Location 42° 35S, 61° 01W
Wednesday 12.12.2007

At noon on December 12th, the Schooner Maggie B was at 42° 35S, 61° 01W. We were motorsailing at seven knots more or less due north, still making for the coast of Argentina between Bahia Blanca and Mar del Playa. The weather is clear and sunny and the sea is mostly calm, at least calm for Blue Water. We are now in the lee of the Argentinean coast, which is only 150 NM away to our West, so rollers don’t have a chance to make up.

We have come 996 NM from Puerto Williams and have 495 to go to Buenos Aires.

We are expecting a fresh northerly to start about midnight tonight and our course should both give us some protection from the build up of the seas as well as having “banked” a lot of Westing that we can give up as we run along the coast towards Mar del Playa (38S/57deg30W). If we time it right, about when we get to Mar del Playa (the “corner”), at dawn on the 14th, the wind will shift to a strong SW’erly which will blow us up the Plata to Buenos Aires. We’ll see.

The waters here must be very rich. Where before we would generally see only a few albatross, here there hundreds. The fishing boats are out (draggers) and we have seen two pods of Southern Right Whales. We had a line out to catch fish for dinner, but had to pull it in as it was attracting albatross.

All is well.