Punta Arenas
06 October 2014
This morning at 09:30 I dropped anchor just south of the town dock in Punta Arenas. I had departed from my previous night’s anchorage in Bahia Manza at 04:00 this morning where I was forced to anchor since the Armada had closed the Port of Punta Arenas due to high winds. As I am discovering the port is closed virtually every afternoon.
Punta Arenas does not have a sheltered harbour and the town dock (Meule Prat) with its huge tractor tyre fenders is hardly the place for a yacht, especially when being pounded against these tyres by gale force winds.
After concluding arrival formalities at the Port Captains office I arranged fuel as the first order of business. And so started an entertaining day: I went to the nearby COPEC fuel station but their fuel tanker was out of action, however the owner kindly gave be a ride to a friend’s Petrobras fuel station who has a working tanker. These are very friendly and helpful people indeed. We arranged that the tanker would meet me at the dock at 13:30, I then arranged with the Port Operations office for permission to refuel, weighed anchor and relocated to the dock. At 14:00 the owner of the fuel station arrived and informed me that the port would not allow his tanker to enter due to some new bureaucratic customs rule. He did however suggest that we could head to a small fishing harbour 5nm north and refuel there. Thus, with him on board, we sailed north to the little fishing harbour which is full with rough and ready fishing vessels. We rafted up against two other fishing boats and fortunately the hose was just long enough to reach my tank. During the refuelling operation the wind increased to 30 knots pinning me against the fishing boat. Of course now it was announced that the port was closed. Ever more fishing vessels were scurrying into this tiny harbour for shelter effectively boxing me in but fortunately none rafted up against me. Finally at 21:00 I got permission to depart and head back to the anchorage. I am not sure how I would have gotten out of that spot with paint work intact without the bow thruster.