Puerto Deseado, 47*45,3 S / 65*54,2 W, 2 january 2010.
We are on a buoy in front of a little stone beach. (See photo’s)
Most of the time the wind is blowing very hard.
At low water we are only a few meters from the rocks, very scary.
But the Prefectura insisted we moor to this buoy.
First we refused because we felt much safer on our anchor,but at last we gave in and with their help we moored with three lines on this buoy.
From the patagonia Nautical Pilot:
Fernando Magallanes anchored on the river for repairs in 1520, and named the place Bahia de todos Trabajos (Repair Bay). Francis Drake called on May 1578, and renamed the place Bahia de las Focas. The present denomination dates back to 1586 when Thomas Cavendish named it Puerto Desire, after one of his vessels.
HMS Beagle made two visits here, twice hitting the same rock (Beagle Rock, now destroyed); an engraving in Captain Fitzroy’s journal shows her at anchor on Christmas Day 1833, opposite what is now the Coserena dry dock. A small museum 5 munites’walk from tthe Club Nautico has beautifully preserved artifacts salvaged from HMS Swift, which sank in the inner harbour in 1770; the crew of the Swift were eventually rescued by another British vessel, following an epic 400-mile row in an open boat by some of Swift’s survivors, from Deseado to Port egmond (Islas Malvinas/ Falkland Isles) !!
The day after we arrived here a Swedish boat anchored near us: the name of the boat is
“Blue Dame”. It is a Jeanneau 49 feet long. The owners are Jan (75) & Monika (65).
They are very friendly people. In the morning the wind was again blowing very strong: up to 37 knots and they decided to move because they came very close to the rocks at low tide.
We have a tidal difference here of 5 to 6 meter!
When they reanchored their 10 mm chain broke and they lost their anchor with about 20 meters of chain. They have two anchors and the moored their boat in the fishing harbour at a towing boat. They had a very stressy morning!
On next monday a diver will search for their anchor.
After that they plan to sail straight to Ushuaia because friends will be waiting for them there to continue the voyage through the Chilean waters up north along the west coast of South America. We are also planning to take that route so we will see each other many times.
