Just Another of the Great Capes

So, we started our South Africa sojourn in Cape Town.

And, no, we Galactics are not city people.

I will say that sitting on a bench in the chi-chi Waterfront Mall in Cape Town, watching a swath of the world walk past me, just 36 hours after we completed the passage from South Georgia - that was pretty good as a life-as-hallucigen experience.

But once we'd done that, and taken in the view from Table Mountain, there wasn't too much to keep us.

Luckily, Giselle on Pelagic had told us, way back in Stanley, about Simon's Town.  (And no, not this Pelagic.  This one.)

Simon's Town, she said to us.  That's where you want to be.

After a few days of watching the turds float by on the tide at the Cape Town marina, and not having any place for the boys to run, we were ready.  The trip from Cape Town to Simon's Town is a totally routine day hop of about 60 miles.  Get up at 0400, be more or less awake and away from the dock at 0430, and you're finished well before dinner.

But the trip from Cape Town to Simon's town has an added bonus above most coastal hops.  The route (below) just happens to take you around the Cape of Good Hope.  (What a name!)

Now the Cape of Good Hope isn't the southernmost point in Africa.  That title goes to Cape Agulhas, just a short way down the coast.

But if you compare the two names, you'll quickly see why one gets all the press.

We were on something of a roll.  Only a few months before, Galactic had, improbably enough, been off Cape Horn.

Cape Horn had been a total lark - we weren't going anywhere else but there.  It was just a side trip to see that most famous of all landmarks, and nothing like the traditional experience of rounding the Horn at sea.  But even though it was a lark, we also got a bit of a floggin'.  Three reefs, a staysail, and parted aft lower shrouds.  Lord have mercy.

For this Cape, we were actually going somewhere.  It was legitimately on our way from point A to point B.  But although we had a more businesslike purpose in hand than we had for the Horn, the actual day trip involved was much more tranquilo.

Eric, incapacitated at the Horn ("Grab a bucket!") got his chance to shine this time.

My captain's hat, that physical embodiment of the nearly divine authority that I bear within the confines of our little floating home - that came out for photos in front of the Cape, just as it did at the Horn.

The beast itself

Elias.  He always shines at sea.

So, yeah.  Just another Great Cape.

(And, if you're wondering, I reckon there are five of them: the Horn, Good Hope, and Leeuwin, plus the southernmost points of Tassie and En Zed, whatever they might be called.)

Unstuck

Speedwell Settlement

At the Speedwell/George/Barren group we applied that favorite tactic for sailing vessels harbor-bound by bad weather: patience.

Eventually we waited long enough.  The west winds died to a whisper, and we carried on our way, unstuck.

We were bound across Falkland Sound, the body of water that separates East Falkland from West Falkland.  Our destination was Albermarle, a property run by the same extended family that owns Speedwell.

We were happy to be able to carry some empty fuel barrels from one settlement to the other.  The first practical thing we've ever done with the boat, I joked with the farmers.  The boys found the drums to be useful for making music.

With Tanya and Shaun and family at Albermarle

We had another good visit at Albermarle.  Tanya and Shaun, the young couple who farm the place, made us very welcome.

From Albermarle we took two leisurely days to get right around the bottom of West Falkland to our local friend's island.  We had good sailing winds both days, and it was a joy to not be motoring into the weather.  But I was still a bit on edge about the state of our rig, with the three stranded lower shrouds.  It will be a relief to finally replace that wire when we get back to Stanley.

Gentoo penguin

Peale's dolphin

On the second day out of Arbelmarle we came upon our local friend, completing a charter for a group of biologists on his yacht Peregrine.  We had last seen Peregrine in Tasmania - a lot of sailing miles ago, let me assure you. 

Peregrine

It was a treat to sail in company with a friendly boat.  That doesn't happen too often.

Our friend, Leiv, got this picture of Galactic as we were coming in towards Beaver Island, with a fresh breeze behind us and the tide full in our face.

The jetty at Beaver Island

Beaver Island

It was at Beaver Island that the adventure really began for us.  Particularly for the boys, who are now utterly and completely in the Boys' Own Heaven that is a Falkland Islands outer island settlement with a very generous, patient, and forbearing host.  Both Elias and Eric have told us in no uncertain terms that Beaver Island is their 100% favorite place on earth.

I'll show you why in the next post.

Local sight

Boy with reindeer antler.  It became our Christmas tree on Galactic.

Cape Horners

The picture above (two giant petrels) is by Elias.  

The pictures of his parents below are also by Elias.  He achieves a certain documentary authority from his perch under the dodger. 

Yes, I'm afraid that's how we really looked.  We were trying to get into Caleta Martial, on Isla Herschel, in the Wollaston Islands.

The Wollaston Islands are the archipelago where Cape Horn is found.

We had a forecast for 20 knots of wind on this day, but got much much more at the end of the day.  We ended up going to windward under three reefs and staysail to make Bahía Arquistade and our anchorage at Caleta Martial.

We put up some points on the Unintended Drama Board (I won't go into details) and also managed to strand another aft lower shroud.  Sigh.

But everything ended up OK.  Meanwhile, Elias was as cool as can be, watching his parents at work - see the selfie below:

Visiting Cape Horn was never something I was particularly interested in doing during our time in Tierra del Fuego.  I figured that rounding Cape Horn meant going from 50°S to 50°S in the open ocean, taking whatever weather came along.  Ever since I heard a motorboat owner at a beach potluck in the tropical South Pacific, talking oh-so-casually about his time at Cape Horn, I figured that the modern version, of harbor-hopping down to the Horn and sneaking around on a fair weather day, wasn't something that I needed to do.

Our track around Isla Hornos

But then Alisa (all praise!) said that she wanted to leave Chile behind without any regrets over things that we'd left undone.  And maybe it would be kind of fun to go see Cape Horn?

Elias latched on the idea, and I was very easy to convince.

So last Friday, with a reasonable forecast in hand, we made tracks for the Horn.

It was a fast trip, as we were eyeing the end of our visas and the time needed to prepare for the passage onwards to Uruguay.  The Wollastons are beautiful, and we could have spent a long time happily knocking around the area between Puerto Williams and the Horn.

But the summer is on, it's going to go quickly, and it's time that we want to be a bit goal-oriented about things.  So we came away with a quick visit to the Horn, which was good enough for us.

And, to whit, here are some crew portraits in front of that most famous landmark in the whole aqueous sphere:

Eric, meanwhile....We had very light tailwinds on the morning we were approaching the Horn, with a respectable swell running.  Which meant that Eric was seasick, and not too keen to get out of bed.

Alisa finally rousted him, held a bowl while he vomited, and put his raingear over his pajamas so that he could come up and collapse under a blanket under the shelter of the dodger.

So Eric rounded Cape Horn in his PJs.

The Cape Horn monument from seaward.  The wind had come up from the
northeast by this point, and made the anchorage at Cape Horn untenable,
so we couldn't have gone ashore even if we wanted to.  (Which we didn't.)

But Wait...

...there's more!

After a bit of a jaunt down-country, we find ourselves once again in Puerto Williams, tied up to the Micalvi (the Uttermost Yacht Club in the World).

The pace of the summer season is gaining steam, with the million-dollar, Antarctic-going charter yachts awake and beginning to do their thing.

Next to us is a Big Green Sled that has been chartered as support vessel for some guy who is famous from the America's Cup (Never heard of him.  Barely heard of it.) who is going to be the First Person In The World To Sail A Tiny Little Hydrofoiling Catamaran Around Cape Horn.

(To which we think: that's nothin'.  Our five-year-old did it in his PJs.)

We haven't met him, but the Lucky Winner of the contest put on by the Sponsoring Sunglass Company, who is going to accompany the Famous America's Cup Guy on the Hydrofoiling Catamaran - we did meet him.  Lovely guy, from "Southern Bavaria" (is there any other kind?), who seemed to learn quite serviceable Spanish just for the trip.  He helped Elias and me launch our dinghy.

The crew of the Green Sled are from Tassie, and know some of our peeps.  Plus the Famous Guy and his support team are all French, which gives the Bold Endeavor just enough of Je ne sais quoi to keep it from being laughable.

We're starting to see what all the old Patagonia hands were saying back in July and August when they explained how much more they like winter...

But anyway!  We're enjoying the energy.  And now that we're back in internet world I can finish up with our calendar-worthy photos from our month in the Beagle Channel.

So, we pick up the narrative after the sensory delights of Seno Pia, east arm, and find the Galactics in the west arm, where the skies are grey and the sunshine is interrupted by a surprising amount of SNOW.

The boys love shoveling the decks.

But I wonder if they'll still love it in Alaska, when it's an everyday thing?

We finally got to use the ski goggles that we've been
carrying around...just the thing for keeping watch
in the driving snow...

Captain and cabin boy getting a line ashore, Estero Coloane.

I think that's a look that says he's happy to see beaver sign
- the fresh woodchips on the ground.

Family-friendly terrain in Coloane.

Eric!  It's right over there...

Magellanic horned owl!

Elias afterwards: Can you see how nervous I was in the picture?

Family and glacier snout.

The sun finds us again.

It was such a nice day that we are dinner in the cockpit for the first time
in a long, long time.

Estero Fouque.

Caleta Nutria, Estero Fouque.  An all-time favorite.

We got the perfect hiking day.  Alisa and Eric went up the hill partway.

Elias and I kept going up the ridge behind the anchorage. 
He was over the moon at all the icefall that we saw.

He's a great hiking companion.  We saw four "lifers" (new bird species) on this day, including the seed snipe he was gunning for.  You have no idea of the excitement.

Our high point.  Galactic is way down there in the lower right.

At the high point.

The Mothership

The next day in Estero Fouque.  This is the same shot that everyone gets.  But I'm glad we got it, too.

Shortly after this picture was taken, the crocodile went overboard.
Recovery was successful.

And, that was more or less our month in the Beagle.

Being distracted now both by the question of how we are riding against the Big Green Sled in the gale that has visited the anchorage, and the long list of tasks that awaits before we leave Chile, I think I'll let the pics speak for themselves.