News from the boat reported daily by Jerzy Kolakowski and Michal Boguslawski

 

28 January 2004

Leelee,
We'll get hback to Peurto Williams. Storm yesterday and we headed fo
r cover. We all needed the rest of a night at anchor after Drake pas
sage. Winds 50 gusts of 75 but the boat is so heavy no problem. We
did sail backwards in an orderly fashion for a few minutes. Finally,
go to see some stars last night. Southern Cross, Canopus,the Magella
clouds. I'll get another message out at least from Ushaia.

Patrick

22 January 2004

 

Leelee,
We have added another continent to the list. We went ashore at the tip of the Arctowski Peninsula--64 degrees 36 minutes roughly. Not an easy landing, but we all got ashore in turn. Now we're headed back north. Perhaps it might even warm up a bit. Something tells me we'll be back. Cold, severe and gorgeous. There are, however, too many t
our boats.

Patrick

20 January 2004

Unfortunatelly weather did not cooperated yesterday, strong wind (up to 60 kts) prevented them from sailing South. They spend all night sailing around Amdirality Bay. This morning weather improved and they were planning to go South.

Robert

KB2PNM

18-19 January 2004

Thay are visiting Polish Station in King George Island. They should cast off today (19). They Are planning to sail South and reach Davis Coast. Check the weather maps where you will find latest maps with ice

Robert KB2PNM

17 January 2004

message from Patric Lee

Leelee Greetings. We visited cape horn and have the $10 stampas to
prove it. We headed south. Now about 2 days later we have cleared a
bit of a storm. We have been running under a small storm jib. Today at the beginning of our watch Gerhard saw the first iceberg. Now we're in the middle of them approaching Robert and Nelson Islands. We'll go between them and then up to Admiralty Bay. We'd like to go to Deception and then down the penninsula, perhaps as far as Anvers Isl
and and the pass between it and the mainland. Words cannot do justice to the beauty of the icebergs. The big ones are a piece of cake; it's the little ones that cause the problems. One person watches for
growlers and the other steers. Not a problem now; the newness gets p
lenty of volunteers. We'll how it looks at midnight. Cold as heck;
even though it never gets dark. More later.

Patrick

 

Dear Robert, thanks for weather reports. Everything is ok. Position:

59deg48.6S;063deg36.8W

Pressure:960 hPa. wind from west, 20 kt

Michal

15 January 2004

Robert, everything is OK. We are sailing in good direction. Sea is high, waves - few meters, wind NNW - 7B. Position: 57 deg 49.08S, 64 deg 35.00W. Good humor in spite of the cloudy weather and rain.

Best regards

Michal

Below - second message dated 15 of January

Thanks fo message. I have never seen such a low atmospheric pressure: It is 969 hPa. It dropped from 998 hPa today. I am just wondering what changes in the weather it will bring? Everything is OK. Position: 58deg39min S, 64deg24minW

Michal

 

14 January 2004

Robert,

Positon: 56deg 09min South, 66deg 59min West. We visited Cape Horn today. We walked up in 3 groups. Now we are on the way to King George Island and Arctowski's Station. Everything is OK. Best regards

Michal

 

13 January 2004

Leelee

We are finally underway. We left Puerto Williams around 6 pm and now
just after midnight have about 10 or 11 hours to the Cape. We are m
otoring as the wind is directly in our face. The wind is not bad bu
t the visibility is terrible. Radar running as engine is generating p
ower to supply it. The boat is quite comfortable on the small waves.
It is 61 feet long and weighs about 40 tons. More later.

Patrick


Below is the first message from today

Thanks for weather report. We are in Port Williams waiting for better weather. So far we do not yet have permit to go. It is windy

Jerzy

 

12 January 2004

Robert, we will be leaving soon, but we will stop in Port Williams waiting for your decision when to go towards Drake. The spirit on the boat is fantastic, but we are waiting for the Fax from Poland because some oficials here have problem with the fact that we are on Polish boat but we are not from Poland. Robert please remember that you are a part of the team and like all of us you too have your duty and a lot depens on you (Jurek is talking about weather reports -KB2PNM)

Best Regards

Jerzy

 

 

11 January 2004

This morning we had big, tasty and cheap breakfast, then we picked up main sail from repair and went to visit Mr. Michal Zaprucki, the only Polish man in Ushuaia. He has been living here since 1952. He's 92 y.old, but in very good shape. First he told us the story about his way to Sybir (1942), then story about his colorfull life. I recorded everything of the tape for TV POlonia. Later surprise, his wife and lovely doughters served the best lamb we have ever had. Great people. Wife and doughters do not speak POlish and very little English. Later Mr. Michal came to visit our boat. We are planning to visit him on our way back from Antartica and talk more. He's very intelligent man, and still has good memory. He remember Baranowicze (he was born there), Syberia, Palestine, Angola, England, Argentina, Buenos Aires and of curse Ushuaia. He has 4 sons and 4 doughters.

Later we chartered two little planes and went to film bird view of Ushuaia, Beagle Canal, fiords, lakes and Port Williams. It was beautiful, snow, mountains, valleys. Later we visited Polish sailor from Warsaw, who's been sailing for last 6 years. He told us where to go and what to see. We are planning to cast off tomorrow AM. We got your e-mail via Inmarsat. Kaz Maucy is the man responsible for communication. He checked also all electronics. Everything works great. Weather was good today, sunny, little wind, sometimes short shower. I will send next message tomorrow before departure.

Best Regards

Jerzy

 

10 January 2004

Hi Robert, we arrived without any problems. Everybody is fine and got all luggage. We were on the boat at 3 PM, but very tired, so we decided to check the city Ushuaia. It is small, very cozy little town. We ate dinner in local restaurant and around modnight went to sleep. One more thing, it's getting dark here at 11PM! Today in the morning after breakfast we devided work between us. There is a lot of things that need to be done, checking sails, riggings, washing etc. Few of us will go to buy proviant. In spite of the fact that there is a lot of work spirit is high and everybody has good humor. Graham is a fine man we like him. I think he starts to like us as well.

Weather is changing every hour. We have about 200 meters to internet caffe. I will check mail frequently. It is cheap - 50 ichnich for 10 min.

We are planning to cast off tomorrow in the afternoon, sailing towards Port Williams, but we may delay it since we are very busy. We are waiting for you weather report for next few days. Best regards.

Jerzy Kolakowski.