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Rounding the Horn: Being The Story Of Williwaws And Windjammers, Drake, Darwin, Murdered Missionaries And Naked Natives -- a Deck's-eye View Of Cape Horn
For as far back as he can remember, Dallas Murphy has been sea-struck. Since he began to read, "besotted by salt-water dreams and nautical language," he studied the lore surrounding a place of mythic proportions: the ever-alluring Cape Horn. And after years of dreaming -- and sailing -- he finally made his voyage there. In this lively, thrilling blend of history, geography, and modern-day adventure, Murphy shows how the myth crossed wakes with his reality. Cape Horn is a buttressed pyramid of crumbly rock situated at the very bottom of South America -- 55 degrees 59 minutes South by 67 degrees 16 minutes West. It's a place of forlorn and foreboding beauty, one that has captured the dark imaginations of explorers and writers from Francis Drake to Joseph Conrad. For centuries, the small stretch of water between Cape Horn and the Antarctic peninsula was the only gateway between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, and it's a place where the storms are bigger, the winds stronger, the seas rougher than anywhere else on earth. Rounding the Horn is the ultimate maritime rite of passage, and in Murphy's hands, it becomes a thrilling, exuberant tour. Weaving together stories of his own nautical adventures with long-lost tales of those who braved the Cape before him -- from Spanish missionaries to Captain Cook -- and interspersed with breathtaking descriptions of the surrounding wilderness, the result is a beautifully crafted, immensely enjoyable read.
384 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2004
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 60 reviews
June 17, 2025
A delightful read, a mix of history: the discovery of the southern passage from Atlantic to Pacific, the uses put to the passage, the adventurers, explorers, missionaries, indigenous people, pirates, and fools who came and went or disappeared without a trace, but also the fascinating, once-in-this-world weather that makes the Horn the most treacherous water in the world. Bonus: Murphy is a snarky, clever writer who tells the story well and brings it to life with imaginative language.
February 24, 2010
Cape Horn, at the southern tip of South America, is the most famous place for sailors – even amongst non-sailors. The mountainous seas, the near endless storms, the scores of lost ships and drowned sailors; this is a legendary place well respected even feared by all those who go to sea in boats (or ships). But what is it like really? What are the islands? Who lives there, if anyone? Dallas Murphy has written a wonderful book about Cape Horn that is both an engrossing story and packed with facts, anecdotes and a sense of history.
Rounding the Horn, A Story of Discovery and adventure by Dallas Murphy. Published in paperback by Phoenix in 2005.
“The myth and legend of Cape Horn – the sea stories – are rooted in the conditions. Extreme weather is the antagonist. However, if it were limited to that, to man-against-nature stories, Cape Horn would have remained an alluring geographical curiosity, thrilling to the sea-struck, but useless. Rounding the Horn had historical significance because of this geographical accident: From the Arctic Circle all the way to the sub-Antarctic, there was no natural break in the continental coastlines of North and South America (the Panama Canal was both unnatural and recent) through which you might sail big ships – except the Drake Passage.
“Cape Horn is the southernmost point on the southernmost island in a string of islands that stretches northward seventy-five miles to the south shore of Tierra del Fuego. This – the Fuegian Archipelago – was a range of high alpine mountains before the ice sheet moved in to decapitate them. Then when the ice melted some seven to ten thousand years ago, the resulting rise in sea level inundated the mountains, turning them into islands. And humans arrived soon after the ice retreated.”
The Yahgan, the people who inhabited the region when the first whitemen arrived in their “cloud canoes”, have all but gone now. The second-to-last full-blooded Yaghan, Emelinda Acuña, died in 2005. The last full-blooded Yahgan is “Abuela” . She is also the last native speaker of the Yahgan language.
Traditionally, the Yahgan “found enough prey – seals, finfish, sea birds, and shellfish – to keep them alive if they were willing to live as marine nomads in this harsh, demanding environment.” This is a place where blizzards can blow on the summer solstice and sixty-knot storms can go on for weeks. The typical weather is cold, windy and wet. “The Yahgan went naked down by the Horn, and Europeans were astounded. Their nakedness was a conscious adaptation, and, naked, they survived for eons, but they couldn’t survive a century of contact with whites.”
What is so enjoyable about Murphy’s book is that he is a sailor who knows first-hand what he is talking about, rather than a writer, no matter how excellent, who doesn’t really understand the attractions, dangers and challenges. He surveys the whole panoply of stories and aspects of this barren, bleak land and seas – the geography and botany and wildlife, as well as the stories of the Yahgan as individuals, and the seafarers.
This is not a “sailors’ book” but a good read for anyone with a ditty bag of curiosity about this patch of the globe that few of us are likely to visit. Ideal material for the armchair traveller or the sailor relaxing down below when storm bound.
For more reviews, essays and stories, please visit my website:
Serendipities of a Writer's life www.dennisonberwick.info
Rounding the Horn, A Story of Discovery and adventure by Dallas Murphy. Published in paperback by Phoenix in 2005.
“The myth and legend of Cape Horn – the sea stories – are rooted in the conditions. Extreme weather is the antagonist. However, if it were limited to that, to man-against-nature stories, Cape Horn would have remained an alluring geographical curiosity, thrilling to the sea-struck, but useless. Rounding the Horn had historical significance because of this geographical accident: From the Arctic Circle all the way to the sub-Antarctic, there was no natural break in the continental coastlines of North and South America (the Panama Canal was both unnatural and recent) through which you might sail big ships – except the Drake Passage.
“Cape Horn is the southernmost point on the southernmost island in a string of islands that stretches northward seventy-five miles to the south shore of Tierra del Fuego. This – the Fuegian Archipelago – was a range of high alpine mountains before the ice sheet moved in to decapitate them. Then when the ice melted some seven to ten thousand years ago, the resulting rise in sea level inundated the mountains, turning them into islands. And humans arrived soon after the ice retreated.”
The Yahgan, the people who inhabited the region when the first whitemen arrived in their “cloud canoes”, have all but gone now. The second-to-last full-blooded Yaghan, Emelinda Acuña, died in 2005. The last full-blooded Yahgan is “Abuela” . She is also the last native speaker of the Yahgan language.
Traditionally, the Yahgan “found enough prey – seals, finfish, sea birds, and shellfish – to keep them alive if they were willing to live as marine nomads in this harsh, demanding environment.” This is a place where blizzards can blow on the summer solstice and sixty-knot storms can go on for weeks. The typical weather is cold, windy and wet. “The Yahgan went naked down by the Horn, and Europeans were astounded. Their nakedness was a conscious adaptation, and, naked, they survived for eons, but they couldn’t survive a century of contact with whites.”
What is so enjoyable about Murphy’s book is that he is a sailor who knows first-hand what he is talking about, rather than a writer, no matter how excellent, who doesn’t really understand the attractions, dangers and challenges. He surveys the whole panoply of stories and aspects of this barren, bleak land and seas – the geography and botany and wildlife, as well as the stories of the Yahgan as individuals, and the seafarers.
This is not a “sailors’ book” but a good read for anyone with a ditty bag of curiosity about this patch of the globe that few of us are likely to visit. Ideal material for the armchair traveller or the sailor relaxing down below when storm bound.
For more reviews, essays and stories, please visit my website:
Serendipities of a Writer's life www.dennisonberwick.info
July 26, 2012
I was surprised to find a book about a topic as interesting as Cape Horn boring. But that was the case with Dallas Murphy's "Rounding the Horn" -- it was so ho hum, I didn't bothering finishing it. I honesty thought I was going to love this book (...I was excited when in the opening pages he mentions "Uttermost Part of the Earth" by Lucas Bridges, which is a book I just adore.) But every time I picked "Rounding the Horn" up, I put it down again in just a couple of pages.
The sections about other sailors (like Drake) were okay, but every other chapter was about Murphy's own sail around Cape Horn and those chapters just dragged the book down.
I guess I was just expecting more out of this book.
The sections about other sailors (like Drake) were okay, but every other chapter was about Murphy's own sail around Cape Horn and those chapters just dragged the book down.
I guess I was just expecting more out of this book.
November 13, 2011
Just as there is a "Matter of Britain," what with its King Arthur, Guinevere, Lancelot, and Galahad, there is also a "Matter of Tierra del Fuego." But instead of mythical characters, we have, to begin with, a British Royal Navy captain named Robert Fitzroy hijacking four Indian children and taking them to Britain. One of them, Boat Memory, died of Smallpox shortly thereafter. The other three -- York Minster, Fuegia Basket, and, above all, Jemmy Button -- survived. Great things were expected of them, especially by Protestant missionaries. But Christianity just wasn't a good mix with Fuegian natives,
The missionaries, however, persisted despite one party dying of starvation at Spaniard Harbor and another being massacred by Yaghans, probably led by Jemmy Button. Eventually, there was one missionary by the name of Thomas Bridges who understood the natives: Among other things, he learned their language and wrote a dictionary before the last Yaghan died of measles or influenza or some other white man's disease. His son, Lucas, wrote a book which probably encapsulates the whole Fuegian experience better than any other: The Uttermost Part of the Earth.
Rounding the Horn is about far more than what I called the "Matter of Tierra del Fuego." It's about a present day sailing trip from Ushuaia and Puerto Williams, the two southernmost cities in the world, to Cape Horn and the surrounding islands. Many are still largely unexplored today. When one goes south of the Beagle Channel by even a few miles, the weather becomes very very bad. Storm waves that have traveled for thousands of miles without meeting a land mass upon which to break its force. According to Dallas Murphy, the book's author, this is called fetch, and we see several examples of such megastorms not only in the present, but in accounts of expeditions all the way from the time of Magellan and Drake to the early twentieth century.
This is an exciting book and written with a healthy sense of skepticism that keeps it from straying into the type of bull pucky so prevalent in the work of inferior authors. Even though so much of the book deals with the storms of the Drake Passage that separates Cape Horn from the Ross Peninsula of Antarctica, the ghost of Jemmy Button seems to haunt it. Murphy keeps coming back to him: It is the whites' failure to understand the Yaghans and other peoples of Tierra del Fuego that keeps taking center stage -- because, after all, that misunderstanding is the main human focus of the area's history.
This is a book I would gladly recommend to anyone: It is accurate, witty, and well-researched. And it is entertaining and well written.
The missionaries, however, persisted despite one party dying of starvation at Spaniard Harbor and another being massacred by Yaghans, probably led by Jemmy Button. Eventually, there was one missionary by the name of Thomas Bridges who understood the natives: Among other things, he learned their language and wrote a dictionary before the last Yaghan died of measles or influenza or some other white man's disease. His son, Lucas, wrote a book which probably encapsulates the whole Fuegian experience better than any other: The Uttermost Part of the Earth.
Rounding the Horn is about far more than what I called the "Matter of Tierra del Fuego." It's about a present day sailing trip from Ushuaia and Puerto Williams, the two southernmost cities in the world, to Cape Horn and the surrounding islands. Many are still largely unexplored today. When one goes south of the Beagle Channel by even a few miles, the weather becomes very very bad. Storm waves that have traveled for thousands of miles without meeting a land mass upon which to break its force. According to Dallas Murphy, the book's author, this is called fetch, and we see several examples of such megastorms not only in the present, but in accounts of expeditions all the way from the time of Magellan and Drake to the early twentieth century.
This is an exciting book and written with a healthy sense of skepticism that keeps it from straying into the type of bull pucky so prevalent in the work of inferior authors. Even though so much of the book deals with the storms of the Drake Passage that separates Cape Horn from the Ross Peninsula of Antarctica, the ghost of Jemmy Button seems to haunt it. Murphy keeps coming back to him: It is the whites' failure to understand the Yaghans and other peoples of Tierra del Fuego that keeps taking center stage -- because, after all, that misunderstanding is the main human focus of the area's history.
This is a book I would gladly recommend to anyone: It is accurate, witty, and well-researched. And it is entertaining and well written.
November 14, 2008
Wonderfully well written book about Cape Horn. Dallas Murphy is a sailor who with a group of sailing buddies treks down to the horn to explore the historic sites in the area onboard the 53 foot steel sailboat Pelagic. He writes of the trip they take and the trips that others have taken around the Horn in a style that mixes several story lines at once.
It makes me wish to go there and see some of the sights and experience the Horn myself - just not in my own boat.
It makes me wish to go there and see some of the sights and experience the Horn myself - just not in my own boat.
June 3, 2011
This book is a blend of current and historical trips to, in and around Cape Horn. It is an area of the world known for its violent weather and seas, but I knew little of its actual character with regard to wildlife, or lack thereof, and human life. It is an educational book, but is also exciting and intriguing. By reading the book I could live the adventures vicariously without getting wet or putting my life on the line. Cannibalism has always been a turnoff for me, too. If you enjoy sailing, you will enjoy the book.
January 4, 2010
I began this book because it is about an area we are going to visit, but I finished it because it is a terrific historical adventure about Magellan, Darwin, and others who sailed the world under conditions I cannot even imagine. The author is a good storyteller and I suspect sometimes he doesn't allow facts to get in the way of a good story. Very enjoyable read.
July 17, 2023
Discovering this book in a local used bookstore was a matter of serendipity. We have a cruise booked for next year to travel from Santiago, Chile to Buenos Aires, Argentina by way of the Cape so to read of the history of the area, the travails of the many sailors who fought their way around the Horn (and of those who didn’t survive) along with the contemporary account of the author and his companions is fascinating background that should make our trip even more enjoyable.
The author uses historical narrative interspersed with his travelogue in a way that illuminates this remote part of the world.
He references “Uttermost Part of the Earth” by Lucas Bridges which, obviously, has to be required reading now.
The author uses historical narrative interspersed with his travelogue in a way that illuminates this remote part of the world.
He references “Uttermost Part of the Earth” by Lucas Bridges which, obviously, has to be required reading now.
September 29, 2017
4.2!
A delightful sailing yarn that's equal mix history lesson and real-life adventure in and around what is arguably the roughest patch of water in the world: Cape Horn.
A delightful sailing yarn that's equal mix history lesson and real-life adventure in and around what is arguably the roughest patch of water in the world: Cape Horn.
January 8, 2009
This is a very well written account of a modern sailing ship visiting the notoriously difficult bottom of the world and exploring the historic importance of rounding the Horn to many cultures. This book fulfilled every wish for detailed maps of the complex series of islands and waters they sail. Never have I read a book that provided the images every few pages so I didn't have to flip back to some overly detailed map to see if it could offer the orientation and perspective I needed. This book offers a map inset for every leg of the trip but with a new perspective each time. *****
This is both the history of the ships discovering the Horn and the indigenous people and the biographic image of a current visit to the modern setting and the people who now live as Feugians. As in so many colonies the natives died on exposure to European diseases.
The tale of the Yahgans taken to Britain on the Beagle by Fitzroy agrees well with "This Thing of Darkness" as does the personal information concerning the Captain Fitzroy and the missionaries who hoped to 'save soles'. *****
I especially enjoyed the authors speculations on the nature of a hunter gatherer society as entirely canoe based nomadic society with only temporary shore shelters. Canoe-borne the men of these tribes caught otter and seal and snared birds, including geese and ducks. The women dived into the near arctic water for shell fish or gathered molluscs along the shore. The Europeans repeatedly noted the natives being naked and exposed to the rain & cold. That the Yahgans had short, small extremities showed that, over the centuries, they had physically adapted to the cold climate. ***1/2
The end of the book briefly mentions an abandoned cattle ranch the crew visits but does not go into this portion of local history where miners & ranchers took land and this introduced yet more diseases to the natives. **
This is both the history of the ships discovering the Horn and the indigenous people and the biographic image of a current visit to the modern setting and the people who now live as Feugians. As in so many colonies the natives died on exposure to European diseases.
The tale of the Yahgans taken to Britain on the Beagle by Fitzroy agrees well with "This Thing of Darkness" as does the personal information concerning the Captain Fitzroy and the missionaries who hoped to 'save soles'. *****
I especially enjoyed the authors speculations on the nature of a hunter gatherer society as entirely canoe based nomadic society with only temporary shore shelters. Canoe-borne the men of these tribes caught otter and seal and snared birds, including geese and ducks. The women dived into the near arctic water for shell fish or gathered molluscs along the shore. The Europeans repeatedly noted the natives being naked and exposed to the rain & cold. That the Yahgans had short, small extremities showed that, over the centuries, they had physically adapted to the cold climate. ***1/2
The end of the book briefly mentions an abandoned cattle ranch the crew visits but does not go into this portion of local history where miners & ranchers took land and this introduced yet more diseases to the natives. **
March 14, 2023
A delightful mix of contemporary adventure and exquisite bits of history from the area, I loved reading this book. The most illuminating bits concerned the Tierra del Fuegans, ultimately very primitive and a lesson in the differences between savagery and civilization.
May 29, 2016
Finally finished this by reading a chapter or less in the evening when I had the oomph. It isn't an easy read (very dense at times) and I skipped some. But some of the stories are amazingly horrific, such as the descriptions of some of the attempts to round the horn when boats got caught in freezing storms that blew them backwards, sometimes for months. Not a place I'd ever want to be. And then there is the story of how Darwin got to sail around the horn--a bit of him holding the short straw and too young to have anything better to do.
If you sail, you would be interested, I think.
If you sail, you would be interested, I think.
March 30, 2013
The climate, flora and fauna along with the history of Tierra del Fuego are well presented. The historical context from Magellan to Drake and the Beagle are annotated. But yet is this just plagiarized from other writers?! There is also overuse of nautical jargon.
However the historical context is interesting.
However the historical context is interesting.
August 21, 2025
I couldn't not read a book with a title like that. But like so many other travelogues I've read, this one ended up not being what I wanted it to be (is that the book's fault, or mine? I blame the book! :-) Please allow me to enumerate my grievances!
As usual, my map- and photo-related expectations were not met: inadequate overly-cropped and underly-detailed maps and zero pictures. Someday I will come to expect this, and not be so put out by it. Today is not that day.
Right off the bat, author Dallas Murphy starts laying in to the Europeans for...exploring and trading and stuff, I guess? They are the only people whose motivations are ever questioned - the Yaghan Indians, the South Sea Islanders, the Chinese - all apparently only used their seafaring expertise for good and never for material gain, warfare, exploration, or any other such grubby reasons. An early chapter titled "Discovering Seas" is mostly a sneering and sarcastic overview of 15th and 16th century European ocean voyages. This (apparently) irresistible impulse to badmouth everything Christian, Western, and/or European is just so tiresome. There is also a throwaway reference to "Cold War mindlessness" - what does this mean? Who are you winking at with this type of thing? He asserts that no indigenous culture on earth fared better after contact with the wider world. Is this true? I need to reflect on it more, but it raises the question of what is the alternative? Should no one ever venture beyond his own shore?
Murphy alternates recounting his own trip to Cape Horn in the early 2000s with the history and legend surrounding it (Magellan, Drake, Cook, missionaries, etc.). The historical stuff is ten times more interesting than his personal voyage which is disjointed and overly reliant on sailor jargon. Even the history, though, is hard to follow as he jumps around among a variety of sources and narratives. It was never quite clear to me who the book is for or what it's trying to do as it ping-pongs between history, travelogue, philosophy, personal discovery, natural history, ethnography...it just didn't cohere for me. There were enough interesting bits about some of my favorite topics (Antarctic exploration, the longitude problem, the VOC, the aforementioned Magellan, Drake, and Cook) to warrant two stars, but only just.
As usual, my map- and photo-related expectations were not met: inadequate overly-cropped and underly-detailed maps and zero pictures. Someday I will come to expect this, and not be so put out by it. Today is not that day.
Right off the bat, author Dallas Murphy starts laying in to the Europeans for...exploring and trading and stuff, I guess? They are the only people whose motivations are ever questioned - the Yaghan Indians, the South Sea Islanders, the Chinese - all apparently only used their seafaring expertise for good and never for material gain, warfare, exploration, or any other such grubby reasons. An early chapter titled "Discovering Seas" is mostly a sneering and sarcastic overview of 15th and 16th century European ocean voyages. This (apparently) irresistible impulse to badmouth everything Christian, Western, and/or European is just so tiresome. There is also a throwaway reference to "Cold War mindlessness" - what does this mean? Who are you winking at with this type of thing? He asserts that no indigenous culture on earth fared better after contact with the wider world. Is this true? I need to reflect on it more, but it raises the question of what is the alternative? Should no one ever venture beyond his own shore?
Murphy alternates recounting his own trip to Cape Horn in the early 2000s with the history and legend surrounding it (Magellan, Drake, Cook, missionaries, etc.). The historical stuff is ten times more interesting than his personal voyage which is disjointed and overly reliant on sailor jargon. Even the history, though, is hard to follow as he jumps around among a variety of sources and narratives. It was never quite clear to me who the book is for or what it's trying to do as it ping-pongs between history, travelogue, philosophy, personal discovery, natural history, ethnography...it just didn't cohere for me. There were enough interesting bits about some of my favorite topics (Antarctic exploration, the longitude problem, the VOC, the aforementioned Magellan, Drake, and Cook) to warrant two stars, but only just.
January 17, 2019
Twice I rounded the horn on a cruise ship and visited/saw the places described in this book. The first time the sea was smooth as glass, very placid. The second time the sea was more rough but not stormy. Also, we were in a huge ship with powerful stabilizers and engines so it was hard to relate to the experiences of the explorers or of the author who rounded the horn in a motorized-sailboat.
The descriptions of the explorers trying to round the horn in 90-foot sailing ships was riveting- the storms , the work, the sailors, the captains, the natives, the missionaries, Darwin, the privations- all brought the experiences alive. It made me feel grateful that I could be in/near the same places as them but without the misery (but also without the excitement of discovery.)
The author is a sailor and writes in a lot of sailor-speak which was lost on me, a land-lubber, but I thoroughly enjoyed reading about the history of Cape Horn and the descriptions of the landscape.
This is a must-read if you are curious about the Horn. Rounding The Horn was a necessity for commercial travel before the completion of the Panama Canal so this book gives the reader some insight into how dangerous the travel was and how brave the sailors were.
I recommend this book and am glad I read it twice.
The descriptions of the explorers trying to round the horn in 90-foot sailing ships was riveting- the storms , the work, the sailors, the captains, the natives, the missionaries, Darwin, the privations- all brought the experiences alive. It made me feel grateful that I could be in/near the same places as them but without the misery (but also without the excitement of discovery.)
The author is a sailor and writes in a lot of sailor-speak which was lost on me, a land-lubber, but I thoroughly enjoyed reading about the history of Cape Horn and the descriptions of the landscape.
This is a must-read if you are curious about the Horn. Rounding The Horn was a necessity for commercial travel before the completion of the Panama Canal so this book gives the reader some insight into how dangerous the travel was and how brave the sailors were.
I recommend this book and am glad I read it twice.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 22, 2019
I was recently on a birding trip to Ushuaia and Tierra del Fuego and wanted to know more about this part of the world, which led me to this book. It's a history of exploration and sailing in the Southern Ocean, describing the voyages of Columbus, Magellan, Drake, Cook, Darwin, and others, interspersed with the author's account of a recent trip to Cape Horn aboard a small sailing vessel. One of many stories is that of the windjammer "British Isles", one of the last big commercial sailing ships, which took 71 days to round the horn in 1905. "She made it, finally, into the Pacific to her destination on the coast of Chile, but she'd been savaged and broken, her crew shattered, several killed." Three of her crew were killed when they were swept overboard by huge waves. Included is a fascinating description of the efforts of 19th century English missionaries to convert the indigenous Yahgan people, who inhabited this region for thousands of years. Although they lived in a very cold and damp climate, they wore no almost no clothes. By 1940, they had vanished from the earth. A cracking good read--highly recommended!
November 28, 2016
There aren't many books written about sailing around Cape Horn in modern times so this one fit the description and then some. The author, an accomplished sailor, takes us along as he sails into the Southern Ocean in 2000. Chapters alternate between his closely observed and documented personal experience to the history and exploration of the waterways by explorers dating back 600 years. The fascinating flora, fauna, geology and weather patterns of this remote area all get attention. Who knew that there are no insects on those far southern islands? Who knew that one of the most southern Indian tribes, named Yahgan by the Europeans and now extinct had a higher metabolic rate and lived in the extreme climate naked? This title will please both adventure sailors ready for their next challenge and landlubbers planning a trip to the southern tip of South America.
January 20, 2021
Very well written and engaging. Weaves together the author's personal experience sailing in the Cape waters with the history of Western explorers and their various interactions with the indigenous people. The historical record is examined thoughtfully, respectfully and refreshingly without judgement.
December 7, 2020
Interesting read. Probably much more so if you are a sailor. There are many technical terms about sail boats that were a challenge. Much more interesting are the stories about historical sailing adventures and encounters. I learned a lot about the dangerous sailing around Cape Horn.
December 19, 2020
I really loved this book, it dragged a little bit in places (hence the 4 star rating) but the history combined with the author's voyage were very interesting, and I loved Murphy's sense of humor on display throughout.
October 8, 2021
Thoroughly enjoyed the contemporary narrative and survey of the history of the geography around Cape Horn. I recommend this book to anyone with an interest in this area, the impact on European exploration of the globe, and an appreciation for the challenge of sailing around Cape Horn.
April 3, 2024
Such an entertaining, informative book, written by a lover of the sea about the history and unique features of the southern tip of South America. I learned lots and enjoyed the sense of humour that carried the information along.
December 19, 2019
Really a great book. It is a broad set of stories about the entire Cape Horn region. The sailing adventures, the missionaries, the natives. A good read.
August 31, 2020
Terrific storytelling on one of the last wild places on the planet.
December 31, 2020
A fantastic companion to our Patagonia cruise! Fascinating and multi-faceted.
June 25, 2021
I couldn't put this one down once I started reading it. Excellent presentation of history.
May 7, 2023
Really fascinating, occasionally very acidicly funny, a great tale of adventure & stupidity.
June 7, 2023
I read most of this book. I found the historical accounts far more riveting than the juxtaposition of the author's more recent journey in the area.
June 21, 2021
Excellent story about the history of the local tribes and all the sailing ships and their battle to round the most treacherous waters in the world
July 13, 2014
An enjoyable tour of the very end of the earth with a guide who loves the romance of Cape Horn for its own sake.
There are a couple of narrative threads to this book, but the lion's share is given to the history of the place. That history is broken into a first part concerning the Age of Explorers which retells the voyages of Magellan and Drake in detail, and a second part that opens with the two voyages of The Beagle. The arrival of The Beagle in the region, Murphy argues, is decisive because it marked the start of scientific exploration and and an interest in the cape as a location for investment and colonization. The results are predictably disastrous for the natives and really this thread of history is a reframing of the interactions between the Yahgan and the English missionaries to clear away a number of sensational myths.
Another thread is the personal experience of the author as a crew member sailing among the islands and coves of the end of the earth, and this part is total vicarious wish fulfillment for me. Murphy makes it clear that he is considered a good sailor, maybe even an excellent sailor while upon Long Island Sound, but the conditions and circumstances of the cape are unique and alien. These sections are vivid and alive with detail.
There are also sections of natural history and some discussion of the chest thumping Chile-Argentinian politics that delimit where tourists can go in the archipelago far more than even the weather.
Occasionally the narratives get tangled as Murphy weaves between stories, but overall a very enjoyable read and an effective substitute for the actual Cape Horn that will have to do until I have the chance to go myself.
There are a couple of narrative threads to this book, but the lion's share is given to the history of the place. That history is broken into a first part concerning the Age of Explorers which retells the voyages of Magellan and Drake in detail, and a second part that opens with the two voyages of The Beagle. The arrival of The Beagle in the region, Murphy argues, is decisive because it marked the start of scientific exploration and and an interest in the cape as a location for investment and colonization. The results are predictably disastrous for the natives and really this thread of history is a reframing of the interactions between the Yahgan and the English missionaries to clear away a number of sensational myths.
Another thread is the personal experience of the author as a crew member sailing among the islands and coves of the end of the earth, and this part is total vicarious wish fulfillment for me. Murphy makes it clear that he is considered a good sailor, maybe even an excellent sailor while upon Long Island Sound, but the conditions and circumstances of the cape are unique and alien. These sections are vivid and alive with detail.
There are also sections of natural history and some discussion of the chest thumping Chile-Argentinian politics that delimit where tourists can go in the archipelago far more than even the weather.
Occasionally the narratives get tangled as Murphy weaves between stories, but overall a very enjoyable read and an effective substitute for the actual Cape Horn that will have to do until I have the chance to go myself.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 60 reviews