RADIO NETHERLANDS WERELDEMROEP
“Bark EUROPA: In the Wake of the Ancients”
Part Five: Cape Horn
By: Todd Jarrell
SUGGESTED INTRO: The tall ship EUROPA soon returns to her homeport in The Hague from a forty thousand-mile, two-year grand tour. Returning from Pacific waters, EUROPA chose a rare tall ship “doubling” of stormy Cape Horn, and journalist Todd Jarrell sailed as part of the crew. In this last report chronicling their adventure, EUROPA sails the Furious Fifties latitudes to the very foot of Cape Horn.
RADIO – Short-Wave radio news in Dutch w/ background voices Disc 2 Track 10
The voyage is now in the ninth week and except for an all-too-brief stop at Easter Island we have been far removed from the world; our chart lines crossed the farthest reaches from land on the planet. Captain Klaas Gaastra regularly listens to the short wave but the crew is mostly content to hear only the briefest highlights:
KLAAS 6– “A new record… the Euro beats the dollar again. (Laughs). One Euro is more than one dollar.” Ben “Do I get paid in Euros? “Yeah.” “Sweet!” “Yeah!” Laughs. Disc 5 track 12
JARRELL – Enjoying the westerly current and wind, EUROPA makes excellent time. The months of adventure that once lay before us now swim in our wake; our voyage will end soon. We are far south now and the Horn lies just ahead, as Klaas assures us at the daily two o’clock meeting.
KLAAS 7– “So we re going to the southeast at the moment…Antarctica is calling. We did see penguins this morning so we are getting closer.”
JARRELL – Some weird acceleration seems to take place as the lines of longitude tighten their net here before pursing around the Pole to the south. On the equator each degree of longitude equals sixty nautical miles; here it is half that distance and the minutes of degree seem to fly.
The weather seems hurried as well, delivering three seasons in one afternoon. Even the sun seems impatient for the next day; all night there is a glow in the south and full on daytime lights our work well before four AM.
FORCE 5 (on disc with Part 4 sounds)
As if in sympathy for our desire to reach Cape Horn today, the wind gradually strengthens. By noon every sail on EUROPA is trimmed and lifting, pulling the ship towards the Horn, kicking out a long white wake at nine knots. The following sea overtakes the ship, lifting and then settling her down on a maddening variety of courses.
HELM – KLAAS – “Uhh… Zero Eight Zero…” JEFF repeats- “Zero Eight Zero…(Delete pause)JEFF “…Steady on 0-8-0.” KLAAS – Thank you…”
Islands take form on the port bow, a jagged hazard drawing nearer. Breakers send walls of spray against the rocks and into the air. They are uninhabited and small wonder; from our view they are dark, lifeless and alone.
MOMENT —KLAAS – “But in a triangle more or less, but you can see on our port beam land, Diego Ramirez, and we are about sixty-eight miles off the Cape…so getting closer. So go ahead, Jeff.“ JEFF – ”OK. I’d like to, at this time, propose a moment of silence for the sailors that have not quite made the full trip. So in commemoration of that one moment…1;44 Bell x 3… Klaas – ”Thank you.”
A moment of silence is proposed in memory of the ten thousand souls who have come to grief here. Eight hundred vessels have been lost in the waters known as Cape Horn. Fire, shifted cargo, freak waves, dismasting, violent storms, and thirty-meter waves—all take their toll. Registers recall the ships but it is the loved ones who remember the names of those who perished with them. One can scarcely imagine the fear, anguish and anger with which they died—these waters seem salted with their tears.
FORCE 5
In the afternoon watch Tierra del Fuego’s purpled cordillera shoulders over the horizon, softened with haze. By dinnertime Cape Horn stands proud in the distance. Few points are as well known to sailors; Cape Horn is the fulcrum of two great oceans.
The sunset streaks, gleaming across our wake, but not until much later does the last reluctant light leaves the sky. At eleven o’clock we are abreast of the rock. The silhouette looms, appropriately dark and mysterious, but above the moon-glossed sea with its two twinkling beacons, the Horn is hardly as brooding as its reputation. Whatever ominous vibe there may be vanishes beneath our cheerfulness and relief.
One of our crew has waited years to fulfill this dream of rounding the Horn. Rob Duncan proffers his diamond stud earring to the sea, replacing it with the traditional gold hoop earring of the Cape Horner. According to his research the passage and gold hoop will earn him more than just respect…
SARAH/ROB “Yea. Have you looked at it in the mirror?” “Not bad… Pretty sweet.” “It looks great.” “Thank you…. Now I get to eat with my feet up on the table, get to urinate to windward, and spit to windward and all the other priveledges and wear the gold hoop. Excellent.”
Further, he declares that, traditionally, a sailor of ten times round the Horn is entitled to red tattoos on the forehead, thus allowing him free drink for his natural lifetime at shore-side pubs the world over. We begin checking on that one immediately.
CHILEAN NAVY – “Okay, Roger, thank you very much for your information. Uh, we wish you a good travel, good travel. Good xxx Port Stanley and good sailing. Good sailing from Cape Horn. Uh standing by Channel 16. XXX XXX. Thank you very much. Good evening.” KLAAS – “Yes, thank you very much and standing by One Six.”
The Chilean Navy hails us with congratulations and soon Cape Horn is a hulking milestone in our wake to the west. A sense of ease pervades the ship. The waypoint is passed, the test taken, the dreams fulfilled. Our satisfaction is certain but there is no release, no sense of finality—the ship needs us as much s ever and we have yet another week sail to fetch the Falkland Islands.
We have been out ten weeks and sailed one-quarter distance around the globe—north to south—over 7,000 miles, at five miles per hour. At midnight the starboard watch clumps off to their bunks and port watch takes the deck. The helm is relieved and lookouts are posted. Every squares’l is set. The dark crests push us along. Life continues as normal. I check the midnight entry in the ship’s log. The last sentence, written in Dutch, clearly describes the mood tonight aboard our bark EUROPA. It states simply, “Alles Wel.”
FOLLOWING SEA – ATMOS
© Todd Jarrell–2003
RADIO # 9
KLAAS 6 # 10
KLAAS 7 # 11
FORCE 5
HELM # 12
MOMENT # 13
SARAH/ROB # 14
CHILEAN NAVY # 15
ON DECK # 16
