Travel with Indigo

After passing by the eastern entry into the Straits of Magellan, it and its nearby offshore oil wells invisible in the fog, we enter the Straits of Lemaire with the Isla de los Estados off to port.  Thanks to good timing by the captain, the Straits are flat calm.  Entering a protected bay, we anchor for the night and await our daylight voyage up the famed Beagle Channel to the Argentine city of Ushuaia.

Next day, the weather breaks clean with blue skies alternating with wisps of cloud, a rare condition in these parts, and we weave our way along the international boundary between Argentina and Chile that splits this leg of the Beagle.  As we approach the harbor of Ushuaia, we are obliged to take on a harbor pilot for the short and obvious channel into the city, merely the first of many inanities the Argentine, and particularly the Chilean government, has in store for us.

The city–or at a population of 45,000, town may be more like it–is a postcard pretty place perched in the foothills of snow-capped peaks, rising from the waterfront into the forests beyond.  We don’t know it now but this will be our home port, off and on, for the next four weeks.  Its large commercial dock is filled with cruise ships and container ships alike, tied each next to the other.  It receives 370 ship calls each year and the number is growing.  The dock is far too commercial for our yacht, so we anchor in a small bay off its west side and set off to see the town, getting to shore and back each time by our tender carried on the aft boat deck.

I had fully expected Ushuaia to be a ragged frontier town much like the many I had seen in Alaska, but I was mistaken.  It is a tidy place filled with great restaurants serving King crab, Argentine beef and lamb, and wonderful salmon from Chile and Black Hake from the Drake Passage.  Its many shops cater, of course, to the cruise ship trade, but their merchandise is generally of a far higher quality than I had expected.  And it has two fine Irish pubs, the Dublin and the Gallway, both within an easy walk of the shore.  The Dublin is the more popular with the locals and becomes Indigo’s shoreside entertainment center of a sort.  The town also has a disco (nightclub is the term used here for strip clubs) called, with a touch of irony in a Catholic country, Saint Christopher’s.

When we arrive, I take a short walk along the waterfront to the Argentine Navy base where at its only dock is tied, along with several Vietnam era river patrol boats, the “Suboficial Castillo”.  I go there to introduce myself in person to its commanding officer, Lt. Cmdr. Carlos Allievi, to whom I was introduced over the phone back in Punta del Este by his former Navy buddy, Gustavo “Tato” Espina.  After getting past the fatigue clad, machine gun toting shore guard, I am greeted enthusiastically by the ship’s executive officer, Lt. Gonzalo Nieto.  Carlos is on shore leave with his wife.  I invite both of them and Gonzalo for dinner on board Indigo.

The next evening Indigo pulls alongside a menacing looking coastal patrol craft, called the “Intrepeda” (whose captain, Alberto, I am to meet in Dublin pub later), rafted up to “Castillo” and there takes on board Carlos, his wife Laura, one of the junior officers named Victor, and Gonzalo for a dinner cruise.  They are all among the nicest, most cheerful people I’ve ever met anywhere.  Right off they present me with a flag officer’s cap bearing the name and logo of the Castillo, along with a special bottle of wine with the ship’s photo on the label, and a memorial plaque bearing its name and image in bah relief on metal plate.  I reciprocate with t-shirts and caps for all bearing Indigo’s name.  We enjoy a delightful evening of great food prepared by Chef Geraldine, all with a USA theme, fine wines and warm camaraderie among new-found friends.

Only a few days later, we meet with Carlos and Gonzalo and most of their officers in the Dublin pub for a fine time celebrating a birthday of our new stewardess, Tanya Johnson, she of South Africa.  With pub-made fresh pizza and plenty of beer, we all have a great time.  Our entire crew is there, thanks to Carlos allowing two of his young deck officers to stand watch on Indigo while our crew is ashore.

A good buddy from Hope Town, Abaco, Bahamas, and Dewey Beach, Delaware, Rick Judge is with us to join us for the voyage around Cape Horn and across the Drake Passage to Antarctica.  As an experienced sailor, Rick has volunteered to help with watch duties.  Jack Burnell, my good friend of many years had to cancel at the last minute his plans to join us due to a health scare in his family.  The crew would be sorely tested and short-handed without Rick’s help, which we all welcome.

A few days before Rick’s arrival, I am invited, along with Indigo’s captain Toby Gitsham, to lunch on board Castillo with Carlos and his wife, Gonzalo, and two young officers, Victor and Guillermo.  It is one of the most memorable meals I’ve had on this trip, or ever, come to think about it.  With fine wines and a four course meal, it lasts about three hours, time filled with stories, jokes and nonstop laughter.  Near the end of all this revelry, Toby and I are warmly surprised when Carlos brings out the official history annals of Castillo and asks us to sign it.  It traces the history of the ship from the time it became an Argentine warship to the present and contains notes of endearment and signatures from such prominent people as the highest ranking officers in the Argentine Navy and a wide variety of foreign and Argentine diplomats and politicians.  Toby and I feel deeply honored to add our names and notes.  At meal’s end and after photo ops, Toby and I stagger off the ship and return to Indigo in a daze, both deeply impressed with the high quality of young officers in the Argentine Navy (or Armada Argentina as it’s known).  Both Carlos and Gonzalo graduated from the Argentine Naval Academy first in their respective classes.

Next day, Carlos and Gonzalo invite Toby on board Castillo for a two hour learning session on the navigation hazards and weather of our impending voyage to Cape Horn and Antarctica.  They should know.  Castillo’s mission is to patrol the Antarctic Peninsula establishing Argentina’s presence there and rendering aid to distressed vessels, duties they share with Chilean Navy vessels.  The Castillo is, it must be said honestly, a museum piece.  Built in California in 1943 as a US Navy auxillary vessel and launched as the USS Takelma, she saw service in WW II, Korea, and Vietnam before being acquired by Argentina.  She is 190 feet long, draws 15 feet and is powered by a diesel electric motor driven by four 1,000 horsepower Cat diesels.  Her complement includes seven officers and seventy-seven enlisted men.  She is named for an Argentine enlisted man who lost his life while serving heroically in the Falklands (Malvinas in Argentina) Conflict.

A week or so later, I again have Carlos, Gonzalo and some of their fellow officers on board Indigo for dinner and grins.  By then, Kitty and Rick Judge have arrived and join us for the festivities.  Our guests present me with something I have wanted since I was a small kid visiting US Navy ships with my Dad–an official Navy boatswain’s whistle.  But what they present is no ordinary such whistle because it’s attached to a handmade lanyard that is a masterful work of art by one of the Castillo crew done just for me.  It is perfect, and I promptly set about blowing it to the dismay of everybody.  I need practice.  They also present Indigo with a large chunk of berg ice gathered from the ice fields of Antarctica.  It’s great stuff since it hardly melts in your drink.  One chunk lasts nearly all night.  Once again, all of us have a great time together, dining, drinking and sharing laughs.  That night, Carlos and Gonzalo invite Indigo to convoy with them across the Drake Passage, and they invite me upon arrival there to cruise with them on board Castillo.  Carlos even offers me his captain’s cabin for my accommodations.

Now that we are all on board, the plan is to set off for Cape Horn and meet the Castillo forty miles out into the Drake Passage.  For now though, we’re stuck in port waiting for foul weather in the Passage to calm down.  One of the many low fronts that march across the Southern Ocean is doing its dirty deeds down there now, and both the Castillo and Indigo agree it’s no time to leave port.

Before Rick and Kitty arrive, I charter a small single-engine plane for an hour and a half flight winding among the craggy peaks of Tierra del Fuego on one of this area’s few balmy days.  At about this time too, the yacht Octopus arrives.  Owned by Paul Allen, she is the world’s largest privately owned yacht and carries two helicopters, a submarine and a 45-foot sport fishing boat among its array of toys.

When Rick and Kitty arrive, we proceed to Puerto Williams, a Navy base and tiny community sited on an island along the Beagle Channel, where we must deal with Chilean immigration and its rare, even for Latin America, talent for numbskull bureaucracy.  No person of ordinary ability could ask on an official form, “Do the rats on your vessel display unusual behavior?”

The true allure of Puerto Williams, though, is that it is home to the southernmost bar in all the world, actually a partially sunken former Navy ship called the Macalvi, somehow attached to land by way of a dock.  Its bar is a tiny room off the main deck accommodating maybe 20 friendly souls at one time with a ceiling set at just about my height.  Cozy it surely is.  Despite all the tourist hype coming out of Ushuaia, Puerto Williams is actually the southernmost town in the world and the true “Fin del Mundo” or end of the world.  Apart from that distinction, it is a generally clean but poor fishing village with a substantial Navy base and minor airstrip attached.

Now that Kitty is here, she will take over the journal responsibilities and many of her entries will duplicate mine.  But that’s OK–we both notice and record different things.