Friday 11th January, 2013
8am Patagonia Net Wolfgang has been running the Net for cruisers heading up and down the Chilean Channels (protected waters, mainly, with fabulous scenery, mainly deserted with lots of wildlife, between Puerto Montt in the far N to Puerto Williams (Chile) and Ushuaia (Argentina), both on the Beagle Channel in the S, not too far from Cape Horn.
Sun trying to get out through a light cloud layer - fog & grey skies of last few days gone with strong wind of Low passing to S now. Wind set to increase to around 30 kt possibly.
Heading to a waypoint clearing the SE of the shoal area of Burdwood Bank, east of Isla de los Estados (which is off the SE extremity of Tierra del Fuego).
10:30am Wind got up.. reefed down like mad... fell off wind to make course... 7.2kt... . Went down below,, took of wet foulies... calmer... looked at display - speed under 4 kt -just a long passing squall (cold Front?).... foulies back on ... unfurl more genoa for more speed...adjust course again....!! Bun trying to get out again... Black-browed albatross nearby.
Wind kept on dying ... rocking & rolling about in some very rough seas for a long time before they finally died down with no wind. Damp, cold and grey again - added another warm fleece top and had some hot soup!!
3:30pm Has been raining for some time... struggling to make 3 kt in little wind from astern... Not going very far at this rate!
6pm Rain stopped. Making good speed at last! Wind finally piped up - furled away genoa, beam reach with stays'l and 3-reefed mains'l - making over 7kt with some fair current helping . Seas fairly big but not tossing us around too much or too often..
Midnight Hove to in winds around 30 kt with forecast of possibly higher. Unbelievably, drifting at 3.5 kt NE with zero boat speed!! Will get some sleep and see how thing are in the morning...
24hr DMG at 7pm local time (Chile time!) (2300GMT ): 118 n.ml. Cape Horn 428 n.ml. away (WSW) and my next waypoint, keeping well clear and to SE of the Burdwood Bank, is 103 n.ml. away. Isla de los Estados 314.ml. (W). E. Falkland: 228 n.ml. (NE), S. Georgia: 528 n.ml. (E).
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For my positions, see:
www.svnereida.com - 'Travels' - "Where is 'Nereida'?"
http://www.exactearth.com/media-centre/recent-ship-tracks/tracking-nereida/
http://oceantracker.net?event=nereida
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