Penguins Off The Patagonian Coast

"Iron Lady" with a course in Tierra del Fuego

Mar del Plat is aft, and with the last lights of the big city the rough counter-sailing of the first hours disappears. We sit exhausted in the cockpit, the children lie in bed after a dose of anti-sea syrup and sleep soundly. The preparations are literally in our bones, but up to 7 knots of space sheets compensate us. The wind stands by, we fly towards our first destination, the BahiSan Blas.

The next morning the children still struggle with seasickness, but lunch stays where it belongs. Nice sailing, Mich and I sit outside in the sun and enjoy the blue of the Atlantic, the foaming of the wake, you can hear music from inside the ship and the cheering of the children jumping on the beds in the family corner. We are happy, really happy, and almost a little sad that we don't have 2000 nautical miles of open ocean in front of the bow, but rather section sailing on an infamous coastline.

The weather god seems to have heard our request, we are just before San Blas, but a look at the weather map shows that we could make it to Puerto Madryn before the south wind sets in. We correct the course and keep walking south. At 40 degrees south, we were already expecting the worst, the wind falls asleep. Duck pond and engines instead of turned down in the storm, we don't complain.

Every morning and afternoon we lean over the map table and watch the current Gribfiles, our weather report. Only the forecast for the next 24 hours is actually credible, but we can never help speculating about the next few days and making plans that will be thrown overboard twelve hours later with the new weather report. And so we shimmy mile by mile along the Patagonian coast, leaving not only BahiSan Blas but also Puerto Madryn to starboard and after four days and five nights at sea, we drop anchor off the IslLeones three miles from CaletHorno.

It smells of bird droppings, the gentle hills of the island are colored reddish brown, dry undergrowth, steppe and on the beach? Penguins! During the last few miles we have seen penguins swimming in the water on the hunt for fresh fish, and here they stand in crowds on the beach, waddling over the stones and being warm by the sun.

On land it is warm, almost hot, very different from what we imagined the Patagonian climate to be. Our first hike takes us past the birds in their clothes on to the top of the hill to an old lighthouse that is lovingly maintained by an association. Old furniture, faded tiled floors and a wonderful view of the small archipelago await us after the ascent. On the way back to the “Iron Lady”, four Australian dolphins appear out of nowhere in front of the bow of our dinghy. Round after round we dash through the bay at full throttle while the dolphins, so close that you can almost touch their dorsal fins, surf in the bow wave. For the children it is the first dolphins, and we have seldom seen these animals so closely either.

For the night we are looking for our first caletauf, a fjord-like incision in the coast, hardly recognizable from afar. The evening light bathes the top of the red rocks in unreal light as we enter the gorge at low tide. At the end of the fjord, protected on all sides from the wind and the swell of the ocean, we drop anchor and test the new land lines that we tie to one of the rocks for the first time. Silence. Only the screeching of the seabirds can be heard, a shy guanaco appears on a hill. The next days pass with extensive climbing and hiking tours through the bizarre coastal landscape. The image of nature changes dramatically with the tidal range. At low tide, the river that flows into the fjord turns into an extensive mud landscape, pitch-black mussel beds are exposed, while the sea birds, cormorants, skuas and terns sit on the rocks or dive for fish.

Christmas is just around the corner, the question of whether the Christ Child will make it all the way to CaletHorno dominates the conversations of the children, the question of whether the approaching weather window to the south actually comes on Christmas Eve, that of the adults. Missing a weather window can mean we're stuck for a week or more without making a mile south. The “Iron Lady” is not a fast boat, we cannot afford to miss the first 20 hours of a favorable wind.

“Dad, we're not sailing for Christmas!” Say the children, and we hope it stays that way. We transform a dried up bush into a Christmas tree with green strips of fabric and move it back to the IslLeones on the morning of Christmas Eve. The destination is the southern bay of the Isl with its many offshore islets. Because there are colonies of sea lions and, what else, more penguins. Before there is too much sadness about the lack of a festive Christmas mood, we set off with the dinghy.

Dolphins show us the way to the sea lion colony. The closer we get, the more animals plop down heavily from the rocks into the water in order to come closer with curiosity. All around us they stretch and stretch their necks out of the water, snort, snort, dive and chatter excitedly with their fellow species. On land, the bull of each family shifts restlessly on its tail fin, ready at any time to drive away the intruders if they do not behave. At the end of the beach we go ashore, followed by a hundred sea lions, who watch our landing maneuver from a safe distance from the water.

Photo gallery: "Iron Lady" from Mar del Plat to Puerto Desado

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On the other hand, there are no sea lions on IslLeones, instead penguins, newly hatched crane chicks, falcons, armadillos, oyster catchers and ducks. All you have to do is look for a stone in the sun, sit down and wait - and nature begins to stir around us. The longer you sit still, the more birds and other animals dare to come out of hiding.

During one of the explorers' trips, the Christ Child found us completely unnoticed. The children's eyes are shining and it seems that I am mainly missing the real Christmas spirit. Because there can be no question of contemplation when the children go swinging on the foredeck in the sunshine after the presents have been given. The summer nights in Patagonia are long; it stays dark for just three hours.

On Christmas Day it is there, our weather window, and the children also give the green light, now that the Christ Child no longer has to go out to sea to find us. It's not a huge window of weather, not a safe one to make the entire swing south, but enough to get across the Golfo San Jorge. The Gulf, with its tidal range of almost ten meters and the resulting currents, is one of the notorious sections of the route to the south.

We have a north wind forecast, that sounds good. But contrary to the forecast, the wind falls asleep at night, choppy lakes, washing machines, shipping traffic, no fun. The diesel roars for 24 hours, the wind only comes when we can no longer need it.

The lady pulls, wants to race through the night with six knots, but we have to brake. We sail in tidal waters, the entrance to Puerto Deseado is only possible when the tide is still or when the tide is coming in, the maps are wrong, when the water is running out there are up to six knots of electricity in the river.

Brakes. Brakes. The calculations pay off. When the current starts flowing, we steer a school of Australian dolphins as guides into the turquoise blue waters of the Rio Deseado. The PrefecturNaval directs us by radio alongside the pilot cutter “Yamana” at the Muelle Commercial. And that's good. A tidal range of six meters on a dock made for large shipping is not a suitable place for our little boat. But we lie comfortably on the side of the pilot boat, climb up and down with the tide without having to worry about the lines.

Enrique, one of the captains, takes our lines and offers us the shower on his cutter. He and his colleague prove to be reliable helpers over the next few days. Accepting purchases, providing water, no problem at all. We are pampered with Merluz and King Crab, which he received from fishermen.

In theory, we could continue the next day, but we all notice that we need a break. We have covered many nautical miles, spent time in lonely bays, our physical strength needs a breather. The next stroke is said to be the most difficult of the entire route, ending with the crossing of the infamous Le Maire Strait. Are we in a hurry? No.

We decide to pull the weather window and relax, give ourselves a belated family Christmas present and take the big speedboat of the Darwin Expeditions to IslPinguinos. Observe animals as a tourist, without responsibility for our own ship, without worrying about safe anchorages. Maybe 15 people are on board, besides us two other families with children. The dinghy flies over the sea at 30 knots.

Tourists come here every two to three days, nature is untouched except for a small hut in which we can stow jackets and life jackets. The penguins rule here and are used to people. We can approach them up to a few meters. Riccardo has been going here twice a week for twenty years, and yet you have the feeling that this tour is your first. His enthusiasm is infectious, he knows everything about the penguins, the sea birds, the sea lions, he takes his time. No mass processing, but careful ecotourism.

The Magellanic penguins have young who sit in their nests and wait for fish. The skuas, giant brown seabirds, also have young who stumble across the steppe like fluffy cotton balls. The main attraction awaits on the east side of the island, a colony of rockhopper penguins with their funny tufts of yellow hair on their heads. Riccardo walks through the group with the obligatory mate cup and thermos flask while we watch the birds. A magical day.

On New Year's Eve we are preparing the ship for the next blow, the batteries have been refueled, fresh supplies taken on board, the weather forecast promises positive things for the coming day. On a whim I buy a two-kilo leg of lamb in the morning and a little later I know why: The "Nemo of Sweden", friends we met in Buenos Aires, comes in surprisingly, and so we spend the turn of the year like this as we like it best, with friends around the big table, with leg of lamb and red wine and a fireworks display that we watch from the cockpit on the still warm nights of the Patagonian east coast. Tomorrow is New Years, a perfect day for sailing.