Location 50° 45S, 74°48W
Thursday 11.29.2007

The Schooner Maggie B was at 50° 45S, 74° 48W at noon on November 29th. We were making our way through the Angostura Guia inbetween Canal Inocentes and Canal Sarmiento. It is still blowing out of the NW with an average speed of 15-20 knots. It is overcast, raining occasionally and not too cold. We have the fore up alone, with the engine helping a bit. There is plenty of wind to sail, but it is generally funnelling straight down the channel, which tends to make the jib useless and the main dangerous.

We have come 779 NM from Puerto Montt and have 407 to go to the Horn. The barometer is at 995 and continues to fall.

Last night we tucked behind the well-named Isla Bun in Bahia Hugh. It was perhaps 200 meters by 200 meters, with 10 meters of good mud for the anchor in the middle. I could have dropped our “Away Party” with their lines off over the bow, as almost all the shores were steep-to. The entrance carried 10 meters of water all the way through, though the trees on either side almost brushed the gunwales. The wind whistled overhead, but we barely moved all night. We toasted the Italians for finding this lovely spot for us.

Our trip since the marvelous spot last night has been immensely spiced with dolphin playing around our bow and jumping out of the waves. We believe that they are Lagenorhynchus australis, known as the Blackchin Dolphin. But the usual name in literature is Peale’s Porpoise as they were first classified by Titian Peale, who was naturalist on the USS Vincennes on the 1838-42 expedition to Patagonia. Titian Peale is an ancestor on my mother’s side.

We hope to spend tonight in the marvelously-named “Caleta Moonlight Shadow.” It is a two mile long inlet in Isla Piazzi. The isla was named by Fitzroy in 1830 in honor of Guiseppe Piazzi, the astronomer in the observatory of Palermo. At the end there is a tiny caleta, just 25 meters wide by 100 meters long.

The big news today, though, is that we have had our first knock-down. We were carrying just the fore with the wind at about 20 knots, on the port side at about 140-150 degrees relative. We had been watching a black cloud catch up to us, certainly full of rain, and we expected some more wind. We didn’t realize how much. The wind jumped to 40 knots and all was obscured by the rain and flying spume. All the crew was on deck in an instant, in full foulies, ready for anything. And it was something. The wind increased to at least 62 knots (highest noticed on the wind gauge), and shifted in an instant 40 degrees starboard, jibing the fore. She took a knockdown, burying the port rail and more, but Hannah, cool as a cucumber, eased the starboard, windward, sheet and Freddie trimmed the port. The Maggie B sat right up, responded to her Captain at the helm and took off downwind like a shot.

With steady 40-50 knots, the Maggie B was surfing at 10-12 knots, in zero visibility. We functioned perfectly as a crew. Hannah went forward as bow watch, Curtis was on the radar to help keep us in the channel, and Alden and Freddie stood by the sheets. It was wild but safe. Great credit goes to North Sails for building the fore to take such a ride.

All is well.