Cape Horn: A Challange Even for the Best Sailors
Cape Horn loved and hated by seaman over the last four hundred years. Cape Horn was a pivotal point in the Drake Passage, the most popular trade route for ships passing between the Atlantic and the Pacific from the 1700 to the early 1900s. Cape Horn takes its name from the city of Horn in the Netherlands: an expedition sponsored by the city fathers was launched in 1615 to explore the Drake Passage in an attempt to break the monopoly the Dutch East India Company held on Far Eastern trade.
It falls under the provenance of the Antarctica Chilean Province and is located at Isola Hornos and rests at 56 degrees South latitude. Around the caps are fierce winds which are not obstructed by land. Their intensity is hastened by the relatively narrow space they must pass through in the Drake Passage. Large waves (up to 65 feet) and williwaw winds (sudden blast of wind) can strike a vessel with little or no warning.
There are several sailing routes around the tip of South America:
- The Strait of Magellan is a major, but narrow passage (between the mainland and Tierra del Fuego)
- The Beagle Channel (between Tierra del Fuego and Isla Navarino
- Various passages around the Wollaston and Hermite Island to the north of Cape Horn
- The open water of the Drake Passage, south of Cape Horn, provides by far the widest route at (about 500 miles). It is the route most used by ships and sailboats, despite the possibility of extreme wave conditions
Best time to visit
September to May. Mean temperature is in the low fifties.
Related Links:
Video Extreme Sailing around Cape Horn link
Right now at anchor in Puerto Williams in the Beagle Channel. Can agree of the unpredictable weather down here :) I think today (and earlier) most of all private sailboats comes in here at least once to get around SA. Ships might go straight around but us small boat have many interesting things to do in Ushuaia & PW and around, if not only for repairs/stock up. Today is is easier than ever before to get a nice passage around the Horn. Good luck to all sailors out there who want to do it.