Returning from the Antarctic Continent, we sailed around Cape Horn, site of innumerable shipwrecks and disasters. In the days of sailing vessels, before steam and mechanization, ships at sea were
at the mercy of the wind. Often, as they rounded the Cape, these ships would be driven into the shallow water and onto the rocks by a wind they could not control. Countless sailors lost their lives off Cape Horn.
We made a landing there. Ordinarily, I abide by an unspoken agreement my wife and I have- that where the two of us cannot go together, neither of us will go alone. There was something about this place,
however, that compelled me to leave her asleep on the ship, and land on the Cape with the rest of the passengers.
Our Zodiacs dropped us off at a small clearing ashore, and from the tiny “beach”, we were able to climb a set of icy stairs to the plateau above, where the only structures were a small sanctuary and a house in which
lived the lighthouse keeper, his wife and daughter.
Some distance from the house is a memorial, dedicated to the men who died along that coastline. It is a sculpture of two metal plates, depicting the waves on the left and and the rocks on the right. The space between them forms the
shape of a single albatross in flight across an endless sky.
As I approached this memorial, I understood I had been “called”
to see it. I was overwhelmed with the understanding of how blessed I was to be at that place- safe and secure, thousands of miles from home, and I sat down and cried for the souls of those less fortunate... | 
