Cabo Corrientes

It is necessary to set the stage properly. Corrientes is notorious. It is even rumoured that a few boats have been lost while trying to round the point. If conditions deteriorate quickly and get bad, the current, waves and wind could put you onshore with more power than any boat can cope with. The best days to round this point is when the weather calls for calm winds and calm seas. The best time to round Corrientes is early morning and the worst time mid-afternoon. The best direction to round Corrientes (as if you had a choice) is South. With huge swells from the South for the last few days, and North winds of 20-25 knots while we waited in Chamela, we were not looking forward to our trip. We pounced on a weather window that called for no winds overnight and the next morning and hoped the predictions were accurate.

The best time to leave would be when there was no wind and when there was still light. Sunset, at 1900 is the best fit to those criteria. We needed to Corrientes before 1200 the next day or the currents and wind and waves would force us to spend the day at Ipala and head out again the next night to round Corrientes. What that meant was that we needed to average 4 knots for the first 65 miles to Corrientes and then average 5 knots to cover the 35 miles to La Cruz to arrive before dark. If we could not arrive before dark in La Cruz, it means we would have to anchor out instead of going into the marina for some rest.

Of course, when we left at 1740, there was still 15-20 knots of wind from the North. We would be making 3 knots into a 15 knot headwind the whole evening and into the early morning. Morale was low as we realised that unless we could average 5 knots for the rest of the journey, there was no way we would make it around the point that morning. By 0200 in the morning, however, the wind had died and the waves had calmed enough that we could take the sails down and begin motoring. Slowly over the next hour our speed under power increased from 3 knots to our normal cruising speed under power of 5 knots. Things were looking better.

Until 0900, when the waves started building again. The worst possible scenario. No wind to tack with, but the same choppy waves that would slow us down. Luckily, there is a normal 2 knot current setting North around Corrientes. With 15 miles to go to reach the point, we were making 3.5 knots. The mystery of the no-wind chop was resolved when the wind picked up 5 miles further North to 15 knots right on the nose. Putting our main up at 1100, we motor-sailed to point better into the wind and were making 4.2 knots good. We were somewhere between 2 and 3 hours behind schedule when we rounded Corrientes at 1300 just as conditions were deteriorating, but both of us would prefer to anchor in the dark at La Cruz than be rounding Corrientes again if we turned around to go to Ipala for the day.

After rounding the point, we could fall off the wind onto an upwind port tack. We were motorsailing with only the reefed main up and making 4 knots until the wind died down to 15 knots, when I felt we could put up more sail around 1400. So we shook out the reef, put up the drifter (light wind headsail) and suddenly we were motorsailing close-hauled at 5.5 knots. At that speed, we might actually make it. From there, it just got better as the wind moved further West, allowing us to be on a more down-wind tack. By 1600, we were making 6 knots under full sail with no engine heading straight for La Cruz, and arrived after two hours of our best sail of the trip.

We had made 100 miles in 24 hours around the infamous Corrientes and were rewarded with a delicious and expensive dinner of Italian food in La Cruz, and a wonderfully calm night's sleep tied to a dock in the cheapest marina in the world at $15 a night for puddle jumpers.