OVER MY HEAD

iUniverse, Inc.

Contents

Illustrations............................................xiPreface..................................................xiiiAcknowledgments..........................................xviiPrologue.................................................xixPART I: VOYAGE OF THE HERO...............................11. Falling off the Edge..................................32. The Uttermost Part of the Earth.......................73. Baptism by Zodiac.....................................154. Over My Head..........................................275. Hero on the Rocks.....................................336. Swimming to Cape Horn.................................457. The End of the Road...................................53PART II: VIKINGS I.......................................598. Vikings in the Strait.................................619. Losing Claudio........................................7110. Exploring the Strait.................................8711. The Keystone.........................................9112. Storm on the Strait..................................9713. Where Is Claudio?....................................10114. The Admiral Meets the Vikings........................103PART III VIKINGS II......................................10515. Seno Almirantazgo....................................10716. Killer Glacier.......................................11917. No Refuge............................................125PART IV: VIKINGS III.....................................12918. Three Women in a Tub.................................13119. Christmas in Bahia Snug..............................15320. Tortuous Pass........................................16121. The Six Magi.........................................16522. The Lost Connection..................................169PART V: ANTARCTICA.......................................17923. South to Antarctica..................................18124. The Big Chill........................................18925. A Long Way from Home.................................201Epilogue: The Earth Is Flat..............................207About the Author.........................................211Author's Note............................................213Bibliography and Recommended Reading.....................215

Chapter One

On my first flight to South America, an oft-repeated childhood nightmare seemed to come to life: I was looking at an antique map of the Western Hemisphere when suddenly I felt myself sliding southward, down the sheet toward the earth's corpulent waist. There I teetered at the brink, feet flailing in the air, before tumbling down through darker and darker latitudes, until I soared past the bleakly lit Antarctic ice cap into deepest space. To make things worse, as the jet zigzagged southward from New York to Buenos Aires, the odd jogs in the route (Miami to Panama to Rio) disoriented my inner compass, which was set for due south. Over the dark southern continent in the middle of the night, the flickering pinpoints of civilization grew dimmer and farther apart, like tiny campfires bravely holding back the rainforest.

For my first tumble from the belt, so to speak, I met up with two geologists and two other geology graduate students in May of 1974 for a southern Hemisphere winter expedition to the islands south of the Beagle Channel. My doctoral advisor, Ian Dalziel, had made an arrangement with the US Antarctic Research Program (USARP) for us to use their research ship, the R/V (research vessel) Hero. Normally the Hero, the supply ship for Palmer Station in Antarctica, lay in port in Ushuaia, Argentina, during the long austral winter, when pack ice made the Antarctic station inaccessible by sea. Permission to use this ship presented a rare opportunity for us to navigate the spidery channels of Tierra del Fuego. The downside: it was winter in the Southern Hemisphere, and we would have only three to five hours of arctic twilight in which to examine and collect rock samples.

Back in New York, I had latched on to Ron Bruhn, a great bear of a man from Alaska. He had recently wrapped up his geological mapping the north side of the Beagle Channel. Maarten De Witt, a Dutch postdoctoral fellow, was traveling alone via Brazil and Paraguay. Maarten, Ron, and I were officemates at Columbia University. Bob Dott, an eminent geology professor, and his graduate student Bob Winn, both from the University of Wisconsin, met us in Miami. All veterans of geological explorations in remote regions, they tossed around wry remarks about the tribulations to come, such as killer whales upending boats and spilling us into the icy waters.

"I can hardly wait!" I said, trying to imitate the dry wit of my cohorts.

The next morning, the plane landed at Ezeiza International Airport in Buenos Aires, where we were greeted by—no one, not even an exit staircase. We waited in the airless cabin far from the terminal for a half hour until an outside stairway crept toward us, pushed by two frowning men in blue business suits. Outside on the tarmac, we waited as a cargo handler climbed into the underbelly of the plane and dropped the bags fifteen feet to the ground. No luggage carts or helpers in sight, we schlepped our heavy duffels and backpacks to the terminal. Where was everyone? Inside the terminal, lines snaked back and forth from previously unprocessed arrivals.

From increasing grumbles, Ron picked up what we hadn't been told before we left New York. He whispered to me, "There's a national strike on. Peron's dying, and everyone is at the demonstrations, both pro- and anti-Peron. Oh, and they're all worked up about Chile's claims to some of the islands, the same ones we're hoping to land on."

"Great," I said. A long trip to see no more than the inside of the terminal.

Bob Dott turned around and added, "The whole cruise may be off."

Two suffocating hours later, two shipping agents turned up and whisked us around the lines and out a side door, to the muttered protests of the other passengers. Bundled into three taxis, we sped into the city, careening around streets full of protesters, bumping curbs, and skirting ruined fountains. Buenos Aires resembled Hollywood's version of Paris between the Great Wars. Ornate architecture, sidewalk cafes, and stores displaying elegant women's fashions mixed with dreary, metal-shuttered buildings. White marble-carved arches, hundreds of bronze statues, and algae-clogged fountains detoured traffic at many intersections. Ghostly stone mansions and Colonial-style hotels sat behind weedy parks, peering out through layers of grime. Long, wrought iron balconies, lined with shuttered French doors, suggested romantic encounters within. Nearby, piles of construction debris clogged the sidewalks around partially finished Soviet-style concrete apartment blocks. Everywhere, the streets and sidewalks were torn up, and wounds from broken water mains seeped rusty water onto the streets. Buses fueled by crude oil spewed black fumes and stirred the construction dust that lay all over the city. So many signs of fitful vigor, yet the city appeared to be in perpetual decline, despite heroic efforts to recover some lost dream of glory.

In the hotel's tiny lobby, I reluctantly surrendered my brand-new passport to the shipping agents—a gnome-shaped grandmother with a pronounced Swedish accent and her gaunt Italian...