It was eleven in the morning when I woke, feeling warm but steamily damp. Andy was still asleep. I unzipped the tent and peered outside. Our mountain lay in front of me and, as always, it was hard to believe we had actually climbed to the top. It was as if the previous days had been a dream. Reality was less appealing: a leaden sky heralded more bad weather. I scooped snow into the pan and fired up the stove. Andy began to stir beside me.
‘You alright?’ I asked.
‘Yeah, not bad; I’m still feeling pretty wasted though.’
‘You made the best choice of pit.’
I pointed at our sleeping bags. Andy had decided on a synthetic filling; although heavier before the drenching his bag had not absorbed water and there was still form and shape to it. In soggy contrast, my down-filled bag looked like a lumpy bin-liner pulled across my body. We laughed at my misfortune. Luckily it did not matter. Before the end of the day we would be back in the comfort of base camp.
Breakfast was a slow business. We were both desperately tired and although we said nothing I sensed little enthusiasm for what was likely to be a tiring walk-out. It was two in the afternoon before we broke camp in wet, driven snow and trudged forlornly down with bowed heads. The snow on the upper part of the glacier had thawed since our approach and we broke through the crust to our knees with every step. It was a relief when we came off the snow and could take off our harnesses and the rope, but now it was raining hard. Progress became more of a stagger as we slipped on bare ice running with water. Andy was finding it difficult and took several bruising falls before we reached our stash at the boulder. There was now more kit and spare food to add to our loads.
‘I’ll take all this and both ropes.’
‘Are you sure?’ Andy replied, wanting to do his bit as ever.
‘Of course, it’s my day job, carrying large rucksacks.’ It was a bit of an over-simplification, but when I work leading commercial expeditions there are many days when portering seems a big part of the deal.
‘Oh, all right then.’
Thankfully Andy was not going to let his admirable independence get in the way of pragmatism. He was hardly going to be travelling light anyway. Once the re-packing was complete we both had huge loads to carry down.
‘If it’s okay, I’m going to press on.’ I said, shouldering the sack. ‘I’ll put the kettle on.’
‘Sure.’
I had got cold during our break and needed to regain some body heat. Despite the days of exertion and the weight of my sack I felt strong and moved quickly down the glacier. The rain intensified in wind-driven pulses as the cloud base dropped, obscuring the mountaintops. We had been lucky to be in the right place at the right time. The brief window we had been granted to climb in had now closed. There was little to see or savour. I simply put one foot in front of the other and tried to maintain a swift pace without falling on the patches of ice.
I paused at the snout of the glacier. Here the ice dropped away steeply into the river valley and it was essential to pick a good line. I eyed the terrain and tried to link together the longest sections where the ice was pitted with rock debris, knowing that this would offer the best traction. Even so there were plenty of bare stretches. Having visualised my route, I descended cautiously, placing and weighting the tips of my ski poles before each step. Or I simply ran down the bare ice aiming to slow up on the next embedded rocks, stumbling to regain balance whenever I slipped.
Finally, it was done and I reached the muddy gravel by the river beneath the glacier. Hurrying on, I contoured above the water and out of the steep ravine. Rock gave way to vegetation and the ground became slippery again, but I made short work of it and was soon back in the main river valley stomping through dripping forest. It had turned into the sort of day all too common in the early winter months at home in Cumbria — cold, wet and windy.
I reached base camp at seven in the evening. It was dank and uninviting but at least it was well-stocked with food. I dumped my rucksack against a tree, dived into the hut and hurriedly ate some salami on crackers. Then I went to the river, filled a pan with water and made tea. After emptying my rucksack I made tomato sauce to accompany the pasta I planned for dinner and started a fire. There was still no sign of Andy. The light was fading.
It was almost dark when I heard the crackle of sticks breaking underfoot. Moments later Andy entered the hut.
‘I thought that was going to never end,’ he said, shaking his head. He looked completely ragged. ‘The end of the glacier was fucking awful. I was lucky not to break something. I was on my arse most of the time.’
‘I wondered how you’d find it. I’ll make a brew.’
We chatted a little while we drank and ate, but what we needed above all else was sleep. We could bask in the glow of our success later. As soon as the meal was finished we headed for our tents.
Sunlight was casting the shadow of branches across my tent when I woke. In the pleasant warmth, the down in my sleeping bag was almost dry and returning to its former lofted glory. There was little to remind me of the previous days of struggle until I stepped outside. Andy was up and busy. Nearly everything he had taken on the mountain was already hanging from bushes to dry. It was just the day for it, though after an initial burst of activity the morning passed lazily. It was nice to relax yet at the same time I was hoping for a visit from the girls. Elaine and Jane were due to leave Yendegaia the following morning and had promised a last ride up to see us.
‘I’m going down to the estancia,’ I told Andy at three in the afternoon, my patience exhausted. ‘I want to see Jane before she leaves.’
‘Sure. I’m going to hang out here.’
‘I’ll be back up to clear the camp as soon as possible,’ I said, stuffing my sleeping bag into my rucksack. The way down was familiar now and the forest felt more benign, less threatening and remote than it had done before the climb.
I met the girls 20 minutes below the camp, threading their way between huge limbs of dead timber in the densest section of forest.
‘It’s Simon,’ shouted Celia.
‘We did it,’ I told them. ‘Got down last night.’
‘Fantastic,’ Jane said, looking visibly relieved. At least on this trip she would leave knowing we were safe. ‘Was it hard?’
‘Hard enough. We had some pretty shitty weather, but got lucky on our summit day.’
‘We’ve been having a great time,’ Jane enthused. ‘Learning to be gauchos.’
Celia and Elaine said they would go and get Andy. It was a nice gesture. They left with Jane’s horse and we walked back through the forest towards the river, swapping stories. Jose had been keeping them busy gathering firewood, riding and castrating horses.
‘Something horrible happened though,’ Jane added in a hushed tone, which seemed mildly ridiculous as no one could hear. ‘Jose was teaching us how to lasso and he pulled a down a foal; it fell badly and broke one of its front legs.’
‘What did he do?’
‘He killed it. Slit its throat.’
‘Well, I don’t suppose he could take it to the vet.’
‘We all felt really guilty,’ Jane continued. ‘It wouldn’t have happened if he wasn’t showing us. We’ve been eating foal since it happened.’
It was a stark reminder of where we were. The remoteness and isolation of this place meant that the remaining domestic animals on the estancia were there to work or as food, and under certain circumstances both. There was little room for sentiment.
We did not have long to wait by the river before Celia and Elaine returned with Andy. With only three horses between five of us it was necessary to shuttle across the river. Once over, I rode pillion behind Jane as we headed back to the estancia, Andy doing his best to keep up on foot.
That evening we dined on the finest rack of foal and roast potatoes in Jose’s cabin. Two sisters from Buenos Aires — Rose-Marie and Florencia — had arrived. They had some association with the trust that oversaw the management of the estancia and planned to walk out to the north. Their manner seemed out of place in a tumbledown hut at the end of the world and I suspected their more natural habitat to be glittery metropolitan soirées. During dinner they monopolised conversation and took it upon themselves to translate for Jose, even though Celia and Andy had been managing to converse with him in Spanish.
‘This is the way of the gaucho,’ they would say at the end each translation.
Thankfully the sisters went to bed early and left us to our party. The wine and beer flowed as we celebrated our success and a last evening all together. Elaine and Jane said their farewells to Jose before we drunkenly made our back to the yacht.
In the morning Celia ferried Elaine and Jane over to the Terra Australis. By the time we reached the liner the girls had been served cocktails in an airy lounge. They had entered a different world from the one we had shared over the previous weeks; we laughed at this sudden change of circumstances but even so it was a sad moment. Their time in this place had been special and now it was coming to and end. Laughter mingled with tears as we said our goodbyes. Tears were still running down Celia’s face on the dinghy back to Ada. A few minutes later Terra Australis weighed anchor and motored from the bay.
We had arranged with Jose to go and clear our camp from the forest. In bright afternoon sunshine we rode up the valley but could get no further than the river. The storms while we had been on the mountain and the warm sunny weather that had followed meant the Rio Neimeyer was swollen with melt-water. Jose was not prepared to cross and we returned to the estancia empty-handed.
Plans had already been made for the coming days. Rose-Marie and Florencia were ready to start their trek and Jose had offered to escort them as far as a pass from the Lapataia valley. Celia was keen on doing more riding and I was happy to take the opportunity to see more wonderful country. Jose also assured me that there was good fishing to be had.
‘I’m going to stay and paint,’ was Andy’s verdict on the excursion. ‘I don’t think I can stand two days on a horse.’
Next morning we headed off at a canter, the dogs weaving across the path of the horses and occasionally snapping at their hooves. Jose looked comfortable and relaxed; even when his horse appeared to be walking it moved faster than everyone else’s. When we reached the broad flats a little inland he broke into a gallop. The other horses followed. My inadequate riding technique was painfully exposed as I bounced in the saddle. At times I thought I was going to fall, but somehow managed to hold on. The day was certainly passing at a faster tempo than our previous ones on horseback. I was beginning to realise what an efficient means of transport horses could be.
Jose stopped at the wide river that drains the Stoppani Glacier and I caught up. It was a good 50 metres across, deep and flowing quite quickly. White glacial flour billowed to the surface and swirled around, making the water look even more menacing. Jose advanced without hesitation, urging his horse into a stumble down the bank where it took a couple of strides on the riverbed and started swimming. The dogs dived in and were immediately swept downstream. Our horses needed no prompting either. I lifted my wellies to stop them filling with water. It was a serious crossing and I knew from many encounters with glacial streams and rivers that if anyone parted company with their swimming horse survival would be touch and go.
By the time Jose hit the far bank the dogs had already drifted out of sight round a bend. He raced off to retrieve them as one-by-one the rest of us gained the riverbank. I felt a surge of relief as my horse’s hooves touched the bottom and it was able heave itself out of the water.
‘That was interesting,’ I called to Celia, with a frivolity I did not feel. We joined Jose down river where he was fishing out the dogs. Some had made it across under their own efforts, but the smaller ones were having difficulty — paddling frantically but going downstream rather than across. Jose made several forays into the water, plucking the dogs out by the scruffs of their necks and dropping them on the bank. Thankfully he did not ask for help.
The crossing behind us, we continued up river for a short way before heading into a side valley. In a small clearing below a forest of imposing, mature trees lay the ruins of a sawmill. Once it had turned out planks that were loaded on to the boat now gently rotting alongside the pier back at the estancia. In its heyday 60 people had worked on the estate. Entering the forest, it was easy to see why the mill had been located here. The trees were by far the biggest nothafagus (Antarctic beech) I had ever seen, with trunks up to an arm-span in width. There was also a good trail — a leftover from the logging days — weaving uphill between huge stumps and the remaining trees. Jose kept up a good pace and soon the trees became smaller and began to thin. We emerged on to boggy grassland that led gently up to a watershed and then more steeply down the other side. A huge, broad valley fringed with peaks opened up in front of us. It was incredible to think that all this land was still part of the same property.
Following a shallow river course, we rode quickly down to the tree line where a tin-roofed shack came into view. Jose called this place ‘la casa’ (the house). Its simple beauty was complemented by its remoteness and isolation. It was unimportant that the building was little more than a shell with wooden beds inside. There was a hearth, a plentiful supply of pre-cut firewood and an axe. All we needed now was dinner. I unpacked my fishing rod and made for a beaver dam lake. The fish started to bite almost immediately and I quickly hooked one — a pretty trout, greenish back dappled with bright orange spots shading to a lighter orange belly. It was too small to eat and after admiring its delicate markings I returned it to the water.
The sisters appeared armed with a length of fishing line wrapped around a tin can, a simple spinner and weight on the end of the line. They soon bagged two good-sized fish before losing interest and drifting back to the casa. Their visit stiffened my resolve to catch something worthy of the pot. I tried several different changes of flies but the fish had stopped biting. The backwoodsman seemed to have been upstaged by the city socialites; not that it really mattered, it was a lovely afternoon and the setting beautiful.
A strange sight greeted me back at the casa. There was a pile of steaming, half-digested grass lying on the ground and the dogs were all asleep.
‘What’s been going on here?’ I asked Celia as she appeared in the doorway.
‘We went out hunting with the dogs; Jose managed to lasso a large calf and brought it back here, tied it up and killed it.’ The tone of her voice dropped to a whisper. ‘It was all a bit gruesome; he fed the offal to the dogs. Rose-Marie and Florencia found it quite upsetting.’ I looked again at the steaming grass and realised it had been in the animal’s stomach. My disappointment at not catching a fish big enough to eat seemed even less important.
That night the sisters ate the trout they had caught but passed on the offer of beef. For now, they were less keen on the way of the gaucho.
Jose and I left early next morning while the others slumbered on in their sleeping bags. Apparently there were bigger fish in Lago Lapataia, a large lake further down the valley. Jose was going to drop me at the lake, go back to the casa, take the sisters to the start of their trek and then return to escort me back. Though we tried to move quickly, the trail was faint and there were treacherous stretches of peat bog. The horses panicked when their hooves sank deeply and at times we had to dismount and lead them on lengths of rope. It was two hours before we reached Lago Lapataia and halted at a hut by its northern shore. Jose took the saddle and bridle off my horse, then rode away.
I immediately felt very isolated. This place added new meaning to the phrase ‘the middle of nowhere’. The vast lake was cloudy with glacier run off; dry fly fishing was not going to work, as the fish would not see the fly on the surface. I tied on a wet fly and began to fish. Soon I was absorbed in the simple activity of casting and gently pulling in the line. Periodically I moved a few yards. There were no bites or other signs of fish. After a while I took a break and my attention turned to the weather. It had been sunny when we arrived, now the sky was filling with grey cloud and a cool breeze was blowing from the north-west. I fished a bit longer then gave up and sat in the hut to wait for Jose. As the wind steadily rose I became increasingly anxious. The weather was changing quickly. I thought through my options and concluded I needed to leave. However, I had never ridden on my own and nor did I feel confident about finding the trail back to the casa; furthermore, the horse would need saddling before I could go anywhere. It all seemed rather daunting. Then it began to rain and I knew I would have to get on with it.
The horse was tied to a tree and grazing peaceably. It was promisingly co-operative as I led it to a railing outside the hut. I managed to get the bridle over the animal’s head and the bit into its mouth. Buoyed by success I put on the saddle and pulled the girth tight. Finally, I mounted the horse, flicked the reins and, to my surprise, set off.
The first obstacle was a river crossing. The horse barely broke its stride as we went down the bank and into the water. It was not as serious as the crossing the day before, but I still felt a surge of relief when it was over. Two more crossings of the same meandering river followed in quick succession and with each I felt my confidence growing. Finding the trail was not proving as difficult as I expected, as the horse seemed to know the way.
For a while the rain held off, but the wind was gathering strength and I had seen enough of the weather in this part of the world to know that a storm was building. Hopefully I would get back to the casa before it hit. Where the trail was clear I urged the horse to trot and we soon reached the peat bog. I dismounted and to hurry along simply led the horse by the reins, ignoring the longer length of rope that was coiled around its neck. The horse struggled a little as its hooves broke through the surface of the bog, but I kept pulling, marching on. In the centre of the bog the horse stumbled and its back legs sank deeply into the mud. It panicked and in a rapid series of lunges, reared up and surged towards me. A hefty kick from a front foot caught my left thigh and knocked me on my back. I screamed and let go the reins as the horse thrashed past me, only stopping once it had found firm footing. My thigh ached and I knew I was going to have a big bruise later. But I had been lucky, a kick like that could easily have broken my leg. I hobbled to the horse, uncoiled the rope, as I should have done in the first place, and then led the reluctant animal through the rest of the bog from a safe distance. Now I moved with greater caution, only too aware I could not afford a serious accident in this place. By the time I reached the casa the wind was near storm force, driving waves of sleet down the valley. There was no sign of the others. I took the tackle off the horse, tethered it to a bush and made a fire.
Night was approaching when I heard dogs barking, quickly followed by the thud of hooves. I hurried out to see Celia and Jose gallop up to the hut. There was snow in the air and Jose was visibly relieved to see I had made my own way back; he would not have had time to collect me from the lake in the remaining daylight. I’d made the right decision.
‘It was a very long way,’ was all Celia said as they brought the saddles into the casa. She and Jose were wet and exhausted and I wondered how the sisters would be faring on their first night under canvas. Not very well in all probability.
We ate some more of the calf before settling down for the night. Not that the night itself was very settled. Driving rain replaced the sleet and snow as ferocious gusts of wind tore at the building. The casa had obviously suffered from similar batterings in the past. Sheets of the corrugated iron roof flapped so noisily in the blasts that I thought they would be ripped off. Amazingly, they held.
Conditions were little better in the morning and I expected Jose to sit tight until the weather improved. To my dismay he did not. We saddled the horses in driving sleet and Jose loaded the remaining quarters of the calf on to the two spare horses. The way back to the pass was directly into the wind and most of my warm clothing was still at our base camp. Without socks, gloves or my fleece hat I was soon uncomfortably cold. I shivered my way to the highpoint and only began to feel warm once we were down in the forest above the sawmill. The colder temperatures thankfully meant the river was less swollen with melt-water and we crossed it with relative ease. As we galloped the final stretch the clouds began to part and shafts of bright sunlight illuminated the valley. I was relieved to get back to the estancia.
Andy was painting on the porch of Jose’s hut when we arrived. He looked tired and drawn.
‘Some storm, eh?’
‘I thought the hut we stayed in was going to blow away,’ I replied. ‘What’s it been like here?’
‘I was up all night, worried the yacht was being torn from its moorings.’
Later we learnt that the storm had caught a large cruise ship in the Drake Passage — the stretch of water between Cape Horn and the Antarctic Peninsula. A huge wave had broken over the vessel and smashed the bridge. There had been a number of injuries and lifejackets were issued to the passengers and crew in case they were forced to abandon ship. The thought of going into life rafts, in that water, in such stormy conditions, is scary indeed.
Our time in Yendegaia was coming to an end. Celia was keen to move on and Andy and I were looking forward to seeing the mountains we knew lay further to the west. The next day was calm and sunny. Only the fresh snow on the peaks gave any indication of the storm that had passed. We took a final ride up the valley and cleared our base camp, leaving just the shelter, which Jose said could be useful for his hunting trips.
That evening Jose roasted a sizeable chunk of the beef brought back from Lapataia and we shared it in a farewell meal. Andy spoke of his winter solo trips to the FitzRoy region of Argentina — of the weeks he’d spent waiting in remote huts and of his epics on the mountains. There were parallels with Jose’s life in this wild place. The gaucho often went months without meeting another person, seemingly quite happy with just his dogs and horses for company. I guess the big difference was that Andy spent time in such places for recreation, Jose for his job.
Two days later we finally got Ada out of the Bahia Yendegaia and into the Beagle Channel. There had been a false start when strong headwinds forced us back to the sanctuary of the estancia. We felt a little uncomfortable about imposing on Jose again, having already said our goodbyes, and so left him to his solitude. When the winds were still unfavourable on the second morning we did not even pay him a visit. Conditions finally improved and allowed us to sail in the afternoon. After more than two weeks spent in and around Yendegaia it was refreshing to be back in the Beagle Channel. I was ready for a change of scenery.
The slopes and valleys running down to the shores grew ever steeper as we motored west and the channel gradually narrowed. Occasionally, tantalising glimpses of glaciers and snow-capped peaks appeared through the cloud. Squally showers tracked along the channel to meet us and progress slowed in the increasing swell. As Ada crawled past the Chilean navy post at Yamana — a white hut on the shoreline with the national flag painted on its tin roof — someone waved to us from the balcony. A little further on the channel forked and we crept into a narrow passage between the mainland and the chillingly named Devil’s Island, stunted trees somehow clinging to its windswept outline. The island slid astern and a bay appeared on the mainland; at its head a huge icefall spilled down from the Hollandia Glacier and seemingly into the trees behind the beach. It was one of the most dramatic views I had ever seen.
‘Caleta Olla,’ Celia shouted, as she turned Ada into the bay and began issuing instructions for mooring. Andy and I uncoiled bundles of rope for laying lines to the shore and prepared to drop anchor. However, there was a surprise to come. As we sailed deeper into the bay, a cove came into view hidden by a small hill on its seaward side and cliffs on the other. Radiant turquoise water lapped on a crescent beach fringed by trees. It was so beautiful I almost expected it to be surrounded by hotels and packed with tourists. A single French yacht — Le Broulard — lay at anchor.
We spent a full day exploring around Olla before sailing further west to the fjord of Seno Pía. At its mouth we slipped through a gap in a submerged moraine ridge, gazing in silent awe at the surrounding granite cliffs and waterfalls that dropped straight into the sea. Further in, the fjord became choked with ice calving from two enormous glaciers. Frustratingly, the weather remained uncooperative. Each day started clear but soon cloud would build in the west and be driven by steadily increasing winds, bringing rain and gales. Then after dark the rain would stop and stars appear through breaks in the cloud. Yet despite the weather I knew it was a privilege to be in such a place and felt a touch of melancholy knowing our journey was coming to an end.
Four days after leaving Yendegaia, rough conditions forced Celia to turn Ada around and seek refuge in the nearest anchorage — Bahia Tres Brazos, a large fjord that cuts deep into Isla Gordon on the south side of the Beagle Channel. As Celia manoeuvred Ada into a small inlet within the fjord, Andy and I readied lines and lowered the dinghy. The entrance to the inlet was narrow and the wind gusting wildly. Celia was still new to the art of turning the boat in these tight spaces and her face was tense with concentration. Once in the inlet she shouted to drop anchor. It held, but the yacht was still being blown from side to side and there was a very real danger of hitting the surrounding rocks. We needed lines to the shore to keep Ada in central position.
‘You go,’ I heard Celia shout to me from the stern of the boat. I immediately went over the side and into the dinghy, untied it and paddled for the shore. I was quickly blown backwards faster than I could paddle forward and soon passed Celia, a look of horror on her face. I was trailing a line to secure Ada so there was no danger of my actually being blown away, but I needed to reach the land. With huge, frantic strokes I succeeded in running the dinghy aground, pulled it on to the rocks so it could not be swept away, then started scrabbling along the shoreline. We needed to get the rope quickly back beyond the bow of the boat but it was no easy task. The shore was covered in dense scrub and rose to a small headland. I had to thread the rope around bushes and at one point swing around a tree, metres above the sea, while still keeping hold of the rope. I was rushing and soon the inevitable happened: I slipped and plunged up to my chest in the icy water. I was out within seconds, clambering up the rocks still holding the line. The cold was bitter and by the time I had tied the rope to a suitable tree I was shivering uncontrollably. Then I had to repeat the exercise, this time dragging the dinghy below me in order to use the line to haul myself back to the yacht.
‘Why didn’t you go with Andy?’ Celia asked as I climbed on board.
‘You shouted for me to go,’ I said defensively.
‘I shouted ‘two go’,’ she explained, laughing at our simple communication error before turning serious again.
‘We need another line out. Put the engine on the dinghy and go with Andy this time.’
After lowering the motor to Andy in the dinghy I climbed in, started the engine and moved towards Ada’s bow where Celia had readied another line. She passed it down to us and Andy tied it to the side of the dinghy. I revved the motor and we sped off across the inlet as Celia fed out line. She could barely keep up and out of the corner of my eye I saw a loop of rope snag round her ankle and pluck her off her feet. I knew the line would go tight and so spun the dinghy around. Within moments we were skimming back over the rope, which was now likely to snag in the propeller. I snatched and pulled the hinged engine out of the water just in time. Celia got back on her feet and I manoeuvred the dinghy much more slowly to the shore.
Later, over a bottle of wine at the dinner table, we joked about our joint incompetence. It had hardly been a textbook demonstration of how to moor a yacht.
The weather was no better in the morning, but we managed to remove the lines and slip anchor without mishap. After days of struggling westwards into relentless headwinds under motor now it was time to go eastwards back to Puerto Williams. Out in the main channel, Celia cut the engine and we set to work. It was time to sail. The Genoa cracked as it filled and the yacht surged forward. Although it was hard graft and we got soaking wet and bitterly cold, it was a joy to take turns on the wheel. As Ada surged down the waves of an increasing swell we screamed to the thrill of it all.
We were tired when we reached Caleta Olla that evening and an even bigger day lay ahead, sailing all the way to Williams with a great tailwind that only dropped as we reached the port. We were ready to celebrate. After showers in the yacht club and dinner on the boat, we headed to the Mecalvi Bar. The slope of the bar floor became more difficult to handle as the evening progressed, but it was Saturday night and we were going to make the most of it. We walked into town and in a residential side street found a nightclub called Euphoria. I pitied the neighbours. Euphoria appeared to be an ordinary house with most of its internal walls ripped out, and it was rammed with people — mostly with men, Peurto Williams being primarily a naval base.
As one of the few women in the establishment, and the only one with long blonde hair, Celia got a lot of attention. Over the course of several hours of dancing Andy and I did our best to shield her from the advances of the Chilean sailors. Tempers got a little frayed.
‘Shall we sort them out,’ Andy shouted to me at one point.
‘I don’t think that would be wise.’ The odds were hardly in our favour.
Eventually, we stumbled back to the yacht, happy but exhausted.
We all felt terrible in the morning, and in a day made more gloomy by our hangovers helped Celia strip the yacht of its sails and rigging. Then we took off the cockpit and stowed everything neatly in the bow. Finally, we moved the boat to the shelter of the pier where it would spend the winter. It was time to go home.
Andy and I secured a lift to Ushuaia on a yacht belonging to an Argentinian called Mono, who had taken Jane and Elaine back earlier. He looked like a giant, broad-shouldered Father Christmas. Celia, meanwhile, had received a better offer.
‘The guys have asked me if I want to crew Darwin Sound back to Rio del Plata,’ she announced after visiting the French friends who had arrived in the port. She could barely contain her excitement at the prospect of sailing such a boat all the way up the Argentine coast virtually to Buenos Aires.
‘You should go for it,’ Andy said.
‘I think I will.’
We left Puerto Williams late. Mono operated to his own schedule and did not return from town with the necessary paperwork until lunchtime. Then he needed lunch. The final farewell was painful and as we chugged from the harbour I wondered when we would all meet again.
We did not get very far. Mono simply motored across the channel and we spent the night in Argentina tied up alongside the pier of the Estancia Remilino.
‘We should not stay on this side of the channel,’ he confided. We were technically ‘illegals’ since we could not complete Argentinian immigration until Ushuaia. ‘But no one will know.’ Mono, I would come to learn, lived to his own rules.
I woke to the throbbing sound of the yacht’s engine. It was barely light. Andy and I rushed to get up but by the time we got on deck Mono was already casting off.
‘I think there’s a storm coming,’ he said. ‘I want to get back to Ushuaia before it arrives.’ The wind was blowing strongly from the west and the sky filling with wispy cirrus, often a precursor of bad weather. A faint glow of orange marked the sunrise over the eastern end of the channel. As we motored noisily along, Mono prepared a simple breakfast below deck while Andy and I became transfixed by the sky. I took one photograph and then another as an explosion of oranges, mauves and reds rippled across the underside of huge lenticular clouds hovering above the eastern horizon. The show seemed to go on for hours and only when daylight was nearly full did I think of looking to the west. There the white outlines of the Cordillera Darwin peaks stood clearly in all their remote beauty between the sea and a dark violet sky and I knew I would have to return to these empty mountains as soon as possible.
As we approached Ushuaia a yacht came into view coming from Puerto Williams, gaining rapidly on Mono’s boat.
‘It’s Darwin Sound,’ he said, examining the vessel through a pair of binoculars. It was bewildering, we had been told they would sail directly to Rio del Plata, but soon its distinctive white hull and twin masts were clearly visible. Mono called them on the radio.
‘They are going to Ushuaia to get fuel.’
Darwin Sound caught up quickly and as it came alongside Celia appeared on deck and started waving to us. She made her way to the bow of the yacht and hung over the railings with her arms stretched up and out like Kate Winslet in Titanic.
On our last day in Ushuaia Andy and I met up with a couple called Luis and Carolina, who ran the only mountain guide company in town. They were helpful, friendly people and invited us to their house for dinner. They had made three trips to Yendegaia and after the meal showed us some slides. There were views we were familiar with and others that were new. A set of pictures from a winter trip was particularly interesting. One showed a tent glowing in the darkness with a chimney poking out of the entrance, followed by a photo taken inside showing the wood burning stove the couple had fashioned out of a dried milk tin and the chimney made from cans.
‘Outside minus twenty,’ Carolina said. ‘Inside, only underwear.’
They had not been particularly lucky on their attempts to climb at Yendegaia but had obviously had a lot of fun.
‘Hey, look at that,’ Andy said as Luis switched to an image that clearly showed Monte Bove along with the peak we had climbed and a chain of three mountains to the north.
‘These are the Roncagli Peaks?’ Andy asked, pointing at the trio of peaks.
‘Yes,’ Carolina and Luis agreed.
‘Then the peak we climbed is separate.’ Andy was tapping at his map as he spoke. ‘It doesn’t even have a name.’ I took the map off him and studied it intently. It was not the best of maps, little more than a sketch really, but it was all that was available. There was simply a ridgeline from Monte Bove to the Roncagli peaks.
‘It’s not even on the map,’ I added.
‘Exactly,’ said Andy, sounding like a lawyer who had just unearthed a damning piece of evidence.
‘I guess we can name it then. What do you want to call it?’
‘Monte Ada,’ Andy said without hesitation.
I called Jane, before starting the long series of flights back home.
‘Haven’t you heard?’ she asked.
‘Heard what?’
‘There’s Foot and Mouth in the country, our area has been worst hit.’
My shoulders slumped as she listed the farms that had already been affected and people we knew who had lost livestock. Pyres of burning carcasses darkened the countryside around our village, the movement of livestock had been banned and many farmers were virtual prisoners in their own homes. Sweeping restrictions had been introduced to prevent anyone walking across farmland or the open hills. People’s movement was effectively confined to the man-made world of buildings, towns and roads. It was a brutal return to reality. The weeks of freedom in the pristine wilderness and limitless space of Tierra del Fuego had come to an end.
There was other news. Apparently I was going to be a film star.