Heading For Cape Horn

In the southern summer of 1977-78 the author and two companions sailed a 47 foot sloop from New Zealand through the Southern Ocean to Cape Horn where they scuba dived; and on through the waterways, canals and fiords of Tierra del Fuego, the Magellan Straits and a thousand miles of Chilean Patagonia waterways. The narrative terminates at Robinson Crusoe Island off mid-Chile where they dived the wreck of the German light Cruiser Dresden sunk in 1914. In the Golfo de Penas they searched for the lost vessel HMS Wager, storeship of Admiral Anson's 1740 British expedition to loot Spanish ports. These, and other diving and sailing stories, intersperse the journey. The voyage marked the end of an era and pre-dated modern aids. Without a workable radio they navigated with a sextant, two wrist watches and a chart of half the Pacific Ocean. They survived 80 knot gales, numerous knockdowns and seas in the Southern Ocean too great to be adequately described.