Windhorse Sailing

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.