January 2018 – SV Raynad

NORTHERN PATAGONIA

Link to: 2018 CHILE PHOTOS- Northern Patagonia- Isla de CHILOE

Yate RAYNAD -bandera Estados Unidos SEÑAL ZMA2821
1/2/2018 01:16
POSICIÓN: 39°53.24’S 073°23.26’W
ANCLADO Isla Mancera

After a very pleasant motor about 12 miles down the river from Valdivia, we are anchored next to the Isla Mancera. Now we must report our position to the Chilean Armada (every day for the remainder if our time here, unless we are continuing to stay in a marina). They keep a close watch on traffic within Chilean waters, which is great, however, we can only hope that we do everything correctly with our limited Spanish!?!?! Fortunately, we can report via email, so I cut and pasted the basic report done in Spanish (yeah Google translate) and will find out if they will understand.

1/2/2018 08:45
POSICIÓN: 39°50.54’S 073°32.16’W
RUMBO: 246T RV;VELOCIDAD: 5.8 NUDOS
Navigando Isla Maldera a Isla Chiloe
Dos personas; Capitán John Totten, Tripulante Kristy Kissinger-Totten
We lifted anchor at about 7am this morning and are now underway south toward Isla Chiloe. We expect this 148nm trip to take us about 12-14 hours depending on the winds. Will likely be cloudy and rainy with increasing NW winds as we proceed, so good sailing, but not necessarily warm. Sadly, we’ll miss seeing all of the lovely coastline too. The sea birds are super busy this morning and seem to enjoy coming close to our stern, so we’ve had fun watching them. A few sea lions too who mostly surprise us as they pop up out of the water or roll over looking at first more like logs than marine mammals!

We’re going along well, although mostly having to motor with light winds and rocky rolling seas. The birds are wonderful: albatross, shearwater, petrals…and even a large whale which wasn’t a Humpback, so I’ll need to look up my whale IDs because its tail was solid black without any white. I just saw a pod of whales, large ones with a big column of spraying mist when they took a breath and one even came closer to the boat and rolled up a long dark fluke! We can see about a 100m high strip of the coastline until the clouds obscure the tops. I’d really hoped for clear weather on this trip so that we could see some of the scenery that we missed on our arrival when it was completely foggy. The trip down the river yesterday was lovely, it’s a beautiful estuary filled lots of birds, most special being the Black Necked Swans that are nesting and so we’ve seen several pairs with chicks:)
We had dinner on the sailboat of a couple from Victoria, Canada who are just finishing their 4th trip around Patagonia! They’ve really put in the miles including Antarctica, South Georgia, Svalberg, Greenland and the NW Passage east to west into Alaska! It was a terrific evening with some very inspiring people and we were able to get some useful information. She used to be a professional pianist and taught music in various places and in fact has an very nice electronic keyboard built into their boat which she demonstrated a bit, all by memory apologizing for being out of condition. She 70yrs old now, he is 68 – amazing!

1/3/2018 11:12UTC/ 8:12 Chilean
POSICIÓN: 41°51.51’S 073°52.83’W
ANCLADO Isle Chiloe,Estero Quetalmo, Fond Balcacura

Alas we are safely anchored! What started as a rather benign voyage rapidly changed to snarly starting around midnight. Just as we were approaching the infamous Chaco Canal….we were hit with 35-50kt winds, rain, and an outgoing tide! Raynad took the pounding well and our VM engine powered us through with a boat speed of over 8kts,but sometimes less than 1kt over the ground. The waves were enormous and honestly frightening. John and I harnessed ourselves in and just let the stuff crash around down below. It took us 3 hours to get into the inside waters of this northern end of the island. We still have the main Chaco Canal to tackle, but will definitely choose little/no wind and slack tide. John just finished his shower, so now after having done some vacuuming up of our broken coffee cups, it’s my turn. We DO love our hot water!! I am absolutely relieved to be here and with more of this rainy muck forecast for today, it’s a long nap and snuggling with a good book and cuppa.

We are at 41:51.512S / 73:52.850W anchored across from the town of Ancud on Isla Chiloe.

Post nap now and feeling much better! We’ve found a good anchorage as it turns out – we hear the winds howl and look out just past our anchorage to the channel and the white water blowing past, but Raynad just sits and takes the blasts keeping us mostly flat and secure:) Yes, it’s just like SE Alaska and we need to up our respect for the natural phenomena here of large tidal swings combined with frontal weather systems bringing powerful winds. We got slammed especially hard, a situation we would have avoided with better data collection and advanced planning. An awakening lesson to us casual cruisers from Alaska who should have known better! Add the uniquely large swell of the Southern Ocean that predominates always and gains great momentum…I’m very, very happy to be done with offshore passages for awhile:) We’ll look at the weather and tides to decide our next moves, although there is an anchorage that we attempted today which looks really cool for some hiking along the ocean side beach if the weather settles tomorrow.

We’ve had a relaxing post-voyage day clearing and cleaning up the boat then watching a couple of episodes of LOST (don’t recommend – it’s a bit annoyingly like a soap opera, but we have two seasons) then napping for a couple of hours. Now we’ve enjoyed some wonderful Chilean wine with cheese, avocado, sautéed red peppers…and continue to enjoy a peaceful anchorage out of the wind and seas – very lovely and relaxing. As always, we are discussing our future and all the elements of that decision. Nice to at last be in Patagonia, the next best cruising grounds to Alaska:) Best of all, their climate is the opposite of up north, so outside of this coming winter visit, my future visits will be scheduled in the northern summer:) I like those options.
All is well and peaceful with Pacquito D’Rivera “Brazilian Dreams” playing.

04 Jan 2018
We both just finished our coffee following a WONDERFUL long night of sleeping (10 hrs for me:) despite our afternoon naps yesterday. These passages really take it out of us old folks! It’s still a bit blustery outside, although the sunshine is now poking through the clouds more often and the cloud ceiling is lifted such that we can see the lovely low lying hills of the island covered with farmlands and the city of Ancud across the bay. Everything is dry now – thank you John for a fantastic hot water heating system in the boat which gives us not only great warmth, but also much appreciated HOT showers:) We will look at the tides and weather with the thought of probably changing anchorages either today or tomorrow. Not big hurry, although we do want to explore the many inlets of Isla Chiloe before heading into Puerto Montt.

Fecha04 enero 2108

We’ve had a wonderful day navigating our way from Ancud, through the Canal de Chacao, down the Golfo de Aucar and are hoping to anchor in the Caleta Mechuque, a small island across from Isla Chiloe. Because it’s sometimes difficult to get radio connections once inside an anchorage, we’re connecting while about 10 miles away. It’s been a long day (about 9-10 hours) however, lots of sunshine and best of all, we were making easy speeds of
13+knots and had jumping dolphins while passing through the canal! John took some sports mode photos, so we hope they turn out well.

All is well. We’re doing our best to report into the Chilean Armada, but it’s a bit of a hoot to try and communicate in Spanish over the radio!?!?

1/5/2018 22:00UTC / 19:00 Chilean
POSICIÓN: 42°19.35’S 073°15.32’W
ANCLADO Isla Mechuque
After passing several places that were crowded with fish farm or just not so lovely…we have at last anchored in a bit of Chilean Paradise! It’s totally quaint here with little inlets and waterways intersecting through the island. We have our own little spot of magic:) Sun is even shining and Pasta Friday soon to be consumed with some Chilean wine. Life is good!

06 Jan 2018
This is Patagonia! Gorgeously sunny and pleasant yesterday…windy and rainy this morning. It’s an entirely different place now as the boat is getting hit with gusts of winds, everything is gray, the lovely birds are even hunkering on the beach or in their trees. Hopefully this will blow through and gives us more of what we saw yesterday. In the meantime, looks like a cuppa day and reading.

06 enero 2018
Horas 19:00 Chilean (22:00UTC)
POSICIÓN: 42°19.36’S 073°15.30’W
ANCLADO Isla Mechuque/Isla Anihue
Just finished coffee and looked at the updated weather forecast. We’ll have high gusty winds and rain for about another six hours and then it’ll lighten up such that tomorrow should be better and the day after even better:) We’re both really looking forward to launching the dingy and exploring the little waterways around this island. John has even hand drawn a map to help us from getting lost and mostly so we know if there is more yet to discover.

We had a fantastic evening out in the cockpit last night. Just after we sat down, a lovely brown kestrel landed on our GPS compass! There are lots of new water birds here – I must try and get some sort of resource to start correctly identifying the wildlife and marine life of Chile. We both thoroughly enjoyed listening to the bird sounds as they called back and forth to one another and spotting them through our binoculars. This island is the home to many fishermen and the Chilean fishing boats are an art in themselves – different, sometimes quaint designs and brightly painted. John’s starting to try and collect some photographs of just fishing boats:)

07 enero 2018 07:50 Chile/ 10:49UTC
POSICIÓN: 42°19.35’S 073°15.29’W
ANCLADO Isla Mechuque/Isla Anihue
Hopefully the weather will continue to settle down here so that we can launch our dingy (it’s still secured on the foredeck) and explore a bit. When it’s really windy we are reluctant to leave the boat and go out of sight just in case their is a problem. I’d also like to go across to the little community and walk around a bit. It’d be awesome to get a run in, but I don’t think I’ll do that here because most of the roads are just extended driveways to the various farms. It’s a really quaint, pastoral island and we did get a bit of sunshine last night to enjoy once again looking out at the various bird life.
A pair of Black Neck Swans swam along the shore, sometimes with the chicks swimming too and other times, the four of them were piled up on the mother’s back – that’s how these swans move their young from place to place – it’s really lovely.

08 January 2018
We had a wonderful day yesterday exploring the waterways around Isla Mechuque and Isla Anihue. The countryside is pastoral and dotted with quaint villages, farmhouses or fishing shacks. Colorful fishing boats decorate the shoreline, some beached on their sides by the low tide, others floating peacefully on a mooring float. Being spring, all of the birds are nesting or have young chicks in tow. We saw beautiful families of ducks and Black Necked Swans swimming across the channels, the swans sometimes carrying their young on their backs. When we walked ashore, the oyster catchers would screech at us in some obscure attempt to keep us away from a nesting site unknown, but somewhere – we did our best! We were out at both low tide in the early afternoon and then went out again on the high tide after dinner. The evening lighting cast some beautiful hues over the landscape and we managed to get a few really nice photographs. At times we’d just switch off the engine and float around in the dingy taking in all of the many bird calls and the general peacefulness of the moment. Truly lovely and very unique.
This morning we awakened to yet another very sunny day, so after coffee we’ll be off to explore the main village across the channel from us and hopefully hike some of the roads. As with most places, this area is most beautiful in the sunshine! Makes me happier too:) We certainly appreciate this calm and beauty after even more after some of our more harrowing passages.

We’ve had a super sunny day here and tried to make the most of it first with coffee in the cockpit and the taking the dingy on yet more tours of the waterways before heading over to the village and Isla Machuque to walk about. Stepping ashore is almost like going back in time with the colorful fishing boat and skiffs moored or beached (6 meter tide variance here) around the inlet, very unique small homes up on stilts near the beach and lining both sides of the canal which has an ornately elaborate walking bridge to the other side, and cobblestone walks with small houses all hand built and uniquely decorated with clever gardens wherever they can put them. Added to that, the clouds have lifted over the mountains, so we had a clear vista of the snow capped Andes way in the distance over the inland sea of the Golfo de Ancud. After wandering around the village, we took off up into the hills following a single lane dirt road. It felt great to finally really stretch our legs and strain our heart muscles climbing up the hills and into the valleys. Just an amazing day exploring, taking in the scenery, viewing the many small subsistence level farms of cattle, sheep or goats meandering along the countryside covered in flowers and unique vegetation. Very few people, but those we met were cheerful, we were the only ones on the road until a policeman came by on his dirt bike and stopped for a chat on his way into town. It was very quiet and scenic, we must have taken about 100 photographs these past two days.

9 enero 2018 – 09:00 Chilean (12:00UTC)
POSICIÓN: 42°19.35’S 073°15.28’W
Dos personas- Capitán John Totten, Tripulante Kristy Kissinger-Totten
ANCLADO Isla Anihue

HAPPY 68th BIRTHDAY CAPT JOHN!!!

John wrote:
Kris and I laugh that there is a limit to how special a Special Day can be on a boat so far away from the mall. Presents reduce themselves to things like the same bottle of whiskey you got for Christmas and Father’s Day and possibly even the birthday last year. But today Kris went one better. She raided our emergency survival provisions and came up with an unopened small bottle of Nutella. Quite special out here in the Bubbly Goo. This bottle is covered in Arabic writing since you cannot be choosy about where your provisions come from and so – since we are watching Harry Potter movies nightly, I have to assume that this bottle of Nutella carries some ancient Sanskrit spell to me for my birthday. Hopefully a good spell that will lubricate my joints and restore to me all those words that got jumbled and lost in my brain over the last few years.
Along with the Nuttella came a sheet of paper made into a special birthday card with lovely photos of Kris and I at our best on some remote beach in Patagonia. So the day has begun well. Lets see if the years that follow maintain that illusion..
We have lovely balmy sunny days here in an archipelago of lovely islands so lots of hiking and evenings in the cockpit.

10 enero 2018 Hora- 19:00 Chilean (22:03UTC)
POSICIÓN: 42°22.94’S 073°38.78’W
ANCLADO – Dalcahue, Isla Chiloe
We just returned to the boat after exploring the lovely town of Dalcahue tucked in one of the inlets of Isla Chiloe. Our main focus was to visit the hand hewn and built cathedral here which is the oldest in Chiloe and is really quite remarkable – the church was built with all doved-tail joints or mortis and tenon construction. We also enjoyed wandering around the many artisan markets, however, when we returned to our dingy it was totally beached with many meters of stinking mud between it and the water! So, off we went to enjoy some fine Chilean wine and food while we waiting for the tide to flood back in. Fish farms abound here, so I took the plunge and ordered salmon for dinner!?!? Nothing compared to the wild Alaskan, absolutely, but the portion was very generous, beautifully presented and only US $10! We must admit that eating out is very reasonable here, it’s the wine ordered out that hikes up the bill—oh well–still a real bargain. Gorgeous evening, absolutely clear blue skies – we can even view the snow capped volcanoes on the mainland of Chile.

11 enero 2018 18:40 Chilean (21:41UTC)
POSICIÓN: 42°28.74’S 073°45.31’W
ANCLADO Castro
After a sunny day navigating some of the inner canals, we are anchored in the capital city of Chiloe, Castro. We’d had high hopes for good resources here (translation – Internet) but it’s a bustling place and no luck with that so far. We are checked in and will be here for 2 nts before leaving and making our way to Puerto Montt via a couple of other anchorages.
John wrote:
Kristy and I are in Castro which is the big city in Chiloe. Just been visited by kayakers who boarded the boat. A 13 year old boy and an 11 year old sister. They are here on vacation from Santiago and couldn’t wait to get away from their parents and do something radical so they got in a plastic kayak and paddled around the boat shouting Hola !!. The result was a guided tour, candies and a review of the computer which shows Santiago (they drove from there), Colorado, Africa and Scotland all on the one map. Lovely kids. They had no email address and were surprised we were not on Facebook. How do you explain that in Spanish ? That 11 year old girl had more hair than I will grow in a lifetime.
So Kristy has just set the smoke alarm off again making steak. Occasionally she gets Xtra points for NOT setting it off but tonight – no Xtra points but a good bottle of wine anyway. Tomorrow we start our life of abstinence….This place is really lovely. Everyone has lots of personal space, waterfront, farms and no worries. All the roads lead to the beach which is the coastal highway.

13 enero 2018 10:30 Chilean (13:30UTC)
POSICIÓN: 42°37.04’S 073°29.71’W
ANCLADO Estero Pinto a Isla Quehui

Yesterday we went into Castro and hiked up the very, very steep hill (they have stairs for walkers and some super steep single lane roads for cars) to the plaza and the cathedral- Iglesia San Francisco de Castro. This large cathedral was built entirely of hand hewn wood and is impressively huge with domes and carved ornamentation. There are many World Heritage churches scattered around Chiloe, but this one is the largest and the one we visited in Dalcahue, is the oldest. Is wonderful to see them trying to keep them restored and well maintained. Castro is a typical bustling city, sadly with the added high rise shopping mall that seems progressive, but takes all of the local business away from the small shop keepers. Other than the vendors around the plaza, many of the shops in buildings are shuttered. We had four teenagers kayak out from town last night to visit our boat. It’s cute really – they were so excited to come on board and look around. We were worried about them getting in and out of the kayaks especially because the wind was pretty strong, but their strong and lithe bodies had no problem and they were very amused by the entire process. Shivering from the wet and cold, they gave us huge repeated waves as they paddled back to shore:)
We woke up early and made the 20 miles journey from Castro on the main island of Chiloe over to Estero Pinto in Isla Quihue. There are two old churches here, one in the main village and a very old, rather abandoned one on the hillside across the bay which we will hike into later. This is another very quaint fishing village with various types, sizes and colors of boat beached around the lagoon, colorful modest homes on the hillsides which have scattered patches of farm and grazing lands. We are so fortunate to have yet another clear and sunny day in Patagonia with SE winds which are quite unusual for this time of year, but are what bring the crisp, cool, dry air. This is great for us not only for the dry and sunny weather, but also the south winds to help us go north toward Puerto Montt tomorrow.

We arrived into this lovely sunny anchorage by 10:30am this morning and after warming up a bit with a cup of tea, we set off to view the each of the old churches on each side of the lagoon. They are interesting, but both in need of some renovation and not open to view inside. The views were really nice though and John got some nice photographs, however, it was already a windy day and surfing landing in the dingy, so concerned a about the inflatable bashing on the shore, the difficulties launching into the surf and of course making sure that Raynad is securely anchored, we chose to cut short our more distant hiking and return to the boat. It’s howling away out there with south wind coming through at an accelerated strength in the only low lying gap between the two islands – otherwise it would be a dreamy place to be. Launching the dingy and getting back to Raynad was a wet experience, so we’ll not go ashore again unless the winds die down, which is not in the forecast. John’s napping, I’m reading, and I decided to write you a little email and send it when checking the latest weather forecast. We’re planning to leave early tomorrow and make about a 60 mile trip up toward Puerto Montt, stopping at an anchorage about 25 miles short of the city. These same south winds should give us a fast trip northward!

14 ernero 2018 Hora- 18:00 Chilean (21:00UTC)
POSICIÓN: 41°53.68’S 073°04.92’W
ANCLADO : Isla Lin
After a full day of sailing northward between many of the islands off the west side of Chiloe and crossing Golfo de Ancud with some brisk speed and rakish waves, we rounded the corner of sandy Isla Lin and decided that because of the strong south winds this anchorage on the north end of this rather quiet island would be just fine for an overnight:) If the winds shift north, we’ll have to leave, but that’s not in the forecast. Life is good, the sun is out, we can see the full range of the snow and ice capped Andes mountains. We are so lucky to have clear weather this time of year, it’s usually rainy!
Just like to add that we watched the local gaucho herd his cattle around the island at low tide to the point, leave them there and then sally back to his house for the evening. Presumably the cows will be warm and dry in a tide induced pen to enjoy the early eastern sunrise, then make their way mooingly around the beach back to home! Ingenious cow management:)

16 enero 2018 07:40 Chilean (10:40UTC)
POSICIÓN: 41°46.45’S 073°05.09’W
ANCLADO Isla Puluqui, Estero Machildad
This is a surprisingly great anchorage about 25 miles from Puerto Montt, yet still retaining that rural/pastoral feeling. I enjoyed a wonderful run around the bay this morning. John dropped me off at the beach. It was the perfect temperature and I really enjoyed watching all of the birds feeding at low tide and even a horse laying down in the cool wet sea grass! Thought it was dead until it flicked its tail about and then cocked up its head to watch me pass.
Nearly ALL of the bays and inlets have salmon and oyster farming nets. Some are totally chocked full and nearly impassible. We can really only travel by daylight due to the many uncharted obstructions from the fish farming and scattered fishing buoys – even in the major waterways. Fortunately, this one isn’t too bad and we had a very clear, though narrow passage into the beautiful bay. This is probably due to the ferry which also transits that passage about every hour!

1/16/2018 15:43 Chilean 18:43UTC
POSICIÓN: 41°29.42’S 072°58.89’W
ANCLADO Marina del Sol, PUERTO MONTT

We made it into the Marina del Sur yesterday and have a slip for the next 40 days. It’s much more expensive here than expected with crappy wifi, so we may try to find another marina and move, but for now at least we have a secure place to leave the boat. We walked into town yesterday (about 5km each way over two hills-quite a workout!?!?) and enjoyed wandering through the markets. A bit overwhelming compared to the smaller markets we visited in the islands of Chiloe. We are already missing the peace and tranquility of the countryside. For the next few days it’ll be boat projects, cleaning, packing, etc as we get ready to leave for the USA.

Puerto Montt is a very busy place and the walk between our marina and town is not at all pleasant! Fortunately, the buses make regular run and are easy to catch, but I will really miss running because I have yet to find anywhere to go. Oddly, the sidewalks switch from side to side of the roadway, or don’t exist; it’s dusty, with uneven surfaces and lots of traffic. John road the bike into the industrial area yesterday which was reportedly quite a harrowing experience with no ride-able shoulders to most of the roads which climb up and down precipitately! I took the bus into the center of downtown and was just walking along when John suddenly appeared! What a surprising coincidence that we should meet up unexpectedly on the corner of a random street in downtown Puerto Montt!?!?

Month: January 2018

SV RAYNAD PHOTO GALLERY OF THE BOAT

2018 CHILE Journal

2018 CHILE PHOTOS- Northern Patagonia- Isla de CHILOE