ABSTRACT
The corvette Atrevida had been anchored in the port since the 11th. Her commanding officer later told me officially that calms and the inaccurate plotting of the coastline on Moraleda’s chart had made his passage slower than we had expected. The mist and the heavy sea from SW caused him much inconvenience, not only making it impossible for him to keep the coast in sight, but almost forcing him on two occasions to drop a kedge because he had been set too far towards the land. In spite of this he had managed to plot with full confidence the coast from Quiriquina to the mouth of Río Itata and then as far as Ensenada del Cerro, the vicinity of Morro de Topocalma, the bluff itself, Bajos de Rapel, Playas de Cartagena, and finally the section between Puntas Coroumilla and Los Angeles. 1 All these were exceedingly interesting operations which redounded all the more to the reputation of the commanding officer of the Atrevida because of the great difficulties he had to overcome with regard to the weather.
