That’s a lot of extra miles. We’ve had wind at every strength, from every point on the compass rose, and it has been by all definitions a hell of a slog. And though our goal, to sail around Cape Horn has not yet been realized a successful run through the Le Maire Straits today, which we completed a few hours ago has the most grueling and dangerous part of our journey in our wake. We can now rest - not easy, but rest assured that our goal, barring a breakdown we cannot repair will be realized.

Usually this landmark would be cause for Luke and I to have at least a bit of a celebration, knowing full well we still have over a hundred miles to Ushuaia and we don’t want to lose focus yet, but while I am jubilant, I am hardly ready to crack the champagne. This is hard to define. It has been well documented that solo circumnavigators often experience their worst hardship on finally reaching port after months at sea. While humbled and usually in awe of the sea and its power they grow very attached and almost dependent on its moods. Moods that often reflect their own. Suddenly their quest, which began for reasons only they can understand is over and the prospect of figuring out what to do now leaves them mirthless and even more alone than they were at sea. Many experience nervous breakdowns. Some commit suicide. Many find a way to sail again, running farther from whatever it is they can’t attain on land. I’ve read countless books about adventurers - land and sea expeditions and the people who take them on. Many end in triumph, some end in tragedy. There were many days in our journey south that I asked myself why in the hell would I do this? What drives me to take these kinds of things on? Living in such cold, damp conditions. Forever trying to eat and cook at a 30 degree angle. Things slamming and banging incessantly. Noises that just will not go away. Going to the bathroom is probably the most dangerous thing we do. But now we are here and I realize that shit, that wasn’t that hard. “That was supposed to be hard dammit!” But it wasn’t. We battled some awesome seas and there were times when I thought we’ll never, ever, ever get there. But here we are. Luke kept a positive face throughout and we had many great laughs. In fact we couldn’t have asked for better rapport, hard to find in small quarters in such conditions. And now we’re looking at each other going man, that was supposed to be brutal. I think deep down we wanted it to be brutal because that’s what you expect, and that is the glory you hope to somehow pocket and take with you long after the expedition’s end.

For five minutes this morning the gray blanket of fog and rain that looked well and truly to live permanently in these parts suddenly lifted, giving me a most breathtaking view of soaring snow covered peaks that were hardly five miles away. My heart sang and I started to dance, the Rolling Stones and I playing air guitar at the bottom of the world. In another moment it was gone, the mountains swallowed whole by the grayness as quickly as they appeared. So we don’t have a harrowing account of 70 knot winds and behemoth seas. We don’t have a knockdown, man overboard, fire or any other truly harrowing story to tell. But however the remainder of this adventure plays out and whatever inevitable joys and disappointments arise, I got what I came for in those brief minutes. My own story, written just for me.

Gavin McClurg, bottom of the world.

Day: 15
Position: 53.11 south, 66.44 west
Airtemp: 40
Heading: SE
Weather: Clear Blue, Variable wind direction 10 knots
Seas: calm

We are relatively becalmed in the “Furious Fifties.” We wait patiently for the fulfillment of the forecast that promises 20-knot winds from the north for the next 3 days. We are only 230 miles from our Goal, Ushuaia in the Beagle Channel. However, in between Ushuaia and Shangri-La awaits the Le Maire straits, considered one of the most treacherous stretches of ocean for its long history of wrecks resulting from strong tidal currents and “furious ” winds.

Historically, the Straits were first put on the map in 1616 by Dutch captain Willem Schouten who named them after Le Maire the owner of his merchant ship. Incidentally he then named that dark pyramidal rock known as Cape Hoorn after the small sister ship that burned at Puerto Deseado earlier that same voyage. Hoorn was also the home of the Dutch port their voyage originated from.

Le Maire Strait was then and is now the preferred and safer alternative to the straits of Magellan. Magellan is a longer passage, is narrower at many points and has currents exceeding 8 knots in places. Surrounded by mountain and glaciers also creates a prevalence of “williwaws” in the straits of Magellan. These icy winds can reach gusts of 100 mph and, deflecting off the terrain, can come from unpredictable directions. These factors make Le Maire straits our preferred route as well. Although I admit those same “williwaws” await us in the Beagle Channel.

Geographically, Le Maire straits lies between the southeastern tip of Tierra del Fuego and Isle De Los Estados. The Straits are 16 miles wide west to east, and 25 miles long with a north flowing tidal flood and south flowing ebb. In the middle of the Straits on the Tierra Del Fuego side is a cove called Bahia Buen Successo where one can find safe anchorage and an Argentine prefectura radio station with one lonely guy. We plan to say hello by radio only.

Tierra Del Fuego Province, almost a quarter the area of the whole country only has 250,000 people, half of which live in the port city of Ushuaia. The main industries there are fishing and tourism. It is a popular staging point for trips to Antarctica and sails around the infamous Cabo de Hornos. As far as Isla De Los Estados is concerned, there are no people, only a variety of penguins and sea lions. In 1902, after less than 10 years, an Argentine penal colony was moved to Ushuaia. The conditions on De Los Estados so harsh that the guards had trouble staying alive.

Drifting in wait of the winds we use the time to carefully plan our route through the Straits. Only 98 miles from our current position we expect to get to the mouth of the Straits at high water tomorrow at 1pm. We will give Cabo San Diego a wide birth of at least 6 miles to avoid the tidal rips that can create standing waves of up to 10 meters. As the tide ebbs over the following 6 hours and 15 minutes we will expect to make ground using the current that will build to 5 knots in our favor. It is our hope that that the matching directions of the wind and tide will keep the water flat further helping our speed. If we figure things right it will be a quick 25 miles. If weather and tide line up it’s a “go” for tomorrow. If not we anchor at Bahia Thetis just north west of the Straits and wait for proper conditions. For now we enjoy the sun and calm resting up for whatever comes our way.

Day: 12
Position: 49.50 South 65.53 West
Airtemp: 41F
Heading: SE
Weather: Overcast, wind SW
Seas: 5′ southerly chop

In the end the 3 days in port ended up a waste of time as the repairs we’d hoped to accomplish were impossible and the need to move on with what we have has taken precedence. We won’t likely need the engine until we enter the Beagle Channel so by then we’ll have something worked out to get us by. The tiller pilot is only something we need when there’s no wind to steer the boat, and this is likewise something we don’t anticipate. We did have a beautiful day in port that we could have used to repair the staysail, but neither Luke or I could get out of bed after tying on a night of beers and wine I would have been proud of in my college years. Unfortunately neither of us recovers as we once did back in those days, so the sail remains in its bag, and will until we reach Ushuaia.

We left Puerto Deseado four hours before sunrise, on the ebb tide and a light westerly so we could simply sail off the dock rather than go through all the necessary stunts to use the engine without a throttle or control in the cockpit. Luke navigated through the maze of fishing vessels with aplomb and once we got out into the main channel the combination of ebb current and river flow catapulted us back out to sea in rare speed. Two Tonina Olvera dolphins played in our bow wave, acting as pilots for our exit and reassured us with their presence. Sailors, whether they care to admit it or not are a superstitious bunch and dolphins are always taken for good luck. For the first 10 hours we enjoyed steady NW winds which allowed some solid southing in calm seas, but since then it’s been more similar to our journey up until this point: slow.

In hindsight we should have never stopped at Deseado and gone with the northerlies that would have taken us all they way to Bahia Thetis, our launch point at the tip of Tierra Del Fuego to round the peninsula through Le Maire Straits, by far the most hazardous segment of the journey. From Deseado to Bahia Thetis it is only 420 miles, but there isn’t a single anchorage the entire distance making this run the most weather dependent of our voyage and thus timing is critical. But those three days in Deseado has allowed the next series of lows to sweep across the Andes and in their wake we are now caught again in their southerly winds, blowing relentlessly in our face.

Cold and damp these winds are, and while this boat is steel and acts like a gigantic refrigerator by far our most pressing concern is not our comfort, but our need to get south. With any luck we’ll cross into the 50’s tonight but miles are ticking by slowly. We have to sail 3 or 4 miles for every one gained south, our track an endless run of Z’s that wears on our spirits. The forecast? More of the same. We are hopeful another low just reaching Chile now will reach us sooner than expected so we can ride the northerlies on its front side past the Straits of Magellan and down to Thetis, but the pros are saying southerlies for the next 3 days, which means more Z’s for us, but not the kind we seek.

Gavin McClurg

I could see the city lights of Deseado and that was all. We had the ports coordinates and the compass bearing for a safe entrance, but the current played havoc with our steering. The boat compass told me we were pointed to 240 degrees and the GPS said we were moving towards 200 degrees. We were getting swept by the swirl of currents created by the out flowing Rio Deseado and the inflowing tide. Steering for the city lights was no good. There were shoals, small rock islands and Punta Cavendish to navigate past. Gavin kept us on course by shouting out the GPS heading from down below while I did my best to hold that course. As we got closer to the port the current became more consistent allowing us to breath easier.

We made our way up river past and the scores of industrial fishing ships to a floating dock and the only suitable mooring for a sailboat owned by the Cosarena shipyard. We radioed for permission, but at 3am there was no one there to hear us. Under engine at this point I maneuvered Shangri-La to tie up along side as Gavin stood forward ready to jump off with the mooring lines. “Give it a burst of stern.” I had just tried to shift to neutral and although it was barely idling we were still in forward gear. “I don’t got it; the throttle isn’t working!”

“What!” Gavin’s voice cracked. “Hard to starboard! Hard to starboard!” With the dock to our port side, a small fishing vessel moored 15 feet in front of us and no reverse I looked to starboard, and turning, thought we would never make it. “Hard over! What’s our depth?”

It didn’t matter and I couldn’t take my eyes of the rocky shoreline to look at the depth gauge. In my memory I can make out every jagged rock not a boat length in front us. As if by miracle a small eddy created by the opposing river and tide currents grabbed our bow and turned us on an axis and we idled slowly out to the wide river. In twenty minutes, Gavin, who can always make due, had jury-rigged a screwdriver and pair of vice grips bypassing the faulty throttle and we successfully tied up to the floating dock. This is how we arrived at Puerto Deseado.

Over the next three days we would beat our heads against the wall with a few jobs that needed attention, not the least of which was the throttle, which we installed only three weeks ago. It turns out it had a defective spring inside that snapped and jammed and wore away a small internal grove. It can be repaired, but in a town of 9,000 people and 200 fishing vessels they don’t have parts for yachts. The nearest town might have it, but it wasn’t worth a 400-kilometer drive.

One thing that wasn’t in short supply were marine electricians. A Senor Gonzales was able to help us find and replace the corroded battery sensing wire to the regulator and a fuse for the alternator. But he was not able to repair the 4-year-old Raytheon tiller pilot. He felt it had worked hard and was past its useful life expectancy. I could have worked it harder.

Anyway, our time in Deseado was no fun. The people were nice, but the place cold and bleak with no visible vegetation. On the walk from the dock into town I saw a dead cat that looked like it froze to death and dead bird leaving no doubt that this is hard place to live. The high lights of our visit included a shower at the Petrobras gas station, a few beers and some decent seafood.

Overall, I would say as a pirate, I would have passed this port by. It was no prize.

Day: 7
Position:  45.18 South  64.41 West
Airtemp:  48F
Heading:  SW
Weather:  Cloudy, wind NNE
Seas:  4′ Northerly

As stated in the Patagonia and Tierra Del Fuego Nautical Guide:  “The route between Rio De La Plata and Cabo San Diego, the SE extremity of the continent, is considered, without exaggeration, one of the toughest a yacht is likely to meet. A long record of wrecks, accidents and misfortunes, amplified by time, could not but strengthen the discomfort sailors feel leaving Mar Del Plata.”

After making almost no ground for 48 hours and taking quite a beating in the southerly gale Luke described yesterday Shangri-la is again pointed south and making great speed.  We are gently rolling dead downwind with full main and poled out jib averaging 7.5 knots and Luke and I are all smiles.  But a smile would have been hard to find as recently as yesterday.

I have been trying to quell something I’ve yet to experience in almost 40,000 miles at sea on Saoirse, my own yacht which we’ve sailed throughout the Pacific over the past 6 years, nor commercial fishing in the Bering sea, nor on various other sail and motor vessels in all kinds of heinous conditions over the years:  sea sickness.  I always thought I was immune and while wholly sympathetic to those who suffer I never really understood what they felt, and how debilitating it could be.

This isn’t the puke your guts out, turn green, want to die sea sickness that I’ve seen many times in others, but a general sense of unease and lack of ability, or I guess desire, to do anything at all. If sea sickness stems from a mental rather than physical nature, as I’ve always presumed then possibly the above quote is why I cannot loosen the knot in my stomach.

I’d like to think it’s just getting used the motion of a different yacht, or maybe it’s because I’m crew instead of Captain and can afford the luxury of letting someone else do the lion’s share of the work.  Maybe I’ve always had the tendency but when you’re a Captain and responsible for others, getting seasick isn’t an option and thus have somehow mentally fought it off.  Time will tell and hopefully this sense of unease will pass but I can say that after our battle with the gale I am much more confident than I was in two very critical things of which the success of this expedition hinge.

The first is our vessel. Shangri-la has proven herself a remarkably able and strong ship.  Her wind vane steers in the most challenging of conditions perfectly, allowing her crew ample time for sleep and rest, which are critical components of safety when shorthanded as we are.  Her rig is solid, her sails well balanced, her hull capable of withstanding a hell of a bashing.  She is easy to handle, easy to reduce sail, and quick to alert us to her needs, which are few.  While we are likely to experience at least one more full gale or storm on our route south I am supremely confident in our vessel and her ability to weather what is to come.

The second is my captain, Luke.  It was exactly this time last year that Luke and Francis hatched the idea of sailing around the Horn while sailing with Jody (my girlfriend) and I in Fiji.  We were in very different roles back then.  I his captain, he my client, and sailing in the southern ocean a world away.  To be honest, I never really took their idea very seriously.

To purchase and equip a yacht, find crew, learn all that is required to sail around the Horn, and do it in a year- a very daunting task to say the least.  It seemed nothing more than an ill-thought-out dream that sounded rather dubious at best while gunk holing around paradise.  We entertained their plans and gave encouragement where needed, but I never thought it possible that he would get this far.

Luke returned to Saoirse later in the year to take part in his first offshore passage from the Solomons to Darwin.  He proved an excellent student, capable sailor, and remained ever positive to move forward with his dream.   He has worked tirelessly, against a mountain of hurdles and yet he still climbs.  His resolution to complete this journey against such inevitable adversity is simply remarkable.  I don’t think either of us would have ever imagined our current reality.  He my Captain, I his crew, sailing around the Horn together, both fulfilling dreams that are difficult to define, and harder to justify. 

And, here we are, and for the past week, one of the toughest I’ve had at sea Luke has proved that Captain’s shoes are anything but too big.  I am enormously proud of my once-student and can only be thankful my first trip around the Horn will be with someone so capable.

Gavin McClurg, heading for Port Deseado, the last safe haven before the long push to the cape.  

Day: 6
Position: 43.10 South, 63.37 West
Airtemp: 40F
Daylight: 8.6hrs
Heading: SW
Weather: Clear, wind W 10-15knots
Seas: 8ft southerly swell

I am a day late with this log. I have a good reason. The last 36 hours have been pretty tough. The last two nights we got tossed around pretty good and it was never a good idea to pull out the computer. The good news is we are well fed, well clothed, and well rested. The bad news is we haven’t made much ground. First - the good news. The sun is shining. The winds are from the west and we are moving at 7 knots in the general direction of our next waypoint, Puerto Deseado. We are covered by a large High-pressure system that is tracking NE and should now provide favorable winds. I won’t make any predictions, but I am as ever optimistic.

Now - the bad news. We had planned to get to an anchorage before a low-pressure system came up the coast bringing strong cold winds from the south. As you recall, “the race was on.” Well we lost. The high-pressure system (turning counter clockwise) over Tierra Del Fuego moved east towards us and Created a crunch zone with the low over us (turning clockwise). This crunch zone augured 20ft seas from the south and 35 knot winds from the SSW and gusts of 45 knots. We prepared the parachute sea anchor, but never used it. We prepared to hove to, but we never did. Instead we tacked back and forth under a deeply reefed main, storm jib, and only about 20 square feet of headsail. We didn’t make much ground to the south, but we didn’t give up valuable miles and we worked our way closer to land and safe harbor. Shangri-La made our decision for us by riding so smoothly. With the wind vane set to keep us close hauled on the wind and a conservative sail plan She kept our bow into the waves and our rail out of the water, relatively, most of the time. Gavin and I traded two-hour shifts throughout the night keeping an eye on things. Minor sail adjustments were needed here and there, but overall allowed us good rest in our off time.

With the rising sun this morning the winds shifted around and settled down as if granting permission to proceed. Now we can relax and take care of things like going to the bathroom and brushing our teeth, washing dishes; things made dangerous by a pitching boat in heavy seas. With these things down we can enjoy the ride. We’ll keep an eye out for an Albatross, good luck to mariners, or the Elephant seals that our guidebooks say are migrating north. I’ll write this log and get some weather reports in preparation for the next low certain to come our way.

Day: 5
Position: 42.32 south, 62.32 West
Airtemp: 48 F
Daylight: 8.75 hrs
Heading : W
Weather: Clear, S winds 16-18 knots
Seas: 6′ S chop

We tacked this morning about an hour before sunrise to the West, heading for land after a full day and night of making good time to the south. Luke headed back to bed and I remained topside opting for the sunrise even though cold air bit harshly at toes and face, a gentle reminder of much, much colder days to come. We’ve had three days of beautiful weather, blue “Simpson” skies by day and crisp clear nights filled with a waxing moon. Molly Hawks continue to visit and we’ve had two Albatross flybys, which we’ll take for good omens.

I’ve been living in the tropics the last several years and have grown accustomed to the almost sudden rise of the sun, like an egg cracked into a skillet with a plop, so this morning’s deeper latitude sunrise was something altogether different. I thought it would never climb out of the sea, somehow stuck on a pendulum teasing me with filtered gray. But it did indeed rise, timidly spreading brilliant colors of reds and oranges over a blanket of altocumulus clouds, which covered our eastern horizon. The show lasted over an hour and I found little else pecking away at my mind other than taking it in.

At some point today, some point among the typical daily chores one goes about; eating, preparing food, sleeping, logging progress, reading, that sunrise came back to me and I caught myself smiling. There’s been hundreds of times in the last month that I’ve wondered what in the hell I was going to do this for. Sail in the middle of winter on a small boat around Cape Horn, one of the most inhospitable places on the planet. Why? Because for today and the four days before and whatever days lay ahead, be they brutal or perfect I will have little else on my mind but our job and our journey; not much more to process than the rise and fall of the sun and the seas. Even though the winds will howl and the rigging will scream and at times it will be anything but quiet, this kind of peace cannot be found anywhere except right here.

Gavin McClurg. 65 miles from safe haven, racing to beat a forecasted southerly gale.

Day:4
Position: 41.50 south, 61.15 west
Airtemp: 45F
Daylight: 8.75 hrs
Heading: SSW
Weather: Clear, W Winds 20-25 knots
Seas: 10 SW swell

Going into last night we had light southerly winds that danced from due south to southwest.  In the late evening we went over to a starboard tack heading SSE away from land.  I set the wind vane to steer us against the wind and checked on it periodically knowing that if the wind shifted more westerly as we expected the windvane would alter our course in proportion to the wind shift always keeping the same angle on the wind. Down below, the movement of the boat and the sounds of the rigging would alert us to any imbalance. An added measure was setting the alarm on our radar to warn us of other vessels within five miles. All these meaures allowed us to enjoy a couple episodes of the West Wing on DVD.

We had an easy night with plenty of sleep. Each of us checked things now and again during the night. A great night gave way to a great day. The sun shining and, as forecasted, winds from the West at 15-20 knots. The day was a sled ride at seven knots of speed headed in the general direction of our goal 200 miles to our SW, Bahia Janssen.

Tactically we are keeping close to shore to avoid the north running Faulklands current further out. Also we are targeting a few specific safe havens. If all else fails we have a Fiorrentino 12′ parachute anchor that will hold us steady in heavy weather, but it would be less wear on the gear and us if we could find a safe anchorage. To that end we have scouted a few, and there are few on the Argentine coast, that we will run to if the forecast looks ominous.

Bahia Janssen is one such haven. Morning and night we receive a weather fax via Single Side Band radio for southern South America put out by the Chilean Armada. Daily we receive a weather forecast via email from Maxsea. Using these we try to predict the paths of the very fast moving lows and highs. I say we try to predict, but we actually hope for the best and prepare for the worst.

The worst right now is a southwest gale right in our face sometime  Sunday. Our hope is to be
anchored in Bahia Janssen watching ‘The West Wing.’

As I write we are still enjoying the Westerly wind driving us to the SW and Bahia Janssen at over 8 knots. However the swell from the SW is growing foretelling of the gale to come, perhaps sooner than we thought. The race is on.

Day: 3
Position: 40 15 south, 61 12 West
Air Temp: 49 degrees F
Daylight Hours: 8.75
Heading: WSW
Weather: Heavy overcast, SSW winds 20-25 knots
Seas: Heavy steep 8′chop from the SW, 4′ NW swell

What a difference a day makes. Sometime in the middle of the night we motored in calm seas and two knots of wind out of the south into the “roaring forties,” so named for the band of latitude between 40 and 50 south (or north) for strong westerly winds. After a day and a half of moderate northerlies the low pressure center moved over us, giving us a nice respite from the southerlies that we are now dealing with on the back side of the low. We had hoped to make a small anchorage called San Blas before the southerly hit so we could hole up until she blew through. But it wasn’t to be. The southerly hit this morning, building quickly to 20-25 knots and a steep sea to suit. Shangri-la has been humming along on a reasonably comfortable close haul at 6-7 knots and we are still making decent ground, but we’ll likely have to heave to if the winds build further and possibly deploy the parachute anchor so we won’t have to give up valuable ground we have made south.

We have had two setbacks, though neither more than an inconvenience. The first presented itself last night as our winds died and we brought out the tiller pilot, which steers the boat when we don’t have enough wind for the wind vane. Nada. Something has happened in the electrical circuit and either the pilot itself has shit the bed or something has gone astray in the wiring. But we don’t plan on having many calms on this trip so this is hardly something to worry over. The other inconvenience happened today. I rudely awoke Luke mid-morning from a deep sleep to help me hank on the staysail, as I am still unfamiliar with some of Shangri-la’s systems and thought it would be prudent to get a hand. Luke boldly took to the foredeck and while I tried in earnest to keep our head down and keep the seas from breaking over the deck, although Luke definitely took some good shots. After a couple problems with the halyard he was almost home getting the sail hoisted when one of the hanks got twisted on the stay and shredded a good foot of the luff and ripped the hank right out of the sail - so much for the staysail for a while. We’ll leave it to repair at an anchorage at some stage. We are now flying a very deeply reefed headsail, storm jib and a triple reefed main and other than a queasy stomach when I go below, we’re sailing well.

There are many reasons I’m on this trip with Luke- the challenge, the adventure, the unknown, and doing it in the middle of winter just seemed outright insane so therefore worth a shot; but this morning just after sunrise I got a glimpse of why humans have always ventured into inhospitable places for a tiny share of a view few have seen. Hundreds of Molly Hawks, a smaller cousin of the great Albatross swept in from over the gray horizon and treated to me to an air show of such spectacle it has left me with goose bumps all day. Such exquisite flyers, never beating their wings, simply rising and falling with the waves using unseen eddies and currents to their advantage for speed and height. Like watching a big wave surfer in a huge tube, faintly touching the wave with his inside hand, not for the picture, not to be steadied, but just because it feels awesome, so does the albatross almost indiscernibly brush the water as he screams by, a knowing touch with the water that is where he spends more than 85% of his life. They are the dolphins of the sky, in perfect harmony with their environment. We pale in comparison in our rolling, rocking, pounding home but she got us here and there’s no telling what’s over the next horizon.

Gavin McClurg

Day: 2
Position: 39 south, 59 west
Air temp: 50 degrees F
Daylight hours: 9
Heading: due south
Weather: Rain
Seas: Relatively calm

Things are moving pretty quickly. Gavin McClurg arrived almost 3 weeks ago and jumped in like the pro that he is. Combined with his know-how and our collective elbow grease we’ve repaired the headsail, installed a new throttle linkage, serviced the engine, epoxied and varnished the tiller, built a new bracket for the alternator, and provisioned for the voyage to Cape Horn. Getting ready for any ocean passage is always an endless list of tasks. Given the extreme conditions we expect to face on this dead-of-winter passage those tasks take on magnified importance.

On July 4th Francis and I set sail down the Rio De La Plata from San Fernando to Mar Del Plata on the Atlantic coast. We logged 450 miles for the 300 mile journey in 5 days, weathering a gale from the south, which forced us to heave to for the night, one day of calm and a blustery northerly gale which blew us straight into Mar Del Plata, the ‘Silver Sea’. While we battled the elements Gavin took our computer and his Spanish skills to Buenos Aires to arrange repairs as it had crashed. We would later have to buy a new one, as our weather updates and email are reliant on a working laptop. Francis and I endured the cold and wet slog to Mar Del Plata as a shakedown trial for the elements of Tierra Del Fuego. After 6 months at sea together and some incredible miles Francis and I have decided to part ways, citing nothing other than the trials of living with one another on a small yacht. Our relationship has simply run its course. He plans to complete a diesel mechanics course in Orlando in the near future and will undoubtedly get back on the sea in short order. I wish him nothing but the best.

Undeterred Gavin and I have decided to take on the sail to Ushuaia, at the southern tip of Argentina. Our four days in Mar Del Plata convinced us that the two of us were more than prepared to handle the expedition. We found the staff at the Yacht Club Argentino to be a wealth of information, many of which had sailed our route before. The North Sails representative Paco, or the ‘duck’ made some repairs and reinforcements to our headsail overnight knowing what we would likely face on the trip south. Tito, the head mechanic who helped us with the alternator bracket took an interest in our trip and was keen to impart wisdom from his two trips to Cape Horn. All things considered Mar Del Plata was a great staging point both physically and mentally. While we will miss Francis, Gavin and I have the confidence and motivation to achieve our goal.

We left yesterday afternoon heading out of the port dead into a northerly gale. A sliver of headsail and full engine got us just past the breakwater where we could hoist the main and enjoy the following winds that for the last 24 hours have been sweeping us southwest at upwards of 7 knots under a deeply reefed main. With our first night under our belt and a favorable forecast our excitement has grown, tempered only by the lore of the weather that we will undoubtedly face as we travel further south.