We finally lost sight of the lovely Beagle Channel and the distant, ice-blue mountains of Tierra Del Fuego. Of all the places I have sailed to, none have been better than this. I leave with a heavy heart, not only for the landscape but the people who have been endlessly helpful. There is nothing to beat the smile on the face of a Chilean if he thinks he can help you.Thanks to all of them. The next adventure was the transit of the Le Maire Strait. This is famously the place of the 10ft standing waves which swallows ships whole. But not if you plan it carefully, which we did, and choose your weather, which we also did. As a result we sailed through, literally. It was a somewhat nastier world as we started to point north, and homewards. Grey sky, grey seas, grey mood. Coming south I remember this daunting stretch of water and it's not a friendly place. The strong wind came first from the north west then, thankfully, round the south west which gave us a fair wind if at near gale force. The seas grew, the needle hit 35 knots and we were reduced to running under a tiny scrap of jib. It's possible I am being needlessly conservative in the way I sail but always at the back of my mind is the fact that anything that gets broken round here, including us, stays that way.