I now write this blog post as we are happily cruising the waters of the Beagle Channel on a sunny day. Its amazing how quickly one can forget the trials of just 24 hours ago.
The good news was that the Drake Passage was fairly fast. We left the Melchiors at 3 in the morning to take advantage of the day light and iceberg spotting. The seas and wind were nearly perfect – 25knots gusting 30, from the port beam, and we were cruising along at 8.5-10 knots. All was well with the world and the Beagle Channel seemed like it would be here in no time.
After about 24 hours the wind more or less died to 8 knots if we were lucky! We resorted to the motor and continued north, all of us rotating through our 2 hours shifts.
The day before reaching the Beagle we knew we would get a decent blow, and a decent blow indeed we got! Quickly the winds started blowing 25, then 30, then 35 and then 40. The seas started to build and we reduced sail right down to just the main with 2 reefs. We even got some gusts up to 45 knots. Hold on for the ride. For a ride indeed it was. The seas as always in the Drake tend to be large and confused. for the most part we had seas from a stern which gave us a gyro-scoping type of ride. We got a few good wave crashes. A notable one sent an apple from one side of the saloon to the other, landing in a chair.
However a huge highlight of the Drake was crossing paths with the Europa. This trip we have crossed paths with Europa, a tall ship 3 times and it always seems to be on grey fogging days. We always wonder if the pass is real or if its just a ghost ship passing by us. Its amazing how in the hundreds of miles of the Drake Passage we ended up so close to Europe just south of Cape Horn. It was truly magical as she passed our bow. We got more than a few photos. We hope they also got some photos of us!
As we crossed Cape Horn Fede kept promising that the seas would abate. That didn’t ever seem to happen until we were actually up near the Beagle Channel and alongside Isla Lennox. Given the timing we decided to stop for the night at Caletta Lennox, a small Chilean island just south of the Beagle Channel. We were all ready for a good night’s sleep and a good meal. The bonus was the anchorage was gorgeous – a long beach, low cliffs with the hints of a wind swept southern forest. Reminders of a green world we had left behind nearly 3 weeks ago.