When Friday morning came about – the weather was still blustery and a little grey. We sailed over Whale Bay (well – motor sailed) and up a tiny creek to another yet another settlement – this time to ask permission to go and visit another inlet just a couple of miles south. Once granted, we re-positioned to the new outlet called Crooked Inlet (you can imagine why – yes, because it was). This narrow channel with steep cliff faces on either side meandered its way in land and then opened up into an internal natural bay. We pulled the boat into a narrow side channel and tied up to rocks front and back and nestled in for the day. Now that sounds like a throw away comment – tied up to the rocks front and back – not quite so simple. If you were doing a risk assessment (there goes that term again) you would have to include the following: no common language, no previous experience of doing this for well over half the crew, a wind that was backing and veering, and numerous other things. So the “tech” for this is to drop a person off on a chosen rock together with a very large wire strop (like a heavy duty circle of thick steel wire, like 3/4 of an inch thick.) The rock has to have been assessed as being big enough and attached to the shore well enough to take the strain. The strop is placed over the rock and checked that it will not slip off. Once you have the port and starboard rocks sorted with their strops, very long lengths of polypropylene line are pulled from the boat by whoever is in the dingy, passed ashore and then tied to the strop with a robust bowline knot. Once both port and starboard are attached, the slack is taken out of the lines and the boat is set secure at the front and then the stern lines can be attached. Simple – almost!

Everything was going well, regardless of the lack of a common language and the lack of specific experience. I attached my bowline to the strop and waited for the strain to be taken up and then I would be picked up by the dingy to go and tackle the stern lines. The strain was taken up and everything looked good. I was looking at the boat to see what was happening when all of a sudden there was an almighty crash behind me and the massive rock we were attached to was rolling down the incline towards the sea with “gusto.” I was directly in its way. I had been very careful, even cautious to make sure I had good foot hold when I had clambered onto the shore initially to do the job. By the way, the shore was a cliff face. As I heard the crash I instinctively dived to the side, faster than I may have moved in some time. I then looked behind me to see this huge boulder unseated and 4 feet from where it had been initially. This tells you two things: 1) the forces involved with this boat are huge and 2) I hadn’t chosen the best boulder (I was given significant advice on which one to go for.) To cut to the chase – we spent the next 10 minutes undoing what we had done, retrieving the strop now trapped under the boulder (not an easy job) and then gingerly choosing another place to tie up to! With the job finally done, we were set for the rest of the day and the night – firmly tied up in the middle of the channel and safely being held off the rocks on either side. Some went off to fish for dinner and some of us stayed behind to…… not fish! Those who went ashore returned without fish and a new dinner plan needed to be made.

The weather for the next day was forecast as gale force winds from the West – which was the direction we needed to go if we wanted to head further out into the most western islands of the Falklands. We decided to just relocate the boat into the natural harbor further up the main channel and have a little explore of the surrounding countryside. That involved a reversal of the previous day’s activity, this time with a lot of speed so that the lines are pulled back on board before they drift back into the prop and bugger the entire boat up. Again, we managed to make it happen and we were free to move off. I have to say, Alec, the boat’s permanent skipper has a deft, tough maneuvering this thing about – very impressive. So that’s what we did, reposition into the open water, drop the hook and then 6 of us set out in the dingy – with a fishing rod and a fishing net to see what mischief we could get up to – and apparently, quite a lot. Firstly, we got well and truly soaked driving through fairly large waves caused by the strong wind whipping over the water (and I mean large waves – about 4 feet high and we were in a 14 foot inflatable dingy) and then upon entering a narrow channel and heading up to find fish, we hit a large rock and broke one of the three propeller blades off! Never mind, this was stunning scenery (because it was quite bleak and narrow, but it opened up at its head a plateau). It got really quite cold in the strengthening wind.

While 4 of the 6 of us stood around, the other two tried their luck with the fishing rod while progressively moving up stream. The rod yielded only 3 smallish fish – not enough to take back to the boat as spoils for supper. However, Alec stretched the net across the little river and that yielded 3 fairly large fish and 1 very large one – and so we ate what we caught together with large potato wedges cooked in the oven – the nearest thing to fish and chips we could do! The fish was fresh and awesome and baked stuffed with lemon and herbs by a combination of the Colombian and Latvian team members. I provided a more Irish input – the spuds!

Pip pip

In order to put a plan together for James to be moved off the boat back to Stanley, the first step was to make contact with folks in Stanley who operate the plane service that goes around the various settlements. While there are some scheduled pick ups, generally it works like a taxi service – call it the Uber of Islands. The nearest place for us to go to be able to communicate effectively with Stanley, was the settlement on West Point, the Island we were sitting just off. All of the islands are linked through a microwave satellite system giving access to both voice and data. Once everyone was up and at it, we sailed the boat the short sail into the beautiful bay directly in front of the settlement and then Alec headed off to use the farmer’s phone. His mission identified that the earliest available flight would be the following day from Carcass Island – a short sail from West Point, back up Byron Sound. This meant we now had no major deadlines for the day. James was in no imminent danger and he was feeling well enough to stay with us another day. Had this been an emergency, there is a helicopter rescues service that could have made the trip, but this wasn’t an emergency, his condition was under control.

The new plan left us with enough time to explore West Point, see the Albatross nesting grounds, meet the farmer and still sail over to Carcass Island in plenty of time that afternoon. So that’s what we did. The walk to the nesting grounds took us about 40 minutes, up and over a hill, and on an outcrop just above the crashing waves of the Atlantic. What we saw was an incredible collection of nesting pods, some occupied by young Albatross who had yet to make their first flight. These nesting pods stand anything from a foot tall, to well over two feet – made from mud and compacted materials, they are perfectly round and on top there is an indentation, like a bowl, where the female and male albatross will incubate their eggs. Good lord, I was having a David Attenborough moment, but strangely loving it! There was unlikely to be another opportunity in my lifetime, to be this close to an Albatross in the wild. While in London, I frequently cycle past regent’s Park Zoo – but that doesn’t count does it?  We were able to walk through the thick, high, tussock grass and get within 2 feet of one occupied nest. Sitting off at a discrete, but still threatening distance, sat about 8 Turkey Vultures waiting for something bad to happen – so they could then swoop in and clean up.

As we walked back to the landing area, we passed the farm building, and our Colombian friends Ernesto and Juan spotted a couple of old, wasted LR Defenders parked up behind a hut. They were wrecks, the Land Rovers, not Juan and Ernesto. However, upon closer inspection, guess what they found? Yes, the part they had been in search of! In fact, between the two vehicles there were several of them and they were working, even if nothing else was. As we celebrated this discovery with them, Alan the farmer pulled up on his quad bike. After introductions all round and sharing the parts story, he told Ernesto and Juan they were welcome to take what they needed and he even offered to get some tools to make it easier. Alan’s wife, Jackie pulled up on her dirt bike and the plan expanded to include coffee in their kitchen. And so, we ended up drinking hot coffee and eating homemade cakes and biscuits, and hearing all about life on the Islands, in the comfort of Alan and Jackie’s cosy, hundred year old kitchen. While the way these folks live may seem quite basic to us, they proudly showed us the recently added luxuries – a fridge/freezer and a microwave – that we would call basics back home. What they described from a lifestyle point of view, was a comfortable life that they thoroughly enjoyed. They valued their surroundings more than their possessions. They loved the work they did – the land and the sheep. They clearly had alternative paths they could have taken in life but this was their choice one. This was not a hardship or an imposition, it was a choice and they were very, very happy with the life they lived.

Something struck me and here it is. While this was a remote island, set within a remote set of islands, miles from anywhere, where people visiting is more an exception than a rule, here for the second time we were talking to really “normal people.” They consider living here to be normal. Somehow, I had expected that we would be greeted by people who were more likely to be recluses – who might shy away from the company of outsiders, having decided to live out on these remote settlements. These folks very much consider themselves Falkland Islanders and they are fierce when it comes to their independence and allegiances. They are closely related to the mothership, the UK, but not part of it. They never want to be part of Argentina. This is a serious subject to them and it should never be taken lightly. They send their children back to the UK to be educated from aged 16 or so (if they want to go) and both the farming families we met, have close family connections back in the UK. So when I said “these people seem normal,” I think that was the conclusion we all agreed upon. Of course, normal is a relative term – and I’m not sure I have the right to judge anyone as being normal, it seems condescending, but I think you’d say the same if you met them. I’m not sure sailing the South Atlantic would qualify me as being normal!

After re-boarding the boat, we headed off back into Byron Sound on the short sail to Carcass Island. The name Carcass – led to us having a conversation with our Colombian friends, who felt compelled to ask about the difference between a cadaver, a skeleton and a carcass. I don’t think we were terribly convincing or clear in our definitions of each. But here’s the thing – apparently, and we didn’t find this out until later that day, Carcass Island is named after a naval ship and not because of anything gruesome. The naval ship was, in turn, named after the small pouch a musketeer would used to carry his gunpowder. I’d like to verify this, but where’s Google when you most need it? We arrived at Carcass in beautiful sunshine and completely calm seas. I stayed on board to make a call to settle some business that I needed to attend to (again, the wonders of Satellite meant I was able to do my duty!) and some of the others headed-in to explore the settlement a little. Once back on board, Alec announced the weather was right for a BBQ and so with pork ribs roasting off the back of the boat, we enjoyed mussels cooked in white wine for the appetizer. Boy, this was hard to take in – having a soirée on the back of a boat in the Falkland Islands in stunning (but cold) weather! James was well enough to join us, but it was clear he still very much needed to go and get sorted if he was to stand any chance of making the Ocean passage. We finished another night down in the saloon chatting and drinking wine. We didn’t have to deposit James on the Island until 9.30am the next morning and only then after the plane was confirmed to have taken off and heading our way. Some of the party, not me though, may have pushed on a little later into the night on the basis that we were going to have a later start the next morning and some showed distinct evidence of their late evening when they showed up on deck the next morning!

So, the next morning dawned hazy, blustery and cold, with a low cloud base, and we wondered whether this might put James’ departure in jeopardy. But no, these guys aren’t put off by a little low cloud and so word came over the VHF to confirm we needed to deposit James on the Island as planned so they could transport him over to the landing strip, which was just a strip of land wide enough, long enough and reasonably straight enough to take the twin prop plane that serviced these Islands. There was a landing strip on West Point, over the hill from the farm and within spitting distance of the sea and there were times when planes could land – depending on the wind. Alan, the Farmer over there, had explained that he and his wife couldn’t both fly off the island at the same time, because there needed to be someone on the ground who could operate the emergency equipment and fire truck! In the relatively recent past, a plane had crashed on the island while trying to take off and one of the passengers had broken a leg. I’ll never again complain about Southwest.  Once the mission of depositing James was achieved, we upped anchor and made our way out into Byron Water once again, and back up to West Point, bound for our anchorage for the night off a small island (Hummock Island) in Whalers Bay off to the south west. The day continued to be grey and cold as we sailed back into Hope Harbour and then a quick turn to starboard out into the Atlantic, sailing past a stark headland called Death Head – a creative and reassuring name for a huge lump of sheer rock facing out over the Atlantic.

The Island we were heading to was only about 20 miles from Carcass and an easy sail. It was now owned by a conservation trust and a couple who Alec and Giselle knew who were there building a small house that would be used in the summer by scientists and the like who would both study and work on conservation issues. The couple, Ken and Sally, had only recently finished circumnavigating the Southern High Latitudes on their old 32 ft steel hulled boat. They had headed around Cape Horn, up the coast of Chile, then over the Pacific to New Zealand via French Polynesia – on to Tasmania and Western Australis, up to South Africa and back across the South Atlantic to the Falklands. Ken had also sailed his boat up the Atlantic to the UK and back. This boat was well under half the size of Pelagic and many, many years older, but she was sturdy and they trusted both the boat and their sailing and navigating skills completely. It was almost a little shameful, for us to have even the slightest doubt about our trip over to South Africa given the resources and the boat at our command. Maybe any doubts we may have – and I’m not saying I have any – but if I was to have any, maybe it would be personal doubt and not about the boat. Both Thomas (our first mate) and Dave (who will skipper the boat across) have sailed this passage numerous times and they most likely have a very well honed sense of self preservation, so no doubt we can have great confidence in their ability, even if we might doubt our own – very reassuring – case closed!

Once the anchor was down off Hummock Island, we launched the dingy and took it over to the to meet the couple, take a look at the house they were building and to understand more about the conservation work they were undertaking. As with everyone else we met, they were very interesting people. We took a walk up and over one of the hills to look at the work they had undertaken to help save the vegetation on the Island. We learned all about the erosion of the top soil and vegetation,  a cycle caused by over population of sheep in the past and now encouraged by climate change (the place only gets 12 inches of rain). The conservation trust, of which Sally was a trustee, is now planting tussock grass and Boxwood to try and head off the erosion which, if left to its own devices, will in time make the Island barren (apparently). I have to confess, it seemed to me to be a bit of a long shot – but what do I know about such matters. It was a large enough island to need a huge amount of planting to just counteract the current level of damage and already, the planting they had done only worked spasmodically. Below the very shallow top soil, the Island is just a huge peat bog, and the top layer of peat that is exposed once the top soil is blown away, was like dark black coal dust. It meant everything was brown or black, including Ken and Sally. This was dirty work. In any event, they showed us the work they’d completed so far on the house, which was like a scene from the HGTV program called something like – Remote Cabin Builders of the Falklands (don’t laugh – there are a number of programs on TV back in the U.S. about building in remote parts – aren’t there, Alice?) Even in this remote setting, they are able to get all the supplies they need (tax free) delivered to the Island – dumped on the beach and needing to be carried to the build site. The house was already looking quite cozy and another winter and it should be done. The folks who originally came and colonized these Islands had to bring everything they needed with them, or face an uncomfortable wait for months or even years for additional supplies to be sent. If only they’d had Amazon Prime and access to a fleet of drones! From a building material’s point of view, there isn’t any lumber and the stone is too difficult to extract, so houses were and are, by and large made with imported wood with metal roofs. Most of the older houses have corrugated metal for the roof, the newer ones have raised metal seam instead. There is a frontier look to these houses, but really quaint.

While they build the house, Ken and Sally live on their boat which is anchored in a little sheltered bay, right of the house. I asked about showering facilities on the boat and they laughed – yes the boat had a sort of shower, but it wasn’t great and the water wasn’t always warm! Remember, I mentioned that everything was black or brown from the peat, including them. Alec and Giselle invited Ken and Sally to come aboard Pelagic and have a hot shower, a cocktail and dinner, which they did and an educational conversation ensued. Ken was very humble about his achievements and Sally emphasized how they loved their long passages at sea away from the world, especially when they hit doldrums – no wind. Ken told us that after a day or so, they would likely get a few knots of wind – may be 3 or 4 and he could get the boat moving again at 5 knots. Well, to get Pelagic to go at 5 knots we probably need about 15 knots of wind in the first instance so we would be sat a long time in the doldrums. This baby needs a lot to get it going and then a lot to stop if once she is going, (that’s why she has a bloody big engine and she carries a lot of fuel – just in case!)

I decided to hit the hay quite early and I left the others talking, although by that time, we’d all learned way more about grass conservation and it’s fundamental importance than any of us envisaged necessary and there were certainly a few poorly disguised yawns. Only the day before I’d had a David Attenborough moment and now I was too close to being in an episode of Country File (a BBC program about the countryside and what’s new and interesting). I needed to get a grip of myself, and take stock before another environmental episode was presented the following day. It didn’t help that we had just eaten Thomas’ Lasagna, which was absolutely excellent, but this wasn’t light food and I needed to lie down! I went to my bunk via the deck where I did my nightly download from the satellite and also put a call into Bernadette who was in NYC with Karen and Josh (closest of friends from the U.K., Mother and son, friend and Godson). She was having a blast and about to have dinner. I was heading to bed. It was 7.30pm in NYC and 8.30pm here on the Falklands and 12.30am in the U.K., so only the U.K. offered me the option of a more normal bed time. Clearly my new status as an Eco-Warrior was taking its toll!

Pip pip

The wind was strong on Tuesday morning as we raised the anchor, raised the main and raised our spirits in anticipation of a great day’s sailing. Ernesto, one of my colleagues from Colombia, was going to navigate us through the Pebble Sound and Byron Sound and out to the West End of West Falkland. This was a huge challenge – but he approached it with gusto – and no, that’s not another member of the crew – so may be now is the right time to start to introduce the rest of the team!

Firstly, Ernesto is one of two Colombians amongst us. He and his sailing buddy, Juan, are both lawyers. Ernesto is in his early 50’s and an accomplished lawyer, specializing in, amongst other things, human rights and risk management (yes, me neither – but he understands it). He also happens to be an enthusiastic and accomplished cook, not to mention a thoroughly nice guy. He was the one who reached out to me from Santiago to try and help figure out the flight situation when things went tits up with LATAM. He has only been learning English since January and he is doing incredibly well. His friend Juan, is the youngest amongst us at 30. He and Ernesto are family friends. Jean is a Yacht Master Ocean, the highest qualification for a leisure sailor. His English is exceptional and he also speaks German, being of Colombian and German heritage. His Spanish seems pretty good too! While Juan has the exuberance of someone of his age, there is no arrogance at all and his naturally inquisitive nature means he asks a lot of very good questions. Collectively they are really good fellow crew members in every way. They came on this trip with a second objective, other than to sail the Southern Ocean. Ernesto has an old LandRover Defender back in Colombia and some 10 years ago Juan broke off a knob that controls the air vent under the windscreen (there goes that exuberance again). The Falklands used to boast to having more LandRover Defenders per capita than any other country in the world and I can now attest that it has more abandoned Defenders than I have ever seen. So Ernesto and Juan came with the anticipation of finally finding this illusive part – here in this huge LandRover graveyard. After trying a salvage yard in Stanley,  they were advised to try a farmer out on a settlement, and it just so happened that this was the settlement we visited last Sunday. Sadly, no dice, but Nick, the farmer told them to make contact when they got back and he would help them locate it. Stay tuned for the latest on the part hunt!

Next up is my cabin-mate Edgar. Edgar lives and works in Malmo, Sweden. He is Latvian and had to do his military service with the Soviet Army. Luckily, he was sent to the Czech Republic and not Afghanistan, which was the most likely place to have been sent at that time. He is now a Trauma Doctor in Sweden, where he lives with his Swedish family. Being a Doctor is a big plus on the boat – our very own Doctor in case of emergency. He has that quiet, precise demeanor that is so common in Scandinavian and Baltic folk. It’s not necessarily declarative, just precise and it balances against the very relaxed approach of the Colombians.

Then, in the middle, we have Tig, who is from Canada. Tig has sailed for a long time and it shows in his deftness, the result of quiet confidence of such experience. Tig is also the oldest on the boat and I would suggest he’s in his early 70’s, but as fit as any. He has clearly led a very interesting life. His parents were both from London, but he was born while they were living in the Sudan. He emigrated from there to Canada when he was 6 and that has been home ever since. He has a PhD in something related to statistical analysis of farm animal genetics, something mainstream like that, and he has traveled extensively. It does mean that when we’ve chatted with the local farmers while visiting their settlements, at least one of us asks intelligent questions. Unfortunately it also means we then get chapter and verse on all things sheep! Tig is a quietly spoken, confident man who asks and listens with care and courtesy. He’s definitely Canadian.

There are, or may be there were, two other crew members who made it over to Stanley from Chile, but one is permanently gone and the other is now back in Stanley seeking medical attention. The first of the two was Steve, a Brit and a very accomplished sailor. When we first arrived at the boat, he disappeared off on a long walk and joined us directly at the dinner table while the rest of us had met up for a quick beer in the bar first. He was an interesting guy and very much the contrarian amongst us. When the issue was raised of Trump’s presidency (one of only two topics the skipper asked us all not to raise – the other being Brexit) and someone amongst us (no, it was not me), but it was an American member of the crew, said Trump was a “****ing Idiot,” Steve suggested he wasn’t – on the basis that he had stood on shaking things up and he was doing just that. He also accepted the argument that what Trump was there to solve for –  wasn’t shaking things up, but making things better – anyway, enough of that argument. The next day, Steve once again went off on his own, but then joined some of the team who went to a Gurkha Band concert in the Anglican Cathedral (something that I decided I would sacrifice so I could do something else!) and then he came back late to join us for dinner. It immediately became apparent that he was in a distressed state and had had maybe a couple of drinks too many. Later that night he stumbled down the stairs on the way to his cabin and hit his head, having to then be helped into his bunk. The next day he and the Skip decided he needed to leave the boat for his and for everyone else’s safety. He did so with good grace. He was going to have to stay on the Island for the rest of the week until the weekend flights came in the following weekend. I reached out to him by email and met him on Wednesday late afternoon for a cup of tea and a chat after class was let up. I really liked this guy, he was an interesting man who had started out his career as a Deck Officer in the Merchant Navy and then raced sailing boats for a rich technocrat before getting another proper job with a large tech company. He was another Yacht Master Ocean and had sailed the Atlantic a couple of times before. He told me he arrived with reservations about the trip and had decided early on he just couldn’t make the trip and hence the drinking. But, he emphasized many times to me that the decision for him to leave was the right one and he accepted it (he had to really).

Then there were six.

So who have we missed out – well that would be James from just North of Boston. James left the boat this morning to fly from a tiny airfield on Carcass Island (when I say tiny – I mean a strip of grass). He went down with a Urinary Infection and after some antibiotics that Edgar gave him, his recovery was too slow and so he has gone to be checked out and receive further treatment. In the not too distant past, he had recovered from some other major medical stuff, which may complicate things and, before he could set off across the Ocean, it was best he got a better diagnosis and treatment. We all hope he’ll be waiting for us when we get back to Stanley – ready for the onward trip. He is another accomplished sailor and also an expert in radar systems and boat design and building – so another useful chap to have around.

So there you have the crew – and while I will no doubt mentioned more about them as the trip develops, it will likely not be of a personal nature. Oh – sorry, there is another guy on board, but not one who will make the ocean passage. To help us acclimate and form a team, we have a Yacht Master Ocean instructor from the UK, Alan. He taught us celestial navigation and guided us through the meteorological piece and electronics navigation and communication updates. He was/is excellent. He is also keeping us on our toes during this passage around the Falklands. Even though we are all experienced and qualified navigators, we aren’t perfect, and when you don’t do it all of the time, you tend to make mistakes. So far, none of us have made any big mistakes and we’ve managed to get us to where we need to in one piece – but we have Alan looking over our shoulders and making sure we do things correctly.

Today we saw a tug towing a barge (on my watch). Alan asked me what the day and night marks should be – and I knew! All those hours spent in Chatham at 6.30am in the morning in STARBUCKS weren’t wasted, apparently! The towing tug wasn’t showing any day markers (but then neither were we – as we were motor sailing, we should have been displaying a motoring cone forward of the mast). Alec told us we wouldn’t need to know this stuff down here – because we likely wouldn’t see another vessel and if we did – they wouldn’t be showing any markers – day or night!

So there we were, early on Tuesday morning, motor sailing off our anchorage and heading through the inner Tamar pass into what would prove to be a labyrinth of waterways that would lead us to our destination for the night – Hope Harbour off West Point Island, about 48 Nautical Miles away. This was a stunning sail. The topography had changed to something more dramatic, a little bit like sailing off the West Coast of Scotland. There were rocky shores, rising to cliffs at times, and then behind that, high rolling hills. Neither on East nor West Falkland can you find a tree. It’s strange, because this is mainly sea level to about 800 meters, but we’re too far south for trees. However, there are a lot of Peat Bogs here in West Falkland, suggesting that in the far distant past, maybe when the Falklands were still off the East Coast of South Africa (yes, that is where they are supposed to have come from) they were densely covered in trees. I should probably start quiet on this, or may be the South African’s will claim ownership of these splendid Islands, ahead of the Argies.

Pebble Sound is a beautiful expanse of open water, but lurking below the surface are rocks and there the area has had limited surveying done. Ernesto manfully piloted us through these waters and out into Byron Sound and from there we rounded into Hope Harbour and headed up to the South East corner to anchor for the night, out of the way of the building swell. These are distant waters, very sparsely populated with only small settlements dotted around. These days, small cruise ships drop in on the Islands and apparently they provide a better living for the settlements then sheep do (even though wool prices and the exchange rate benefits are making sheep farming quite profitable again). The smaller cruise boats (between 100 and 500 passengers) stop in the bays and then ferry their passengers ashore to go and look at the wild life. They are charged per passenger for stopping there. There is also the chance to sell tea, coffee and souvenirs too.

Now, as we wound our way through these beautiful waters, I did my turn on the helm and then retreated downstairs to join Giselle who was about to induct me into the Pelagic Australis Bakers Hall of Fame. Obviously, when on passage and away from port for three weeks (and currently we are already 10 days out from port and not a store within 100 miles), one has to be self sufficient and that means baking our own bread. So I took the challenge to be the first of the crew to bake. I used the recipe from the side of the flour packet and, under Giselle’s expert eye, I mixed and kneaded the dough and then left it to rise on top of the Reflex heater – and sat and watched. Luckily, I got called up on deck for something and had to drag myself away. Giselle called me back down for the unveiling ceremony. I was on tenterhooks to see if this thing had risen. I haven’t baked bread for the past 30 years – and I have no skills in the area of baking. I can do what I have to and I will bake at home if I have to, but generally, Bernadette takes care of all things baked when we entertain. The stakes here were big – no bread to go with the soup for lunch if I failed in my mission. I asked Giselle if she had a loaf maybe she’d baked earlier, but she didn’t. Well, the dough had risen, so I knocked it back, greased the pans and loaded them for their second stage of proofing. Again, the dough rose, my hopes were now better. I loaded them into the oven and set the timer. Every time I went up on deck, I was asked how the bread was. This was important to people and the pressure was on. The timer went off and I descended to take a look – and to be honest,  they looked good, but Giselle suggested turning the loaves in the pans and giving them another 5 minutes. I did so – they browned. I left them resting on the bread board ready for lunch.

When lunch was served, I was back on the helm and therefore everyone else ate and I had to wait for mine. The compliments flooded in about the bread. It was as if I’d discovered kryptonite, not baked bread. By the time I got mine, I was desperate to taste it and so, for the second time in the last ten days, I ate something I never eat – bread and butter with soup! The first exception was to eat an egg sandwich – don’t get me going. I just don’t do egg sandwiches, but there I sat one lunchtime on break from our class on celestial navigation – eating an egg and mayonnaise sandwich – and enjoying it!

In a world of massive innovation (and Edgar explained some of the innovations he is involved in the medical field), my contribution was the baking of bread on a sailing boat traversing shallow waters in West Falkland. This will not make a scientific magazine nor a Nobel prize nomination! And sadly, as far as my family goes, my brother Trevor used to be a master Baker (hence the name Alice and James still use for him – TrevorBread) and he might not have thought so kindly about my creation based on his standards! I don’t care – little victories need to be celebrated and I took the compliments!

The day ended in our anchorage just up from West Point and again it was stunning. I came here with little expectation about the scenery and the journey from Mount Pleasant Airfield into Stanley reinforced my limited expectation. It was Mars-like and barren, but the trip was about sailing and forming a well oiled machine of a crew, and while that’s true (hmm – oiled may be, especially by 8.00pm in the evening), the scenery has actually blown me away and this anchorage, Hope Harbour, was no exception. It seems the drive from Mount Pleasant is both an enigma and an anathema! We anchored, put the boat to bed and then a landing party went ashore for a stroll, returning with a large bucket of wonderful looking mussels.

Once everyone was safely back aboard, we all retreated downstairs to settle in for the night. The next day was billed as a day at leisure, staying where we were, with a walk over the hills to see the Albatross nesting ground. Shortly after we settled in, the Skip let us know that James needed to get back to Stanley and therefore tomorrow would be all about that. No one cared about missing the day of leisure, we just wanted James to get the help he needed and get fit, if possible, for the Ocean passage. The start the following day might be a bit earlier than planned, but it didn’t dull our enthusiasm for a good evening down in the saloon!

Pip pip!

We rode out the gale on Sunday night – with long patches of there being no wind at all and then a crashing sound as the wind ramped quickly up to thirty knots plus, whirling the sea up around us. Regardless of any nighttime disturbance, we needed another early start the next morning to get back up the channel and out into the Atlantic. So, by 6.30 am most of us were mustered in the saloon having breakfast. I was navigating and orchestrating the crew – we called it skippering, but Alec, our real skipper was at hand the entire time to make sure we didn’t screw up anything too seriously. We weighed anchor just before 8.00am, just in time for slack water and we headed out for the 60 Nm. passage. Once we snaked our way up and we popped out of the channel, we were able to get down to some decent sailing. With a reefed-in Main and the Yankee out fully, we zipped along the north shore of East Falkland heading west, managing close to 10 knots at times, 3 knots ahead of the planned speed.

While this was exhilarating, it also created consequences for us. We had two tidal gates to solve for. One leaving Salvador Water – which led to the early start before we would have to fight the incoming flood tide – and then one at the other end of the passage we had to get through the Tamar Pass – another constriction which meant strong currents during peak tidal times. I had figures if we arrived at the Tamar Pass by about 4.00pm and knew that we should be OK to get through to our anchorage on the other side. Arriving too early would mean battling head-on current from the ebbing tide. I also figured that once we rounded Dolphin Head, the western extreme of East Falkland, we would turn to make for the Tamar pass across the channel that divides East and West Falkland (Falkland Sound) and at that point, we would have the wind right on our nose. Of course, we could beat into the wind (tack from side to side), but Pelagic isn’t a great “tacking boat” – in that tacking her is really hard work and after a while it just gets to be a grind. Because she had 3 forestays, you have to furl away whichever head sail you are using and then unfurl it our on the other side – every time you tack – which over time leads to a lot of work and a knackered crew.

My passage plan clearly said – motor sail the last leg if needed. It was needed, but we had to slow our speed down so we didn’t get to Tamar too early, but I figured getting there between 3.00pm and 3.30pm would still be manageable. And so it was. We headed through the pass and then turned hard to starboard and headed up into the anchorage where we were to spend the night. The previous evening we had been joking about dropping the hook in time for G&T’s in the sun (it had been a stunning, sunny, breezy, long day – but just perfect sailing weather). Once we’d dropped the anchor in the Lee of Pebble Island, in the northern part of Pebble Sound, at the top end of West Falkland and made the boat ready for the night, we found the skip down in the saloon making everyone a well earned, and unexpected G&T.

So we sat out on the back of the boat, enjoying our drinks and watching the sun slowly slip down over the stunning hills that surrounded this lonely spot. West Falkland has more dramatic topography than the East and we were about spend the next week sailing through and around it. Our plan was to get as far west as we could, as quickly as we could and then get the benefit of sailing inside and around this stunning scenery – and here we were, almost as far West as we would go – just a little more West the following day. It may not be for everyone here – it is remote – but it would be hard for anyone not to agree that this was beautiful in its simplicity. Of course, most places that look over open water tend to look better (even Queenborough, just inside the Meadway – look at the photos on previous blogs), but sitting here with a G&T in my hand, the sun shining on the horizon, the water glistening and the hills beckoning – it really doesn’t get much better than this. Maybe a good dinner with good people – and that was the plan again for the night!

Pip pip!

We set out Thursday night and Friday across the sound from Stanley. The weather went from a howling gale and rain, to calm and overcast on a rolling basis – switching one out for the other. Based on the weather forecast, it looked like it would be good to leave early on Saturday and head up and around East Falkland to find an anchorage, tucked in between the main land and Little Shag Island. I kid you not, there is a Big Shag Island – as in the birds (minds out of the gutter). 

So Saturday morning came and at 6.30am we weighed anchor, hoisted the main and motor sailed out of Stanley. It felt so good! We quickly became a sailing boat (no engine) and the crew came together to be a proper crew. It might take a good wind to get this boat going, but once she’s going, boy does she zing along and eat up the sea. We were sailing along in 30 knots of wind and seas that might have been thought to be choppy in normal circumstances – but in Pelagic, they rode like calm waters. As we would find out – when the seas get up a little, you still feel the power of the water below you!

We sailed for about 7 hours, arriving in good light at a beautiful natural anchorage on the north side of East Falkland – at the head of Salvador Water (if you want to find it on a map). We dropped the hook (anchor) – a very technical activity on a boat of this size, and then within 15 minutes we were into a dingy and heading to the beach on Big Shag Island. I’ve already owned up previously that I know bugger all about wildlife and plants – yet here I was heading to an island where all I was going to do was look at wildlife and plants. As we rode the dingy in – dolphins followed us and you could pretty much touch them – seriously they would surface about a foot from the dingy’s side and dart away. They are very entertaining and very fast – I think they want stupid humans to lean out and try and grab them, thereby falling into the freezing water to be laughed at by the much smarter mammals! Upon landing on the Island, the most incredible things were the seal pups and parents. We had been warned not to get too close and to never get between parents and pups. We walked carefully around the rocky headland and passed by the most humongous sized seals – like 15 feet long. Surely these must be the parents? Apparently not, they were the immature males. The West Texas Whataburger effect came to mind – surely not on this small Island? As I would find numerous times over the next 24 hours, there is a serene beauty down here in the Falkland Islands – very different between East and West, and while I could make comparison to Scotland and Ireland and New Zealand, there was something unique about this place and I can’t yet place my finger quite on it. The topography would change dramatically over the next several days, but off Shag Island it was undulating, really quite green, but also rocky. It was dramatic in a non enormous way. I think it was the remoteness that struck me. Here we were, over 200 miles from the nearest next land mass, but many more miles to the nearest inhabited place – actually, maybe Rio Grande would be that place – I need to Google it (but not from here where I have no access to Google and won’t for the next 5 weeks, and I may just be a better human being for that!)

The following day, we had figured on a short boating day, taking the boat down the channel into Salvador Water itself – about an hour or so of careful voyage. This was new territory for the boat and for the three permanent crew members who, I haven’t yet mentioned – and I should do, especially as two of the three aren’t coming with us across the Southern Ocean! When I started my last blog I resolved not to talk about the people I was sailing with and then half way through and a few long days sailing with Barclay – and I had to mention him – it was my release and that dragged other people into the thing – so to not mentioned the permanent crew of Pelagic would seem churlish. 

First of all, our current skipper, Alec. He is from Cornwall, but says he’s spent over half his years in South Africa and his accent is a combination of the two – he definitely has a “grudge” and he keeps “hees car een eet.” He is a good guy – probably in his late 30’s, could be younger, but I don’t think so. He has been master of Pelagic Australis and, before that, Little Pelagic (as they say) for the last several years or so, but sailed down here in the high latitudes with Skip Novak (the owner) in various positions over 12 years and he is quietly very confident, very knowledgable and very capable (which is a good thing, don’t you think?) His briefing on the first day was straight forward and to the point. Not a single word was wasted and nothing superfluous was added, including telling us the main safety briefing would be later in the week – “so don’t destroy my boat in the meantime!”

His first mate is Thomas – who looks a bit like Captain Haddock from Tin Tin. He is German, from the very nice Bavarian town of Ulm (which I know quite well). He’s been first mate on this boat for quite some time, like 5 years I think. He is quite a philosophical sort of chap maybe late 30’s also, but who knows because he has a thick black beard covering his face with rounded wire framed glasses perched on top of the beard. He quietly expounds well thought out points of view, rarely extreme in any way, thoughtful and declarative! He knows the boat inside out (and this boat has a lot of mechanical and electrical systems and they need to be understood before we take it across the water) and if you engage him and listen, he is a very good teacher. When I say there are a lot of systems – they aren’t necessarily high tech, but they are still systems. The doors to the two heads do not have locks on them, so there is a system to avoid the embarrassment of someone opening the door while one is attending to matters of state – knock first. I said not everything was high tech. Between the heating, the gen set, the very large Cummins diesel engine, the day tank, the lock on the lifting keel, the very heavy duty winless (lowers and raises the anchor), the battery monitoring system, the switch over between regular and power driven steering (one is on deck outside, the other in the pilot house inside, one is good for sailing and one isn’t – guess which one isn’t? Yes – inside the pilot house – swines!)

The sails and running rigging are a thing of beauty with more lines than the London Underground – running back stays, three forestays each with a furling line and two sheets, a four reef main with 7 lines and a boom that is large enough to climb on and crawl along when the sail is coming down and being flaked. There is a coffee grinder (a two person pedestal winch – not really for grinding coffee) to grind up the main or a reefing line.  So – a lot of things to master if we’re to be able to adequately crew this thing and sail her properly.

The third member of the team is Alec’s South African wife, Giselle. I believe she and Alec worked the Little Pelagic (53 ft – not so little and then worked this one for a number of years). She is equally qualified on the boat systems and on making Pelagic sail (and secretly, I may be more afraid of her – she doesn’t take any crap when she’s running the deck!) She also acts as our wildlife guide and she is a fully qualified dive instructor – like I’m going to do that – underwater! She also is a first class cook, but then all three of them can cook really well. So far, we have divvied the cooking between us and we’ve eaten some pretty damned good meals.

It must be hard living in the confined space of a boat for an extended time, even if this one has more space than most sail boats. This is their life. They are on her for more than six months of the year. And then, a bunch of guys arrive who want to sail your baby and they are going to invade your privacy. This has to be quite difficult. When we sailed around Great Britain, we would settle into a pattern with the crew by the end of the week. Everyone knew the system and the way of working. Then – a new bunch would arrive on the Saturday and our space, the space we had become so comfortable in, would be infested and things would become uncomfortable and sometimes annoying! The biggest part of this boat’s work (and therefore her crew’s) is carrying paid passengers down to South Georgia and to the Antarctic Peninsula. South Georgia is an Island in the South Atlantic, not the State in the US – it is the place where Shackleton eventually sailed to from Antarctica when his expedition became marooned – and he sailed it in an small open boat in freezing, rough seas – with just a sextant to navigate by, then he climbed a hither too unclimbed mountain without equipment and eventually reached a Whaling Station to raise help to go back and rescue his crew – which he then did – and so, I would suggest he was a hill climber in life.

Generally, the passengers who charter Pelagic either want to climb something or walk on an ice field or film wildlife in very cold, remote places  (the BBC have certainly chartered this boat in the past). Pelagic Australis used to also take charters around Cape Horn, but apparently the Chilean Government have put pay to that and decreed that all boats doing that trip out of Porto Williams need to be owned and skippered by Chilean nationals – not an unfair thing maybe, but it’s a job protection scheme for the large Chilean Navy, for when their deck officers retire. Incidentally, these ex-naval officers have no interest in this kind of work, so instead, the boats going out Porto Williams theses days tend to be unfit, unsafe and mainly unprofessional boats, but of Chilean ownership and management. I’ve heard this is a now a dodgy business to be involved in or to buy from – maybe it’s not unlike buying a car in Essex – where I’m sure you have to be from Essex to sell cars and on the surface the vehicles might look good, but in reality. …… know what I mean!

Any way – now you know a little about the permanent crew – and I’m sure you’ll know more if you keep reading! Back to Sunday and our day. In the morning, a few of us took a dingy ride over to the main land and walked a little inland and then back around so we could come up on a colony of Gettu Penguins (is colony the right word – let me check Google…..apparently yes – who knew – not me, but maybe Google, which I don’t have!) They were small penguins and very amusing. Some were practicing building nests – which involved bringing stones – individually – from the shore about 100 yards away and then meticulously collecting small pieces of plant and other Flora and the like to bed down on top of the stones. They were only PRACTICING for the next season! Can you imagine humans doing that – practicing building houses – OK, maybe there are certain companies in the house building business who roughly approximate to practicing when they build, as in they haven’t necessarily got it right yet, but they charge for their output regardlessly. The penguins eyed us up with a certain caution, but because this wasn’t the breeding or rearing season – they didn’t care about us. Once again, I was in awe of the surroundings. We had stalked up and around a little creek and back to the penguins, and it reminded me of an area up on the North East Coast when you get behind the Dunes (Beadnel), – but more unique than that – there are no penguins in Northumberland. It was just stunning in its simple beauty. I remember as a kid, camping up on the Northumberland coast and we kids would be shooed out of the tents very early in the morning, occasionally accompanied by Dad, but usually not and we would scout this area behind the dunes, in search for mushrooms. We rarely found any and when we did, we had no idea if they were toadstools or mushrooms. Over the years, when I thought about it, I realized that what seemed like a treat from Mam and Dad, letting us sneak off early to explore was in fact an opportunity for some peace and quiet (and they already had eight kids).

We spent the early afternoon navigating carefully through the channel up into Salvador Water and, once we’d dropped the hook in a strengthening wind, we again headed to the shore, this time it visit a settlement – which was a group of a few houses, and a farm with out-buildings. It was a damp business getting on to dry land, but worth it. Where we landed, there was an old stone jetty and a deserted boat house, harking back to the days when getting from here to Stanley would have been a ridiculously long horse ride (there was a plaque up by a dirt road telling us that the road was only built in the early 1990’s) or it would be a boat ride. The first building and some half a mile from the main buildings, was the shearing shed. It was easy to see how the sheep are fed in one side and out the other. There were raised air vents in the corrugated roof and an old generator stood to one side – this was still clearly in use. No doubt at one time, the fleece would have been bundled and taken directly down to the jetty to be transported to Stanley and onwards to the U.K. Midway between where we landed and the main settlement, set off to the side of the road, there were two small graveyards. Taking a closer look, one had three graves in it, the most recent was dated 1893. I would guess that over time, things changed and the dying or dead would be taken back to Stanley and eventually buried in the Main Island cemetery. Of course, no one will know exactly where they were buried, try asking. The other graveyard had no head stones, just an outline of the grave in small rocks, but there were fresh flowers on both the graves. One was normal grave size, while the other was clearly for an infant or child, and again it had relatively fresh flowers. This suggested known relatives of the current farmer. We later met the farmer and land owner, Nick, but I couldn’t ask him about it – it seemed way too personal. These two sets of graves were away from the main settlement and on a bleak Sunday afternoon they seemed isolated and lonely places to be (thinking about it – I guess all graves are pretty lonely places to be). This settlement was into its 5th generation, so it could easily have dated back to pre 1893. The current farmer has been farming it since the early 1980s, when he took it over from his father. In speaking to him (and we concluded he was pleased to have someone to talk to), he told up they had 8,000 (yes, eight thousand) head of sheep on 5,000 hectares and they had specially bred a strain of sheep that would thrive in this barren area and produce high quality wool. Clearly sheep farming is a technical business and the Archers fully misrepresent what has to be done in the world of sheep farming (for those in places other then the U.K. – the Archers is a daily radio programme – a tale of everyday country folk). This guy has spent time in both New Zealand and Bradford in the U.K., learning his trade. He drove an old Land Rover, wore shredded blue overalls covering a spectacular green sweater with a high collar that would have cost a fortune anywhere else. He spoke with a slightly West Country English accent. He was educated, informed and generally thought we needed to know far more about sheep farming than we really did, but it was very informative. As we turned to heard back to the dingy and out to the boat, the heavens darkened, the wind picked up even more and the rain started. By the time we got back to the boat we were drenched – but this is normal on a sailing boat.

We repositioned the boat a couple of miles to the other side of the large bay, tucked in on the lee side of a small hill, ready for the gale that was already building. We then tucked ourselves up below deck and dined on meat balls in a rich marinara sauce served with pasta and a salad. Just the sort of food on a night like this and a great hit, washed down with some distinctive red (from a box!) Our Sunday had been filled with new discovery and it was ending with a great dinner with good people, safe and protected. I think I shared in a post from the last sail – how I like Sunday nights – it’s a glorious feeling I get when the evening draws in, folks turn their lights on to greet the dark, winding themselves down from the weekend and up for Monday and the return to the work week – and I’m not! I really like it when the night draws in, dark and blustery and I just don’t need to worry – fire on, cup of tea in hand (absolutely no fire on a boat). So this Sunday night we tucked ourselves up down in the salon (saloon) on Pelagic Australis and waited without anticipation for the gale to arrive.

Pip pip!

PS. A message for Jamesie. The sunglasses you took such delight in poking fun at are working just brilliantly – not a tear it be experienced – so there!