Adle was about to sink. It became absolutely clear. The hull was lying deeper and deeper in the water. And not because Paul had forgotten to close a through-hull fitting. Neither because Clare had stowed too much food in the freezers and everywhere else. No, mainly because our guests and Jennifer and I had been shopping like mad in Buenos Aires and were now trying to bring everything we had bought aboard Adle to the despair of the crew that tried to find room for it.
And I was no exception. I had bought more shoes than I ever bought in my life before. I tried in vain to explain to the crew why I needed crocodile or ostrich skin shoes in Antarctica. But shoes and all kinds of leather goods certainly were of high quality and inexpensive here in Argentina, and the temptation turned out to be too much for us.
Ineke and Andre, Anette, Bittan and Lasse had met up with Jennifer and myself a few days before in Buenos Aires to see the city. Mostly we had seen the shops! But we had had wonderful steaks and watched the tango being danced in floor shows at luxurious stages and on the streets in the poor mens quarters. On the 10th we went down to Ushuaia to board Adle. Rick was already there and Claes arrived the next day. We also had Eef Willems, our guide during the voyage to Antarctica and South Georgia, aboard.
On Thursday the 11th in the evening we were ready to depart. But the weather gods were not! It was blowing a lot from the South and we didnt want to beat into a storm. We tried to see if we could change plans and sail for a few days in the Beagle Channel waiting for better weather. But to navigate through the combined bureaucracy of Chile and Argentina turned out to be a tough challenge for captain Andre, and before he had succeeded with all the necessary permits, on Friday we spotted a weather window, when reading all our reports and forecasts.
We decided to leave on the morning of Saturday the 13th. Pilot was hired, Andre Hoek bought one more leather jacket and Clare prepared a last dinner in Ushuaia. And at about ten oclock on Saturday morning we slipped the lines and steered out through the Beagle Channel towards Antarctica.
A few miles out we met Yaghan with Arne and Helene Mrtensson aboard. They had been down in Antarctica for a month, since we last saw them for dinner aboard Adle in December. They had had a great time and were now steaming into Ushuaia for provisioning before continuing along the Chilean channels north to the Pacific Ocean and then west towards Tahiti and all the other south Pacific islands. In the afternoon we reached the mouth of the Beagle Channel on the east side, the same spot where we had entered the Beagle a month before. We dropped the pilot and turned south.
When Im writing this we are still in the protection of the Channel and the sea is quite flat, but it has been blowing from southwest up to around 50 knots (we had forty-five in Ushuaia tied up alongside the commercial dock) so we could expect the seas to be a little bit rough as soon as we came outside. Our strategy is to hug the islands down to Cape Horn (motoring if that is necessary) to get as far west as possible and to get there in as much protection as we can. As soon as the land cannot offer any more cover we will sail south in what should have turned into a westerly wind. To-morrow morning the wind will shift to south west and we will change course to south east towards the South Shetland Islands, which we expect to reach on Monday 15 January.
The first penguins (Magellan penguins) were basking on the islands in the Beagle also admired by a couple of the local boats with other tourists aboard. We watched them through binoculars from a distance, but we didnt go ashore. We are too excited to reach Antarctica to stop here.
Clare is back aboard with her delicious soups, but we have lost David as a crew member. He fell in love with a girl in New Zealand and decided he couldnt just dream about her from a distance. He went back to New Zealand in beginning January and Quinton (from South Africa) has replaced him. He is also a big guy, so hopefully the crew gear from David will fit him as well.
I was smoking a cigar in the cockpit when Quinton passed me with his hands full of vegetables. It looked like he just came in from the garden to bring the produce to the kitchen, but in fact we just stored the vegetables in one of our tenders, as space is at premium on this trip which will last around 20 days before we can reprovision in the Falkland Islands.
Drake Passage got its name from Sir Frances Drake, who sailed around Cape Horn with the Golden Hind in the 16th century to plunder the gold that the Spaniards collected (stole) from Mexico, Peru and Panama. He became of course much more famous as the man who defeated the Spanish Armada in the English Channel in 1588. But he fought with the Spaniards many times both before and after that event.
We are now in the middle of Drake Passage, the 500 miles that divide Antarctica from South America. If you are in south New Zealand, you have to sail 1,500 miles to reach Antarctica and if you are in Cape Town in South Africa the distance is 2,500 miles. But opposite South America the Antarctic Peninsula shoots up north in a mountain range nearly meeting the Andes coming south in South America and just leaving a 500 mile gap between the two continents.
Through this gap the wind and waves funnels down at you and as soon as Adle turned south-southwest last night we went straight into the waves. The strategy of motoring in the protection of the Chilean islands didnt work. The islands didnt give enough protection and all of us got seasick. I hadnt personally been seasick since I bought Adle two years ago, and I was immune to it during the long crossings to Cape Horn from New Zealand and to Marquesas from Galapagos. But now I felt it badly! And so did most of our guests and crew. George, our tough girl, through up one second and climbed the mizzen boom to release the sail ties the other. And then she came down, bent over the side and through up again!
Why did we all get so seasick? One reason is the shallow area (less than a hundred meters) around the Horn, which causes the sea to build up. Another is the fact that we motored into it instead of using the sails to stabilise us. But it is also important that all of us had been away from sailing for a month and eaten lots of heavy Christmas food and suddenly the toughness of the Furious Fifties were all upon us again. When we left New Zealand the seas built up gradually. Here it came upon us within 20 minutes from turning the corner from the Beagle Channel.
So we changed strategy and admitted defeat! We set sail and turned south southeast instead in what was a much more comfortable cruise. And this morning the sea had calmed down, the sun was out, guests and crew were up on deck smiling and eating breakfast and the terrible feelings from last night were only a memory. Clares food was again appreciated and Bittan even sat basking in the sunshine aft of the cockpit.
But another low pressure is coming into Drake Passage to-morrow evening, and we are trying to reach our anchorage ahead of its arrival, so we are motor-sailing to get as far west as possible and still be comfortably at anchor before the low arrives. Let us see if the new strategy works out any better than the previous one!
Two days ago, we approached Antarctica south of the South Shetland Islands. We entered through Boyd Strait and on our starboard side we had the mountains of Smith Island shooting up into the sky more than 2100 meters high and (of course) completely covered in snow! On our port side was the chain of islands just outside the Antarctic Peninsula that are called the South Shetland Islands. And just inside this chain is Deception Island, a dormant volcano that had its last eruption in 1970 and is expected to erupt soon again.
Deception Island has a little opening in its big crater through which you sail in to a totally protected anchorage. Or so it looks. But looks can be deceptive and Eef, our guide, said that she experienced 80 knots of wind funnelling down the slopes of the crater last time she was here.
We arrived in time for dinner and after a voyage, where none was immune to seasickness, we were now in flat calm seas and Clare prepared a dinner that started with Bleak Roe (Ljrom) brought by Lasse and Bittan and champagne, which Andre and Ineke had arranged.
The next morning, and the morning thereafter, we tried to land on the outside of the island to visit a large colony of chinstrap penguins (100,000 pairs of penguins to be exact). But both days the swell was too large to allow a landing in safety. The only thing we experienced was the noise and the smell of the penguins. When Adle motored back into the crater after the first attempt, Lasse, Rick, Quinton and I followed in Sanna, our small tender and succeeded to take photos of a little group of penguins and Weddel Seals just inside the crater opening.
In the afternoon of the 16th, we visited Whalers Bay and saw the old whaling station and walked up for some nice views.
To-day, after the second failed attempt to see the chinstraps, we sailed out to a large iceberg about 15 miles outside Deception. It turned out to be a magnificent experience for all of us. The berg was around a quarter of a mile long (450 meters) and 120 meters high with totally vertical sides all around, like a giant had cut an ice cube for his drink. And what an ice cube! Shimmering in white and blue, with the waves breaking against its sides, and with smaller growlers breaking off from it and floating to leeward of the berg.
We spent hours motoring around it and taking photographs and Rick, dressed in a drysuit as protection jumped into the tender and drove out to take pictures of Adle against the white and blue ice.
One of Englands most famous poets, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, was born in Ottery St Mary, less than a mile away from our home in England, Knightstone Manor. Although he never saw an iceberg, his rime of the Ancient Mariner succeeds in catching the feelings of awe that gripped us as we sailed passed.
And now there came both mist and snow,
And it grew wondrous cold;
And ice, mast high, came floating by,
As green as emerald.
And through the drifts the snowy clifts
Did send a dismal sheen;
Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken
The ice was all between.
An iceberg is formed in a glacier. The snow is compressed more and more and turned into ice. The reflections of light in the water crystals make the ice look white, but when the ice becomes older and is more and more compressed the crystals absorb the longer wave lengths and the only light coming out from the ice is blue or turquoise in colour. When we were in Svalbard Rick caught on his photos (see our website) some of these icebergs (although they were much smaller). And here we could again see the blue and turquoise colours in between the white. But I think we can all forgive Coleridge that he described an iceberg as emerald coloured, when a sapphire would be more appropriate.
When the glacier slowly moves out over the sea, it breaks off and we get the bergs with those fantastic vertical sides that we were now admiring. I suspect we will see a lot more ice bergs here in Antarctica.
After the berg we turned northeast to Livingstone Island. Clare was serving one of her delicious soups for lunch, when Andre shouted whales, and we stopped the engine and was drifting among five enormous humpback whales. They stayed with us for more than an hour coming as close as five meters from Adle, and sometimes playfully breaching in front of us or diving and displaying their lovely tailfin, and sometimes shooting up and looking curiously at the people in red and yellow foul weather gear on deck.
For all of us this was the most amazing whale experience ever. I came close to this, when we were sailing with Swedish Caprice in Australia and in the Barrier Reef we met humpbacks, who were as friendly and curious as they were here. But this time they were five of them instead of three in the Barrier Reef. The cameras of all of us were glowing red hot for an hour and Andre Hoek got so excited that he hit the smoke flare that is attached to our life buoy. The smoke flare opened up and when it had started nothing can stop it from emitting orange smoke, which it did for 20 minutes.
We were lucky that no ship was around and tried to come to our rescue. But the whales didnt seem to mind. They became even more curious to find out what kind of animal could send out such orange smoke and flapped their fins applauding Andre for his smoke performance.
After more than an hour the whales swam away and Andre started the engine again, only to find that they came back to us probably attracted by the sound of the engine. We disengaged the propeller but kept the engine idling and the whales did a second act around us of breaching and diving. They were so close that we could smell their (foul) breath! Nearby a couple of penguins were trying to catch our attention by jumping up and down in the water like dolphins at a show. But none took a second look at the penguins with the humpback whales being so flirtatious towards Adle.
After all this we had to reheat Clares soup, which had gone cold during the humpback performance. Afterwards everyone seemed to be tired and they retired to their cabins, while captain Andre and the crew took Adle to the next anchorage.
I woke up an hour later seeing enormous mountains on either side through the portholes at my cabin. I rushed out with my cameras as we entered a pass between Livingstone and Greenwich Islands finally finding an anchorage at Half Moon Island, where their also is a scientific base, manned by Russians. As soon as we came around the island they called us up and welcomed us and asked if they could be of any help. We told them we would love to pay them a visit to-morrow.
I am typing this at 7.30 pm just before dinner. I have a gin & tonic in front of me. Outside the library, in the saloon, Jennifer is playing cards with Andre, Ineke and Bittan. Listening to their comments I think Jennifer is cheating most of the time. Lasse has just turned up the music and Claes is entertaining Anette and Eef in the deck house. Rick, of course, is working hard editing to-days harvest of pictures. Im sure we will see some fantastic shots by Rick on our plasma screen soon.
Lasse is rushing into the library and tells me that Europa, a three-masted square-rigger is just entering our anchorage. We all rush out to take pictures. It is cold and windy out there, and we soon return to our warm Adle, with the smell of Clares lamb wafting through the saloons and preparing us for a nice dinner.
And with these words I bid you all farewell for this time.
Jan-Eric
Dear Children and Friends,
Its just after breakfast and I have at last taken some time off to write to you again. The sun is shining from a clear blue sky and is reflected in all the icebergs surrounding us at Danco Island. The last three nights we have had to have an icewatch/ ancorwatch all night as the bergs are sailing past us and a couple of times every night we have to use the thrusters to move Adle sideways.
We have had calm weather the last days, but sometimes the wind just howls down at more than 40 knots and then it becomes calm again. At the previous anchorage we had to re-anchor several times when it started blowing.
When I came up in the aft cockpit this morning two whales were swimming by no more than 30 meters from Adle. Rick was of course out taking photos. He was also out last night between midnight and 02.30 am to catch the night light and the red sky against the blue ice.
But this story should start four days ago, when we went ashore at Half-Moon Island.
We visited the Argentine (not Russian as I wrote in my last email) base in the morning. Lieutenant Ferrera, who himself only arrived three days earlier, took care of us and gave us coffee and cakes.
We exchanged gifts and signed their guest-book. I noticed that two days earlier the base had got a visit by Northern Light, a Swedish yacht. Northern Light, manned by Rolf and Deborah Bielke, became famous ten years ago when they stayed one winter frozen into the ice in Antarctica a little bit south of where we are just now.
After the Argentine base we headed for the colony of chinstrap penguins on the hills overlooking our anchorage. This was the first of many encounters with a large colony of the funny penguins. They all walked like Poirot in the Agatha Christie movies and sometimes they fell between the rocks or slid on the ice. And the chicks, which were a furry grey or brown, were so sweat. We all picked out our cameras and during the time ashore she sky turned from a wholly grey and white to blue. And that is the way the sky has been since then, four days ago.
We spent the afternoon motoring around McFarlane Strait between Livingston and Greenwich Islands in the South Shetlands and Rick and I ventured out in the tender with George to photograph some very blue and old icebergs that were disintegrating into the most fantastic formations. I imagined I saw an elephant turned sideways, with the trunk of crystal ice glittering in the sun and drops of water falling off the trunk as the sun was melting the ice. We passed Edinburgh Hill, which is a very tall and spectacular basalt rock, the only piece remaining of an old volcano.
In the late afternoon we anchored at Yankee Harbour in Greenwich Island, a nearly landlocked bay, surrounded by land on three sides, covered by ice and snow, and protected by a moraine wall on the outside towards McFarlane Strait. The ice sheet calved, when the shelf moved towards the water and broke down with a thunder and another piece of ice fell down in the water. At midnight the bay was covered in ice growlers and the sun just below the horizon still lit up the harbour with a red glow being reflected on all the ice.
On the ice free part a colony of gentoo penguins resided and we visited them in the afternoon. Rick got some photos of them with their reflections in some fresh water pools, which looked fantastic.
In Yankee Harbour Northern Light was also anchored and we went over and invited Rolf and Deborah for a drink. A fascinating and very attractive couple, who had spent the last 30 years, since they met in Fiji, sailing all around the world. They obviously loved remote and cold places. They didnt have a home in Sweden, but they regarded Fiskebckskil as there home port, and both Lasse and I remembered seeing Northern Light in Fiskebckskil. We told them that we had been sailing in there with Adle as well (although we needed a shoe horn to get her alongside the jetty).
We left Yankee harbour early the following morning as we had a long voyage south ahead of us. We passed the big tabular iceberg that we had seen two days ago, but this time it was surrounded by with a clear blue sky, and pieces of it had broken down, so the shape had changed. This was a large berg for us, but at 450 meters length it is dwarfed by the large bergs that Antarctica can create. The largest iceberg was discovered in the year 2000, when the Ross ice shelf (on the other side of Antarctica towards New Zealand) calved an iceberg 300 km long and 40 km wide!
A few miles south, near Trinity Island, we had the most magic whale experience I ever encountered. A lone humpback whale came up to us and we turned off the engine and started drifting. He stayed with us for around two hours performing acrobatic tricks. He shot up with his mouth so close we could touch him. He dived underneath Adle to come up on the other side. He did a reverse dive (I dont know what to call it), slowly raising his tale more and more out of the water just beside us to the loud applauds of all the guests and crew aboard. He was just lying alongside Adle, with no more than a meter of water separating us, and then he slowly turned around showing his white bottom. I felt like bending down and tickle his belly like I do with Chucky or Nala. He waived his flippers at us both above and below the water and then he came back and shot up his head looking at us like saying, didnt I perform well.
Rick, Andre and I went up the crows nest in turns and we launched Sanna (the tender) and went out to take photos. Unfortunately the whale turned out to be more interested in the tender so the pictures from the tender of the whale next to Adle didnt materialise, but those aboard got some pictures of him next to the tender instead.
The performance never stopped. The lunch got cold because none had time to eat anything. It felt like the whale had fallen in love with Adle. While we were in New Zealand we had two penguins painted on the bottom of Adle. They look quite happy and maybe the whale liked to play with the Adle penguins. We dont know, but it will probably remain the highlight of our Antarctic voyage.
In the afternoon we found a pretty rounded iceberg on which a small group of penguins, both chinstrap and gentoo, were sliding up and down or just resting in the sun. We were all laughing at their playful acts before Adle continued south.
In the evening we entered Murray Harbour through a spectacular small passage. That was the first night we had to set an anchor watch because of the risk of ice bergs and growlers hitting Adle.
The following morning we left Murray Harbour and went around the corner into a bay, where suddenly an opening appeared and we went through Graham Passage. It was named after a whaler, Graham, who was hunting a whale here a hundred years ago. The whale went into the same bay and the whalers thought that now it was caught, when it suddenly disappeared through the passage and out into the open sea again. We did the same trick.
In the afternoon we anchored outside Portal Point in Charlotte Bay. Portal Point had been used in the past as a stepping stone to the Antarctic Continent. Most of the land is very difficult to approach, as the ice is step to and to high to climb, but at Portal Point the land is ice free during summer and gently sloping. It is part of the Antarctic Continent and we climbed ashore bringing champagne and the Adle flag to celebrate the fact that we had reached and been ashore on the Antarctic Continent. Several Weddel seals were lying around us and behind were a very tempting mountain of ice and snow, which we climbed up on. Or tried too! Because Jennifers moon boots were not made for steep climbing. So Bittan tried to help her, but halfway up they both fell and were sliding down laughing so loudly that even the sleepy seals had to lift their heads and find out what was going on.
We stayed at Portal Point over the night. When we left we passed an iceberg, which looked like an enormous chair with the seat under the water (not easy to explain, but in due course the pictures will illustrate it well). The child in captain Andre took over and he asked me if we should put the bow inside the berg. I am never difficult to persuade in such a moment and we brought Adle inside the berg surrounded by ice on three sides, and Rick and I went up the mast to photograph the spectacle. Inside the berg the water was turquoise as we had ice below us and outside it was deep blue, while the berg itself was white.
Midday we had reached Wilhelmina Bay, named after the Dutch Queen, who financed a scientific expedition in the are in the beginning of last century. Wilhelmina Bay had several passages full of ice, which we of course had to explore. We were protected by the mountains around us, so the sea was nearly like a mirror and the sun had become warm enough for everyone to sit outside and eat the lunch, while we were gliding though the ice. It felt like sailing in the Alps. None of us had ever seen that much snow and ice before. And drinking our coffee sitting on the aft deckhouse it was the same feeling as having the after ski drink in an Alpine caf after a day of skiing in the sun.
Rick and I went into the tender again, with George manoeuvring through the growlers. It was impossible to avoid hitting the ice, but George did her best to protect Sanna. It became so warm that we all took off our jackets in the sun watching Adle passing by surrounded by ice and seals and penguins and the occasional whale sprouting in the background.
We reached Danco Island on the evening of 21 Jan and went ashore to yet another penguin colony. We are now so far south that the animal life is much less than before, but instead the ice formations are more spectacular. Here however we had some lovely penguins that strutted around posing for our cameras. Coming back Jennifer and Anette discovered two whales in the bay. The whales stayed with us all evening and it was probably the same whales that I saw, when I woke up this morning.
While I have been writing this, the crew has been mending the sail covers that needed some adjustments, and Paul has taken care of a trash compactor that didnt want to play any longer. When I went up on deck the two Andres were playing with the two model race boats that we have aboard. They are remotely controlled and they were racing them among the icebergs. Andre (the captain) was beating Andre (the designer) with a substantial margin.
The Swedish contingency (Claes and Anette, Lasse and Bittan) was seated in the sun drinking coffee and watching the penguins diving and swimming in between the model boats, while the whales were still blowing in the background. Ineke was working on her computer in the deckhouse, while Jennifer was freezing and went below to our cabin (it is just plus one degree centigrade in the middle of the day and below freezing in the evening and early morning). It is only the lovely sun that makes it so nice on deck, but for a Filipina that is not enough to want to stay on deck all the time. Rick was flying his kite on the aft deck. He has a kite that can carry a camera and he is using it to take pictures of Adle from the air. Eef was below planning the next leg of our expedition.
And now Paul has started the engine. The trash compactor is functioning again and it is time to get moving further south into the ice.
Lots of love from all of us
Jan-Eric
Dear Children and Friends,
Since I wrote the last mail, we have had two more days among the icebergs. The scenery is mind-boggling. All land is covered in white sheets of ice which is up to 50 meters deep here at the coast. This increases to several kilometres in the inner parts of Antarctica. At the coast these ice sheaths calf off tabular bergs which float all around us. We have to have a person up the mast to try to find a way through the bergs and another at the bow spotting the smaller growlers as well.
In the white ice-covered landscape enormous black mountains shoot up like cathedral spires. The tallest mountains near us are 3,000 meters and to-day we passed through the famous Lemaire Channel, which is very narrow with steep mountains rising more than 1,000 meters immediately on either side. Lots of ice, but nothing we couldnt sail through with careful navigation.
We are out in the tender every day following Adle with either Sanna or Kina. Earlier to-day Rick, Quinton and I were with Sanna in the Lemaire Channel taking photos of Adle, when two whales came strolling by. Rick got some fantastic shots of their tails shooting up, when they dived, with both Adle and the famous channel in the background. They will certainly make it both to our website and to the book I plan to publish.
The icebergs come in every shape and form. To-day we found one with a great blue hole through it placed to form a perfect frame for a photo of Adle. The sky is still blue and the ice white or in some bergs a turquoise blue. A world composed of two colours and the black mountain spires.
Both yesterday and today we have come close to leopard seals lying on the smaller ice flows. Leopard seals look like pre-historic animals, which huge gaps full of teeth. They eat penguins, and when they catch a penguin, they shake them so the body is shaken out of their coat and they can easily consume the undressed penguin. They are quite large, three to four meters, and are known to have killed humans.
We were drifting with the tender next to a leopard on an ice floe, taking pictures of course, and didnt notice that we drifted straight into the flow and were only a meter from the leopard. He raised his head, opened his mouth and moved a little bit closer to us. Quinton quickly started the engine and asked which way he should drive. Any way is good, as long as you get away quickly, Rick responded. The prospect of being leopard seal lunch didnt appeal to Rick.
Last night we stayed at Port Lockroy, a British base, tastefully converted into a small museum and manned during summer time by three persons. We have been following the weather forecasts the last days to evaluate the best days for our departure. Commanders told us that the best departure was on the 23rd, and after that we may have to wait a couple of weeks, if we wanted to have a comfortable crossing.
We decided to leave, and after the passage of Lemaire we anchored in the Argentine Islands and had an early dinner. After dinner we steamed out through the French Passage through the last bergs to open water and a three and a half day sail to the Falklands.
It is incredibly calm, with a slight southwesterly breeze in our backs as we sail (or rather motor) north outside the outlying islands of the Antarctic Peninsula. We will arrive in Port Stanley in the Falklands a couple of days earlier than originally planned, but it is better to utilise the weather window that we have been given and travel around Falklands for a few days, than to maximise our stay in Antarctica and fight with the weather Gods in the Furious Fifties.
I am again in my library with a glass of Armagnac beside me on the desk going through all the pictures I have taken. Outside in the saloon Andre and Ineke, Lasse and Bittan are all watching a movie. Jennifer is cuddling up in bed and has taken a seasickness pill, which probably will not be necessary, but better safe than sorry!
Going through the pictures again all the memories come back. Of all the things that happened to us the strangest was certainly meeting the amorous whale, who stayed with Adle for several hours. The photos show clearly how he scrubbed his back at our side and rudder, how he popped up less than a meter from Adle with his eyes looking at all of us manning the railing and looking back at him, how he turned up his belly like he wanted to be tickled, how he performed in front of our admiring glances and applauds, how he dived on one side just to shoot up on the other side of Adle, just to give us the spectators a little bit of exercise.
But equally amazing according to Eef is the fact that we have had sunshine every single day since the 18th. We have seen mist in the background but the sun has always blessed us on our expedition. But now the mist has caught up with us outside the islands, and we have reduced our speed to seven knots, to make sure we dont hit any berg.
My next story will hit you, when we have been in the Falklands a couple of days.
Lots of love
Jan-Eric
Dear children and friends,
We left Antarctica through the French Passage on Tuesday evening 23 Jan after a week of sunshine over the white, blue, green and turquoise bergs and with the black mountains and white glaciers in the background. During the night the fog came. And it never left us. The wind dropped to a below 10 knots, but a thick cloud of fog enveloped us and it stayed the next day, and the next, and the next
We didnt dare to go faster than seven knots in the thick soup surrounding us, but at least the infamous Drakes passage was calm. Unnaturally calm. We were crossing maybe the most treacherous waters in the world in absolute calm and stillness going slowly for engine looking out for icebergs and other ships suddenly appearing through the fog. But nothing ever came out the blanket of clouds surrounding us. Neither did we see anything at all on the radar.
The 800 miles to the Falklands should have taken 3 days at most, but it took us four days to reach Stanley, the capital of the Falklands Islands. Only the last day, the 27th, did the fog lighten up as the wind increased to between 15 to 20 knots and we could set sail. We had a great sail up to the eastern point of the Falklands, where Stanley is based inside a big bay. We turned west and steered down the narrow bay and towards the end, we had to turn 90 degrees to the south and enter another very protected bay, Stanley harbour.
The whole of Falklands have around 3,000 inhabitants of which the majority, about 2,000 or 2,500 live in Stanley. The rest live in camp, the name for the countryside that encompasses all the other parts of the Falklands. The Falklands have been British since the 1830-ies, but the Argentines contest that and started the Falklands war back in 1982. And the relationship with Argentina is still strained and isnt getting any better.
You cannot fly from Argentina to the Falklands, but have to do it directly from England with a RAF flight via Ascension Island or via Chile (and then the flight has to go all around Argentina and cannot cross Argentine territory). Likewise Adle couldnt clear out from Argentina for the Falklands, because Argentina doesnt acknowledge the Falklands as a separate territory. In their eyes it is part of Argentina {there is a law in Argentina that forbids publishing of any map that doesnt show Malvinas (the Falklands) as belonging to Argentina}. So we cleared for Rio, when we cleared Argentina and then we just sailed into Stanley.
And here we got a wonderful reception. Local people have sent us masses of emails welcoming us to the Falklands. The local newspaper, The Penguin News, had an article about Adle, lots of people have come out to admire the boat and we have got wonderful contact with the local inhabitants.
Lasse & Bittan, Andre & Ineke and Claes & Anette all went out for a two day visit to Sea Lion Island, staying overnight at a little lodge. They flew out in a small airplane, landing on a grass strip on the island. Unfortunately, I had damaged a knee in Antarctica and couldnt join them. And out of solidarity (or laziness?) Jennifer decided to stay with me. And on the 30th, they went to see a king penguin colony. But of course, those of us who are continuing to South Georgia will see masses of King Penguins there.
Each evening we had dinner at one of the restaurants in Stanley. The Brasserie turned out to have excellent food and we went back there several times, in order to give Clare some time off and help the crew to prepare the yacht for the next voyage.
One day we sat in the sunshine outside the local pub, the Globe, drinking ale (that is me, not Jennifer!) and eating fish and chips. It couldnt feel more English. But impressions are deceptive, as this story will tell you further on!
We were all invited to Government House for a reception related to the Falklands war. We estimated about 150 people were there. The Governor, Mr Alan Huckle, showed us around Government House and the head of the Tourist Authority, Liz, promised to arrange more interesting tours for us.
Two days later, on the 31st, we gave a return reception on Adle for The Governor and his wife and several of the other dignitaries. It had become quite windy, and we were worried that the guests wouldnt be able to come out to our anchorage and get aboard safely, but it calmed down temporarily in the afternoon and everything went smoothly.
That same afternoon our new guests had arrived. They were Nigel & Michelle Ingram flying in from Holland (but via England and RAF) and David Glenn (deputy editor of Yachting World), who had been aboard Adle in Lofoten in July 2005, and finally Mark Chisnell, an author, who, as a ghost writer, will help me to put together the Adle book.
Andre & Ineke Hoek and Claes & Anette Bourghardt were leaving us the next morning (with the same RAF plane as our new guests had arrived in) and they had moved into hotels, as Adle was completely full. So after the drinks party aboard Adle all of us including those of the crew that could get away went ashore for a dinner that Andre gave to celebrate the birthday of his Ineke. We had a great dinner at the Brasserie.
Unfortunately the weather forecast didnt look too good (winds up to between 60 and 80 knots, that is full hurricane force), so we decided to go for another tour the next day and delay the departure. My knee had improved so I joined) together with Rick, Mark Chisnell and David Glenn and Michelle. We went to see a Rockhopper Penguin colony at Bouganville cape on the north side of the island. The landscape is bleak and desolate, windy, no trees, only some sheep here and there. The colours are muted and when the sky is grey, which it is most of the time, it looks like a photo that has been deliberately desaturated in Photoshop!
But we were lucky and we had a little piece of blue sky, when we arrived and the little splash of blue spread over the horizon until a little later all clouds had blown away. The rockhoppers are very funny and inquisitive, but we also had a colony of cormorants and a couple of bull sea lions lying in the tussac grass. I settled down on a piece of tussock grass with my cameras and was shooting the cormorants as they flew in and landed at their nests, when a little funny rockhopper penguin walked up to me and started pecking on my boots.
I had bought new rubber boots in Stanley the other day. They were thick thermal insulated boots in a bright orange colour and enormous in size; I could wear three pairs of socks inside them. I swung the camera around to the penguin, but I had my large telephoto lens and the closest distance I could focus was 1.8 meters. I stretched out my legs as much as I could but the penguin was still out of focus. I tried to shift to the other camera, but the rockhopper decided that it was enough posing and hopped away.
Rick was a little bit further away trying to catch the swirling grass moving in the wind with the bull sea lions looking up. He told me afterwards that he spent more than 300 shots trying to get the right one. Thank God, we are shooting digital!
When I stood up after shooting the wind immediately brought me down on my knees again. The front had passed, the sky had cleared and the wind had increased to the hurricane force forecasted earlier. I had to crawl back to prevent me falling over with all my camera stuff.
Driving back the same desolate landscape was now bathing in the rays of the late afternoon sun, and looked entirely different. We stopped at several places for photos. Coming back into the harbour, the whole bay was covered with whitecaps. Adle was heeling over on one side and then swung and heeled over violently on the other side. Spray was flying in the air.
We were speaking to Andre aboard, and he said it was no chance at all to get back aboard. Ika had been tied up alongside Adle, but when the wind increased to hurricane force, the waves in this little protected bay grew a couple of meters high and Ika was sometimes rising above the deck of Adle. They decided that Quinton should take her ashore and tie her up in the protection at a jetty (it was far too shallow and small a place for Adle to be at that jetty) as it would have been dangerous to hoist Ika in the forceful winds.
We met up with Quinton and arranged accommodation at a local hotel, Thankfully, The Malvinas House, the best hotel in town, had rooms for us and we again had dinner at the Brasserie. By now we knew their menu quite well.
The next morning it was still blowing between 50 and 65 knots. We had a short period with a lull and tried to get out to Adle but the wind increased before we came out, so we gave up. I walked along the shore and according to Jennifer she could spot me a kilometre away because of my enormous bright orange boots. Around seven in the evening the wind dropped to around 40 knots (still half storm) and Mark and I decided to give it a try, while the rest of our guests preferred the safety of another night ashore.
They rigged up the rope ladder on Adle, as it was too dangerous to try to get aboard via the normal ladder or platform. Ika was manoeuvred by Mark Thirkettle (our first mate, who had jumped into Ika and come ashore earlier in the day) and Quinton as close as possible to Adle and we waited for her to swing so that the aft port side, where the ladder was hanging down, was in some protection from the giant waves. Then Ika came up alongside and we jumped over to the rope ladder and climbed up. I got a great hug from Jennifer and Clare had a wonderful dinner for all of us.
But the remainder of the party decided that they preferred to stay ashore rather than risking an attempt. And this morning the wind had dropped to a benign 10 knots and everyone could make it back in time for breakfast, with Adle riding proudly in a very calm bay.
Andre told me we dragged a boat length, when it was blowing the most, but after that the anchors settled in. Obviously we let out all the chain we had, and as the depth was only between 8 and 9 meters, and we carry 150 meters of chain that is a considerable scope. And we had of course both anchors set. They carried an anchor watch all night the first night, but the second night, when I was back aboard, the wind had dropped so much that it wasnt necessary any more.
Andre and I had just now looked at the charts showing the wind situation to South Georgia over the next days. We have a nice gap just now and will leave this afternoon. If we arent slowed down by ice or fog we should arrive within three days (the distance is about 800 miles) and that is just before the next gale passes through. It is very calm just now, but out there the sea will still be rough from yesterdays storm. Jennifer will have to swallow a sea sickness pill soon to prepare for the next three days. Clare has prepared meals ready to be heated in the microwave, in case she cannot cook properly, and her soups are always fantastic on these crossings.
Lots of Love
Jan-Eric
Dear family and friends,
It is snowing on Adle just now and the mountains behind us are covered with thick snow with glaciers gliding down between the mountain peaks, and the sun lighting them up from behind make the whole scenery standing out against a partly blue sky still visible through the snowflakes. When the flakes drop on our teak deck they melt except when the wind has blown the snow to small drives piling up against the blocks on deck or our liars bench on the port side in the shadow of the sun.
We left the Falklands as planned Saturday last week. Everyone came aboard after the hurricane. We heard from a cruise ship lying outside us that they had measured 84 knots of wind on the day we couldnt go back to Adle. The sea had calmed down a little and we had a nice evening sail in 25 to 30 knots of following wind. But during the night it calmed down and the following days we had only light wind from behind, so again we had to resort to motoring. We are really longing to hoist the sails now!
We had to motor most of the way and arrived 6 February into Grytviken, the main settlement on South Georgia and were met by hundreds of fur seals playing in the waters and jumping up and down looking like dolphins following in our wake.
Grytviken is the only inhabited place in South Georgia and has a research station and Government representatives and a small museum, all in all about 20 people stationed there. They invited us ashore on the following day and we in turn invited them out to see Ricks slide show from Antarctica and have a coffee aboard Adle the following morning.
We have experienced so much that Im not going to describe it here. David Glenn, deputy editor of Yachting World is aboard with us again (as he was in Lofoten in northern Norway in 2005). He is writing a blog, which is published every day on Yachting Worlds website. Please read about us by looking at www.yachtingworld.com. In the middle of the home page you can click on the superyacht section and find all Davids blogs.
Also the March edition of Yachting World (which should be on sale now) has an article about Adle sailing in French Polynesia. The cover of the magazine features both Jennifer and Adle (in that order), so you cannot miss it! It has photos by Rick and myself and is written by me. And the May edition (on sale around 10 April or so) will feature Davids account of our sailing in South Georgia.
Finally I have sent my pictures from the Cape Horn crossing back home with Andre Hoek, and he should have sent them on to our website, where they will be published soon. And Rick sent home his pictures from Antarctica, which are fantastic, and should be up on his website www.rick-tomlinson.com any time soon.
Yesterday was what must have been the high point of our expedition to South Georgia. In the morning we visited Prion Island, where the wandering albatrosses nest. The wandering albatross is the bird with the largest wingspan in the world, more than three meters. They are totally unafraid of humans here in South Georgia and we could be within meters of them.
They use a downhill slope for taking off and need a runway not dissimilar in size to what a jumbo jet needs. Rick and David were the first to arrive and were lucky enough to watch two albatrosses performing their mating dance for each other. We only saw the end of it, but even that was fantastic. They circle around each other and clap their beaks and spread their wings out with the enormous wingspan. A truly majestic sight. And Rick caught it all on camera. I looked at the pictures and Im sure he will dedicate them to his wife Annika, as it was their wedding anniversary.
We spent hours on the hills looking at all the nesting albatrosses all around us with the snow-clad mountains in the background and Adle riding for her anchors just below us.
After lunch we moved Adle to another anchorage from where we could walk to Salisbury Plains, probably named by some military officer, who had exercised at the plains around Salisbury in England. At these plains the second largest colony of King Penguins is situated. It is about a quarter of a million King Penguins in one colony and they are closely packed together, but still cover an absolutely enormous area.
We had an hours walk to reach the colony and had to cross rivers wading in deep water to get there, but this remarkable sight was worth all the trouble to get there. In the evening we celebrated birthdays (Eefs husband) and wedding anniversaries (Ricks) and toasted to the absent partners in champagne before we had venison for dinner. The tough life of an explorer!
This morning we moved a few miles to Prince Olavs Harbour. Nearby is a little bay where fur seal pups frolic around in their thousands! They are totally unafraid and came up very close to our dinghies, so you could touch them. An absolute spectacle to watch! They are everywhere on land as well, but on land they can be quite aggressive, and when we walk around we carry sticks (we bought broomsticks in Stanley in preparation for this) with which we can defend ourselves, if they run up and try to bite us. The pups are of course not dangerous, but some of the larger bulls could be, although the mating season is finished and they are now less aggressive than in December and January.
We plan to leave for Rio in a couple of days time depending on the weather.
Lots of love
Jan-Eric
Dear family and friends,
We are nearly halfway between South Georgia and Rio. South Georgia has millions of animals, fur seals, penguins of different kinds, albatrosses and petrels but hardly any humans. And Rio is boiling with people but not many animals except rats and dogs. In South Georgia it was summer but felt like our winter. The last two days it was snowing nearly all the time. The temperature was around the freezing point and the water just a couple of degrees above 0. In Rio it is carnival time and the temperature is around 30 degrees.
When we left (12 Feb in the morning) we sailed north but had to change course soon as we came across an iceberg. As we sailed the berg grew and grew. We sailed along one side of it and measured it on our radar to be around 25 miles. The other side, which we saw more distant seemed on the radar to be of a similar size. Andre calculated that all in all the berg had an area roughly similar to the state of Rhode Island in the USA. OK, Rhode Island isnt the largest state in America, but for an iceberg it is still quite impressive!
It was also quite unexpected to come across such a berg so close to South Georgia (40 miles north) that none new anything about. We sent emails back to the base at Grytviken, and they hadnt heard about the berg. Neither had Commanders, our weather planning service, any information about it. One would expect that in our time, when we receive satellite charts of the weather several times a day, we also could get an accurate ice report!
The next day we approached a high pressure with blue skies and good wind from northwest and we sailed around 13 knots average during most of that day. Everyone took a turn at the wheel, as we were hand-steering to just feel the joy of controlling Adle at these speeds. She is so well balanced that it is childs play to handle her. David Glenn was steering as we logged faster than 15 knots in 23 knots of wind.
But on Valentines Day we were close to the center of the high and had to resort to motoring. Which wasnt so bad, as it is quite tiresome to live for an extended period on a sailing vessel, when she is heeling over a lot. Simple things, like getting a cup of tea, or putting on clothes become difficult tasks, which must be planned carefully. Now we could instead enjoy Clares Valentine Dinner with some good Argentine Malbec.
I had of course forgotten to buy any Valentines gift, so I had to fabricate a card before Jen woke up in the morning. But Jennifer had bought me a small camera with 10 megapixels and image stabilizer in a package hardly any bigger than a matchbox! Something to easily put in a pocket, when we go out for a dinner or on a walk in town, when my normal cameras are too conspicuous!
The Antarctic Convergence Zone is an imaginary border that goes between Antarctica and Cape Horn and then turns north and goes 250 miles north of South Georgia. It indicates the border between cold dense Antarctic water and more temperate waters north of that. The two water masses dont easily mix, so when you cross the border you can drop a thermometer in the bow and another in the stern and see a big difference. Just kidding! But during a few hours the temperature increased from 3 degrees to 10 degrees, when we passed the zone on the 13th.
To-day has been another fantastic day of sailing. Nigel clocked 53 miles the last four hours of sailing and just now while I write this we are constantly between 14 and 15 knots. But we are also heeling over a lot and I am worried that I will end up in the other corner of the library with the chair and the keyboard over me. I am thankful to Frans, who designed two pillars in the library that I can grab, when she accelerates and heels over a little bit extra.
During the four hours that Nigel measured the 53 miles, we also had a further increase in water temperature, from 15 to 19 degrees! The air is still quite a lot colder (we have lost the air temperature sensor), but to-day we were all on deck without any foul weather gear. And for a short while in the afternoon Mark sported shorts and Andre had a t-shirt on deck.
Since beginning of December we have otherwise mainly been dressed in foul weather gear with layers of fleece sweaters, mid layers, long johns and several layers of socks. The deck has always been wet and occasional seas are breaking over deck and deckhouses. But to-day the aft part of the deck is dry, no spray finds its way into the cockpit, the red cushions are out on the cockpit benches again and Bittan fell asleep on deck.
It doesnt feel like summer yet, but it is definitely spring in the air! And before we reach Rio we will be in warm and humid tropical heat!
Since my last letter we spent a couple of more days in South Georgia. On the 10th we dropped anchor before lunch in a little bay, Prince Olav Harbour, where next to it a small cove was teeming with fur seal pups. It was a nursery, full of happy and playful children, who loved to swim out to and around our tenders (we went into the cove with both Kina and Sanna). We anchored in the bay with the two tenders, and more and more fur seal pups came to play around us, trying to pick up the anchors, bite our lines, splash water on us or just look at us with enormous brown eyes. On land the fur seals can be a little menacing (although we had arrived just after the breeding season, so its not too bad), but in the water their curiosity and playfulness blossom as positive and sweet character traits.
In the afternoon we sailed among the snowflakes to Godthul, another bay. A couple of miles from Godthul is a macaroni penguin colony, and the only way there was to climb a steep ridge along a little stream and then walk down to the other side, where the colony was based at a very inaccessible spot.
The macaroni penguins have colourful feathers sticking out from their heads, and Rick and I wanted to photograph them. But the sleet and snow made them wet and the colourful plumes were not sticking up that morning. They got their name by the English explorers in the 19th century. At that time some dandies in London wore feathers in their hats. That fashion came from Italy, and the gentlemen wearing those hats were called macaronis. So the name stuck for this penguin species as well! But it was nothing snobbish or Italian over all the light green penguin pooh that Rick and I had to walk and slide over in order to try to get some photos.
We came back in the tenders dirty on boots and camera bags and foul weather gear and all smelling from the penguins. That is what I mean with exploring with all senses!
If the Antarctic Peninsula was overwhelming with its beautiful scenery, its magnificent mountaintops, its turquoise icebergs glittering like jewellery, then South Georgias lasting impression is all the animals. Funny king penguins walking with their eggs or their chicks between their legs. Proud albatrosses performing their mating ritual for each other and for everyone else that wanted to watch. Fur seals that try to frighten us on land and forget everything but to have fun when they come into the water. Big elephant seals (the males can be up to 4 ½ tonnes) who rest docilely along our walkways. Petrels of many different kinds that nest on the outlying islands. And rein dears that the Norwegians imported from their home country that shyly cross our walkways.
But the overwhelming impression is that none of these animals is the least afraid of humans. The king penguins and the fur seals come up to you. My lens hood has several bite marks from the king penguins that wanted to see what a camera could taste like! And the albatrosses that take off like a jumbo jet on their long runway downhill do it next to us sitting and having our lunch.
And into this paradise the humans entered about two hundred years ago first to kill the seals. They were nearly totally extinct a hundred years ago but now they have recovered remarkably well. After that the whalers came and caught most of the whales. When you see these wonderful creatures that we met so much in Antarctica, you feel ashamed and saddened that we humans have made several whale species nearly totally extinct. And the whales dont seem to recover that fast and several species will probably never come back. A visit to South Georgia make you reflect not only on the wonders that God has given us to admire, but also on human greed and cruelty.
But now the only visitors to South Georgia come to observe and enjoy, sharing a bit of paradise that captivates you with its innocence. We have been lucky to be able to visit it, and we will never forget the beauty of the nature down here or the spirit of these animals which approach you with neither fear nor threat.
But now is the time to shed the foul weather gear and get ready for the carnival spirit!
Lots of love
Jan-Eric
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Dear family and friends,
We are anchored outside the yacht club in Rio. On one side Pao de Acucar, the Sugarloaf towers above us, on the other Christ the Redeemer, the Corcovado, spreads out his hands in a blessing of Adle. And in the middle of it Adle, who already has caught the attention of the yachting community and the boat press in Rio.
The last days of sailing were in a pure tropical climate beating straight into the wind and healing over so much that it was quite tiresome also to do simple things aboard. But now that is only a memory and we have adapted to the Brazilian lifestyle of late mornings and late nights.
Tom and Carlotta Richardson, who were good friends of Nigel and Michelle and live here in Rio, have now also become our very good friends. They have adopted Adle, its owners, guests and crew and helped us arrange our program for us here in Brazil, booked tours for us, arranged provisioning for Clare, charts for Mark and spare parts for Paul.
They met us when we arrived at 11 in the evening on the 20th and gave us our first Carpirinhas. I woke up with a headache the following morning. During the following days we played tourists and saw all the famous sights as our guests said good-bye, one after another. It was most difficult to see Lasse and Bittan depart, as they had been part of us and Adle for such a long period. We are lucky to count them among our very close friends. When Jen and I waved them good-bye and saw them steer into the yacht club from our anchorage, we felt quite sad.
The carnival had just finished, but the Parade of the Champions were still to come and together with some of the crew, Tom and Carlotta and Mark as the only remaining guest we went to see this parade of the very best of the Samba Schools. It started nine in the evening and finished when the sun got up the following morning. A feast for both the eyes and ears. The samba schools were strutting around dressed up in the most colourful costumes anyone can imagine and looking just like the penguins in South Georgia.
Each samba school parade includes between 3,000 and 4,000 people dancing and playing either walking or riding on the different floats that are truly gigantic.
The day after Jen and I joined Tom and Carlotta and took a helicopter trip around Rio and then we flew to Isla Grande, where we had hired a motorboat for two days around the islands. In the afternoon we reached Paraty, a colonial town completely preserved, which is now one of UNESCO's world heritage towns. The gold, silver and other metals and stones that were mined inland in Minas Gerais were transported on mule trains to Paraty at the coast from where it was shipped to Lisbon. So Paraty was a shipping and trading city of enormous importance. Our friend Mrten Persson has a house in the old colonial centre and we stayed overnight with him.
Roberto Pelicano, or Peli by his friends, was driving the motorboat and an unlimited source of information on the islands and beaches and anchorages, which will be helpful, when we come back here now in March, sailing with Adle. When we were walking back from the restaurant after dinner in Paraty, he stopped outside another colonial house and asked if we wanted to have a look at it. Just before midnight he woke up the caretakers and showed us his friends house, which was the most amazing place any of us had ever seen. It looked so discreet from the outside but filled the whole block with different houses bound together by walkways and gardens in between them and although it was totally closed to the outside, it was open to the gardens in the middle. The ground floor didn't have a wall to the inside, so the air could flow freely and the guests could walk around. And all this was filled with antiques, some junk, some truly magnificent pieces from a bygone era.
After two days in Paraty and Ilha Grande we flew back to Rio and the next day Jen and I were off to the colonial towns inland in Minas Gerais. Brazil is 17 times the size of France and Minas Gerais, which is a county inland from Rio, is in itself larger than France.
We visited some of the old colonial towns and its magnificent churches and stayed there three days. Some of those towns have now been quite "in" and artists and craftsmen have moved in and are selling their wares. Jen and I admired specially their pewter wares and bought beer mugs for Knightstone.
When we came back to Rio this evening, the lady meeting us told us that she had seen the Swedish King and Queen arrive and they were obviously on an unofficial visit to the country. As the Queen has a Brazilian background it seems that all Brazilians are very proud of our Queen and follow our royal couple with great interest.
Later to-night, just after midnight we are setting sail again (or maybe motoring) going to Buzios, which is Brazil's answer to St Tropez! We will remain there a few days and then continue sailing along the coast of Brazil, among other things going back to Ilha Grande and Paraty that we visited by helicopter and speed-boat last week.
Mark just calculated that we have been sailing so much that on average Adle has done one Atlantic crossing every months since she was launched until now. And it seems this voyaging will continue!
In mid March we are returning to Europe for a month and then we will continue sailing in the Caribbean with my children in April and May.
I hope you can hear the samba rhythms that are in the background, while I'm writing this mail.
Lots of love
Jan-Eric