Through the night the Amsterdam cruised out of the Beagle Channel and back South East to the Cape. We awoke to the Captain's announcement, grabbed some warm gear and headed up on deck, to be greeted by the howling Antarctic wind and a view of one of the remotest places on Earth. The somewhat intermittent commentary revealed that 1,700 ships have been wrecked here. For over 240 days of the year there are storms here. Gales rage for a third of the time. We were lucky.