The following are some excerpts from a series of logs written as Luke Henderson and I sailed from Mar Del Plata, Argentina to Ushuaia, Argentina and were then joined by Dirk Kotze for a mid-winter rounding of Cape Horn on Luke's 36' steel cutter, "Shangri-la".

Roaring Forties

What a difference a day makes. Sometime in the middle of the night we motored in calm seas and two knots of wind out of the south into the "roaring forties," so named for the band of latitude between 40 and 50 south (or north) for strong westerly winds. After a day and a half of moderate northerlies the low pressure center moved over us, giving us a nice respite from the southerlies that we are now dealing with on the back side of the low. We had hoped to make a small anchorage called San Blas before the southerly hit so we could hole up until she blew through. But it wasn't to be. The southerly hit this morning, building quickly to 20-25 knots and a steep sea to suit. Shangri-la has been humming along on a reasonably comfortable close haul at 6-7 knots and we are still making decent ground, but we'll likely have to heave to if the winds build further and possibly deploy the parachute anchor so we won't have to give up valuable ground we have made south.

We have had two setbacks, though neither more than an inconvenience. The first presented itself last night as our winds died and we brought out the tiller pilot, which steers the boat when we don't have enough wind for the wind vane. Nada. Something has happened in the electrical circuit and either the pilot itself has shit the bed or something has gone astray in the wiring. But we don't plan on having many calms on this trip so this is hardly something to worry over. The other inconvenience happened today. I rudely awoke Luke mid-morning from a deep sleep to help me hank on the staysail, as I am still unfamiliar with some of Shangri-la's systems and thought it would be prudent to get a hand. Luke boldly took to the foredeck and while I tried in earnest to keep our head down and keep the seas from breaking over the deck, although Luke definitely took some good shots. After a couple problems with the halyard he was almost home getting the sail hoisted when one of the hanks got twisted on the stay and shredded a good foot of the luff and ripped the hank right out of the sail - so much for the staysail for a while. We'll leave it to repair at an anchorage at some stage. We are now flying a very deeply reefed headsail, storm jib and a triple reefed main and other than a queasy stomach when I go below, we're sailing well.

There are many reasons I'm on this trip with Luke- the challenge, the adventure, the unknown, and doing it in the middle of winter just seemed outright insane so therefore worth a shot; but this morning just after sunrise I got a glimpse of why humans have always ventured into inhospitable places for a tiny share of a view few have seen. Hundreds of Molly Hawks, a smaller cousin of the great Albatross swept in from over the gray horizon and treated to me to an air show of such spectacle it has left me with goose bumps all day. Such exquisite flyers, never beating their wings, simply rising and falling with the waves using unseen eddies and currents to their advantage for speed and height. Like watching a big wave surfer in a huge tube, faintly touching the wave with his inside hand, not for the picture, not to be steadied, but just because it feels awesome, so does the albatross almost indiscernibly brush the water as he screams by, a knowing touch with the water that is where he spends more than 85% of his life. They are the dolphins of the sky, in perfect harmony with their environment. We pale in comparison in our rolling, rocking, pounding home but she got us here and there's no telling what's over the next horizon.

Taking a Look Around

We tacked this morning about an hour before sunrise to the West, heading for land after a full day and night of making good time to the south. Luke headed back to bed and I remained topside opting for the sunrise even though cold air bit harshly at toes and face, a gentle reminder of much, much colder days to come. We've had three days of beautiful weather, blue "Simpson" skies by day and crisp clear nights filled with a waxing moon. Molly Hawks continue to visit and we've had two Albatross flybys, which we'll take for good omens.

I've been living in the tropics the last several years and have grown accustomed to the almost sudden rise of the sun, like an egg cracked into a skillet with a plop, so this morning's deeper latitude sunrise was something altogether different. I thought it would never climb out of the sea, somehow stuck on a pendulum teasing me with filtered gray. But it did indeed rise, timidly spreading brilliant colors of reds and oranges over a blanket of altocumulus clouds, which covered our eastern horizon. The show lasted over an hour and I found little else pecking away at my mind other than taking it in.

At some point today, some point among the typical daily chores one goes about; eating, preparing food, sleeping, logging progress, reading, that sunrise came back to me and I caught myself smiling. There's been hundreds of times in the last month that I've wondered what in the hell I was going to do this for. Sail in the middle of winter on a small boat around Cape Horn, one of the most inhospitable places on the planet. Why? Because for today and the four days before and whatever days lay ahead, be they brutal or perfect I will have little else on my mind but our job and our journey; not much more to process than the rise and fall of the sun and the seas. Even though the winds will howl and the rigging will scream and at times it will be anything but quiet, this kind of peace cannot be found anywhere except right here.

After the Gale

As stated in the Patagonia and Tierra Del Fuego Nautical Guide: "The route between Rio De La Plata and Cabo San Diego, the SE extremity of the continent, is considered, without exaggeration, one of the toughest a yacht is likely to meet. A long record of wrecks, accidents and misfortunes, amplified by time, could not but strengthen the discomfort sailors feel leaving Mar Del Plata."

After making almost no ground for 48 hours and taking quite a beating in the southerly gale Luke described yesterday Shangri-la is again pointed south and making great speed. We are gently rolling dead downwind with full main and poled out jib averaging 7.5 knots and Luke and I are all smiles. But a smile would have been hard to find as recently as yesterday.

I have been trying to quell something I've yet to experience in almost 40,000 miles at sea on Saoirse, my own yacht which we've sailed throughout the Pacific over the past 6 years, nor commercial fishing in the Bering sea, nor on various other sail and motor vessels in all kinds of heinous conditions over the years: sea sickness. I always thought I was immune and while wholly sympathetic to those who suffer I never really understood what they felt, and how debilitating it could be.

This isn't the puke your guts out, turn green, want to die sea sickness that I've seen many times in others, but a general sense of unease and lack of ability, or I guess desire, to do anything at all. If sea sickness stems from a mental rather than physical nature, as I've always presumed then possibly the above quote is why I cannot loosen the knot in my stomach.

I'd like to think it's just getting used the motion of a different yacht, or maybe it's because I'm crew instead of Captain and can afford the luxury of letting someone else do the lion's share of the work. Maybe I've always had the tendency but when you're a Captain and responsible for others, getting seasick isn't an option and thus have somehow mentally fought it off. Time will tell and hopefully this sense of unease will pass but I can say that after our battle with the gale I am much more confident than I was in two very critical things of which the success of this expedition hinge.

The first is our vessel. Shangri-la has proven herself a remarkably able and strong ship. Her wind vane steers in the most challenging of conditions perfectly, allowing her crew ample time for sleep and rest, which are critical components of safety when shorthanded as we are. Her rig is solid, her sails well balanced, her hull capable of withstanding a hell of a bashing. She is easy to handle, easy to reduce sail, and quick to alert us to her needs, which are few. While we are likely to experience at least one more full gale or storm on our route south I am supremely confident in our vessel and her ability to weather what is to come.

The second is my captain, Luke. It was exactly this time last year that Luke and Francis hatched the idea of sailing around the Horn while sailing with Jody (my girlfriend) and I in Fiji. We were in very different roles back then. I his captain, he my client, and sailing in the southern ocean a world away. To be honest, I never really took their idea very seriously.

To purchase and equip a yacht, find crew, learn all that is required to sail around the Horn, and do it in a year- a very daunting task to say the least. It seemed nothing more than an ill-thought-out dream that sounded rather dubious at best while gunk holing around paradise. We entertained their plans and gave encouragement where needed, but I never thought it possible that he would get this far.

Luke returned to Saoirse later in the year to take part in his first offshore passage from the Solomons to Darwin. He proved an excellent student, capable sailor, and remained ever positive to move forward with his dream. He has worked tirelessly, against a mountain of hurdles and yet he still climbs. His resolution to complete this journey against such inevitable adversity is simply remarkable. I don't think either of us would have ever imagined our current reality. He my Captain, I his crew, sailing around the Horn together, both fulfilling dreams that are difficult to define, and harder to justify.

And, here we are, and for the past week, one of the toughest I've had at sea Luke has proved that Captain's shoes are anything but too big. I am enormously proud of my once-student and can only be thankful my first trip around the Horn will be with someone so capable.

Slow Progress

In the end the 3 days in port ended up a waste of time as the repairs we'd hoped to accomplish were impossible and the need to move on with what we have has taken precedence. We won't likely need the engine until we enter the Beagle Channel so by then we'll have something worked out to get us by. The tiller pilot is only something we need when there's no wind to steer the boat, and this is likewise something we don't anticipate. We did have a beautiful day in port that we could have used to repair the staysail, but neither Luke or I could get out of bed after tying on a night of beers and wine I would have been proud of in my college years. Unfortunately neither of us recovers as we once did back in those days, so the sail remains in its bag, and will until we reach Ushuaia.

We left Puerto Deseado four hours before sunrise, on the ebb tide and a light westerly so we could simply sail off the dock rather than go through all the necessary stunts to use the engine without a throttle or control in the cockpit. Luke navigated through the maze of fishing vessels with aplomb and once we got out into the main channel the combination of ebb current and river flow catapulted us back out to sea in rare speed. Two Tonina Olvera dolphins played in our bow wave, acting as pilots for our exit and reassured us with their presence. Sailors, whether they care to admit it or not are a superstitious bunch and dolphins are always taken for good luck. For the first 10 hours we enjoyed steady NW winds which allowed some solid southing in calm seas, but since then it's been more similar to our journey up until this point: slow.

In hindsight we should have never stopped at Deseado and gone with the northerlies that would have taken us all they way to Bahia Thetis, our launch point at the tip of Tierra Del Fuego to round the peninsula through Le Maire Straits, by far the most hazardous segment of the journey. From Deseado to Bahia Thetis it is only 420 miles, but there isn't a single anchorage the entire distance making this run the most weather dependent of our voyage and thus timing is critical. But those three days in Deseado has allowed the next series of lows to sweep across the Andes and in their wake we are now caught again in their southerly winds, blowing relentlessly in our face.

Cold and damp these winds are, and while this boat is steel and acts like a gigantic refrigerator by far our most pressing concern is not our comfort, but our need to get south. With any luck we'll cross into the 50's tonight but miles are ticking by slowly. We have to sail 3 or 4 miles for every one gained south, our track an endless run of Z's that wears on our spirits. The forecast? More of the same. We are hopeful another low just reaching Chile now will reach us sooner than expected so we can ride the northerlies on its front side past the Straits of Magellan and down to Thetis, but the pros are saying southerlies for the next 3 days, which means more Z's for us, but not the kind we seek.

Land of Fire

We've had an amazingly fast 24 hours. Luke took watch just past 2 a.m. and brought us to the mouth of the Le Maire Straits two hours before a very bleak and ominous gray dawn with strong winds, gusting to 40 knots but with relatively calm seas as Tierra Del Fuego was keeping the fetch of the seas to a minimum, though we could not yet make out the Land of Fire. I took the watch and simply tacked back and forth for a few hours, waiting for high tide, which would provide a much smoother passage through the Straits. Sleet and rain, freezing wind and these mean, dark walls of cumulonimbus clouds, combined with a barometer that has been on a nosedive since last night would usually have me feeling little but dread. But I don't. In fact today, the gloomiest yet on the passage has me in very high spirits indeed, but in high spirits that also leave me a bit disappointed. We've sailed over 1900 miles in the last 16 days, 1900 miles to cover what a bird could in 1100. That's a lot of extra miles. We've had wind at every strength, from every point on the compass rose, and it has been by all definitions a hell of a slog. And though our goal, to sail around Cape Horn has not yet been realized a successful run through the Le Maire Straits today, which we completed a few hours ago has the most grueling and dangerous part of our journey in our wake. We can now rest - not easy, but rest assured that our goal, barring a breakdown we cannot repair will be realized.

Usually this landmark would be cause for Luke and I to have at least a bit of a celebration, knowing full well we still have over a hundred miles to Ushuaia and we don't want to lose focus yet, but while I am jubilant, I am hardly ready to crack the champagne. This is hard to define. It has been well documented that solo circumnavigators often experience their worst hardship on finally reaching port after months at sea. While humbled and usually in awe of the sea and its power they grow very attached and almost dependent on its moods. Moods that often reflect their own. Suddenly their quest, which began for reasons only they can understand is over and the prospect of figuring out what to do now leaves them mirthless and even more alone than they were at sea. Many experience nervous breakdowns. Some commit suicide. Many find a way to sail again, running farther from whatever it is they can't attain on land. I've read countless books about adventurers - land and sea expeditions and the people who take them on. Many end in triumph, some end in tragedy. There were many days in our journey south that I asked myself why in the hell would I do this? What drives me to take these kinds of things on? Living in such cold, damp conditions. Forever trying to eat and cook at a 30 degree angle. Things slamming and banging incessantly. Noises that just will not go away. Going to the bathroom is probably the most dangerous thing we do. But now we are here and I realize that shit, that wasn't that hard. "That was supposed to be hard dammit!" But it wasn't. We battled some awesome seas and there were times when I thought we'll never, ever, ever get there. But here we are. Luke kept a positive face throughout and we had many great laughs. In fact we couldn't have asked for better rapport, hard to find in small quarters in such conditions. And now we're looking at each other going man, that was supposed to be brutal. I think deep down we wanted it to be brutal because that's what you expect, and that is the glory you hope to somehow pocket and take with you long after the expedition's end.

For five minutes this morning the gray blanket of fog and rain that looked well and truly to live permanently in these parts suddenly lifted, giving me a most breathtaking view of soaring snow covered peaks that were hardly five miles away. My heart sang and I started to dance, the Rolling Stones and I playing air guitar at the bottom of the world. In another moment it was gone, the mountains swallowed whole by the grayness as quickly as they appeared. So we don't have a harrowing account of 70 knot winds and behemoth seas. We don't have a knockdown, man overboard, fire or any other truly harrowing story to tell. But however the remainder of this adventure plays out and whatever inevitable joys and disappointments arise, I got what I came for in those brief minutes. My own story, written just for me.

Setting the Stage

"The true voyage of discovery does not consist in looking for new lands, but in having new eyes." - Marcel Proust.

Last Friday we entered Ushuaia harbor. From the deck of Shangri-La, the city was an amazing sight. Under the gray sky the city's lights reflected off the still water giving it the appearance of being larger than it is. Ushuaia is just large enough to have all the things you need and just small enough to welcome all visitors with its charm. I was excited to get on land and take care of all our repairs in a place that had decent facilities. I also looked forward to calling home, getting laundry done, and a hot shower. I was ready to take advantage of all Ushuaia has to offer. However, I wasn't intoxicated by the city, rather I was intoxicated by how I had arrived there - under sail. There have been many times throughout this voyage from Cape Town, South Africa that I thought of quitting. There were times when I felt that I had bitten off more than I could chew. I felt that things had conspired against me and this simply wasn't meant to be. Pulling in to Ushuaia was a definitive victory over all those doubts.

I think of all it took to get here, the sacrifices, the stress, the logistics, the labor, the imagination, the courage, and the friends…oh, the friends. My family's support never wavered, but it was my friends who helped me get to here. A positive word or a good idea, the offer of help with technical matters beyond my experience, and much more - throughout this, my friends were always with me.

One such friend is Gavin McClurg. Gavin is here now on Shangri-La. He has had opportunities before to round Cape Horn and for various reasons has never capitalized on one. He chose to join me. For that I am honored. I would never have thought he would have been able to, but it turned out the timing was perfect for him. And so I tell him here now how important he is to this voyage. With all his experience he walks me through the replacing of the alternator regulator and the diagnosis of the problem from the engine alternator, the field wire to the regulator. That is just one of many jobs. The ease with which he attacks the complex issues that a home at sea can present is enviable. I am encouraged by his strength of character and enlightened by his abilities.

Another such friend is Miss Elvia Garcia. Supportive since the inception of this voyage, she has never been offshore, but she has been a most important crew member. Elvia has been a tireless source of information and help. I thank her for always being there as a guide and for her keen and positive insights the many times I was at an impasse. Were it not for her I could not have made it this far.

I thank Gavin and Elvia, my family and all my friends at home and along the way for Giving me the new eyes I sought.

We got all our work done in Ushuaia and picked up Shangri-La's builder and former owner Dr. Dirk Kotze. With Dirk's help the work was easy and made easier still by the amperage he added to our already charged excitement. Cape Horn is literally just around the corner.

Wednesday we checked out of Argentina and made our way 30 miles east on the Beagle Channel to Puerto Williams, Chile. Chile controls the archipelago south from here that includes the infamous Cabo De Horno. By mid evening we had safely docked and checked in. All that was left was to rest up before reporting to the office for a cruising permit and setting out towards cape horn. Dirk still jet lagged from the flight in from South Africa retired early and Gavin and I watched a movie before retiring ourselves. Personally I was too excited to think of sleeping, but at this point it is vital to be rested.

Thursday morning we got our Zarpe or permit and left the dock at 10am heading east and then south around isla Navarino to the southern most village in the world Puerto Toro. With favorable NW winds we made the 30-mile trip in 4 hours and were encouraged by the quickly changing weather report to pull in and raft up to a fishing vessel. For a bottle of wine we scored six walking, crawling Centolla. A Centolla is a giant crab, with six legs and two arms each they will feed us three mariners for three days.

Meanwhile the low swept thru and the fishing vessel we were rafted to decided to pull out at 1am. We had planned to leave at 3am, but after this rude awakening sleep would be hard to find again so we set sail as well. We had to navigate through the Gorree channel using GPS and radar being unable to see thru the sleet, snow and darkness. Light, though no sun, came at 8:30 and revealed magnificent snow capped mountains on the islands all around. As well, having left early we were able to sail due south to Paseo Bravo en route to an anchorage in the isla Wollaston group. There are two recommended anchorages. On the east side of the island group is Coletta Martial and on the west side is Isla Maxwell. As we made our way further south, about 60 miles the winds shifted to NW and allowed us to sail a bit more west and make our way into the western and spectacular anchorage of Isla Maxwell.

We are now nestled in for the night in ten meters of water and in the protective lee of the mountains that dominate this archipelago. We will rest some more for tomorrow's short run around the southern most Isla of the archipelago, Cabo De Horno. The forecast is for 30-40 knot westerly winds and clear skies. The weather here can change as you report it so we will keep an eye on all our weather report sources and hope to make sense of them as we make our decision. Whatever tomorrow brings, I am glad to be with friends and confident in our equipment and abilities.

Cape Horn

I woke up today with a sense of calm that is difficult to explain and impossible to duplicate. Even from our protected anchorage, a bay called Puerto Maxwell, you could hear the winds and snow shrieking all night, whistling at us, reminding us of our day ahead. Our forecast looked positive- winds 25 to 35, gusts to 40, typically conditions I wouldn't be excited to go sailing in, but for Cape Horn, we couldn't ask for much better. And really, that's part of the mystique- it would be a disappointing to round the Horn on a light day. But still, why this sense of calm? I've dreamed of rounding the Horn by sail for many years, been plagued by nightmares in the last few weeks that have kept me permanently on edge, the muscles in my neck and back have been jacked up into a ball of knots no massage could ease. Everything, all this work, all this effort, all for this one day. And today I wake up like I'm on valium?

Maybe its because I was setting up for the inevitable anticlimax. Sail two thousand miles to round a desolate rock at the bottom of the world. Ridiculous. Like climbing a mountain, I have tried to focus on the journey, rather than the goal. But I am happy - no, actually ecstatic to report that the Horn has lived up to its grandeur in regal splendor, at least for our small yacht and trio of men. In "The Way of a Ship," Derek Lundy describes, "the reputation of the Horn as a place of tribulation for seamen is based on a few facts of physical geography that can be expressed in six words: compression, thin water, latitude, ice, mountains." I've read sentences like that in innumerable books so many times it becomes almost blasé. Wind and seas circle the southern oceans unhindered the circumference of the globe except at the Horn, where 2,000 miles of water and waves are compressed through a funnel into 600 between Antarctica and Tierra del Fuego. Seas that thunder in long swells in bottomless depths slam suddenly into "thin" water by a shelf that rises from 4000 meters to less than 50 in under two miles. The massive energy in these giants are further confused and concentrated by the effects of land, creating steep breaking behemoth seas and vicious rogue waves. As for "latitude, ice and mountains," no description is needed I believe. Mountains create havoc with winds, funneling already strong gales into unpredictable williwas and making forecasting a rather dubious affair. Latitude - we are way the hell down here, and ice - well ice is cold and hard and even with a steel yacht, that's a battle the ice is going to win.

With a hearty breakfast behind us we shipped our two stern lines and anchor and headed on our last journey south through a tiny pass between Isla Hermite and Isla Jerdan. We glimpsed our first view of the Horn some 15 miles distant, a great mountain of steep rock, shrouded in dark clouds and swirling snow. We would be protected from the west for a few miles before gaining open ocean so we unfurled just a bit of headsail and killed the motor, trying to get a feel for the conditions to come. Shangri-la responded in form, accelerating and heeling over in 25 knot winds, but with much more violent gusts that seemed to hit with no warning. We battened down, making our final preparations for the sail, snapping pictures, clapping backs, timid yet thrilled. A half hour later, in open ocean and 30 knots of wind Cape Horn began to come alive. The seas weren't huge- 25 feet, but in a 36? yacht, with many breaking in long white plummets of foam, wind-whipping tops completely off others in dense spray, it was very impressive. With Luke at the helm and Dirk trying to figure out how to capture this chaos on film I secured myself onto the aft stanchion and just felt it all come alive. In the troughs of the waves, trails of wind ripped on the surface, a phenomenon only present in gales - over 30 knots, or 40 miles per hour. When the occasion allowed, on the crest of some of the larger rollers I could plainly see the Horn, a magnificent mantel of sheer steep black rock, much larger than I had imagined. From a distance you could see great waves of ocean slamming into her base, sending plumes of water easily over 80 feet, as they had for millennia.

Shangri-la was in her groove, her crew getting more and more tuned into her surroundings. It was simply glorious. Gusts to 45 knots would try to yank our bow into the wind, forcing us beam on to the seas and making for dangerous broaching conditions. At one point a breaking wave caught our stern and completely flooded the cockpit, slamming into the boat with a heavy thud and throwing us violently to port, the winds reaching 55 knots. Dirk was then at the helm and yelled, "shit I'm scared- this is some serious shit." And he was right, this was some serious shit but my God it was an awesome sight. I was almost delirious with peace and wonder. The Horn was anything but an anticlimax. In fact it was awesome. Besieged since the beginning of time and yet proud and benevolent. A brief snowstorm would hide her and temporarily rob us of our landmark, only to suddenly appear again in full sunshine. The seas would shift colors as quickly as the clouds were racing by overhead- from black and menacing to huge cascades of white. Dirk commented at one stage that if you took someone totally unaccustomed to the sea and her ways and transported them somehow directly into this situation that they would die from anxiety and fear. And he's probably dead right. Wind literally screaming through the rigging, a tiny aspect of sail unfurled enough to push us well beyond Shangri-la's theoretical maximum speed, waves that would roar at us and march on, oblivious of anything so small in their way.

At some point it occurred to one of us that we were "Horners". We had crossed that infamous line between Pacific and Atlantic at the bottom of the world and successfully run the gauntlet. We hugged each other and laughed, each of us contemplating on what it meant to ourselves, while outwardly enjoying each other's praise. I'm sure I saw in Luke and Dirk's eyes the same thing they saw in mine: pride. And a bit of humility. We were all here for different reasons and though we could be proud in our endeavor the sea had been kind, and mesmerizingly beautiful. She had treated us to a magnificent display.

After rounding the Horn.I got the lighthouse watchman on the VHF and told him that while we had hoped to stop the deteriorating weather and waning daylight hours had collaborated to keep us moving. He wished us well and we promised we'd drink his bottle of wine in good will this night, which we'd brought in hopes of landing. In whiteout conditions we finessed Shangri-la back upwind, in the lee of the Horn and then Isla Herchel through Paso Bravo and into Caleta Martial, a well-protected anchorage just as the last light of day was swallowed by darkness. It had easily been the best sail of my life. After dinner and a glass of the light keeper's red I went topside to do a last check on our anchor and with snow falling I stopped for just a moment to realize that the sense of calm that had somehow pervaded my being this day was not due to experience, or worse- ignorance, but because for this day I was so acutely aware of the wind and waves and Shangri-la's hull between them I was completely unaware of almost everything else.