Cape Horn

Mariners have feared it for at least five centuries. The dreary, cold island cluster at the southern tip of South America is a stormy region of treacherous currents at the meeting of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Explorers, traders, whalers, sealers and naval crews all have dreaded “rounding the horn.” In prolonged gales, it took some vessels days, even weeks to make the passage. Hundreds of ships went down struggling against the elements.

Interestingly, the term “Cape Horn” does not signify any part of the “horn” shape of South America. It was given its name by a Dutch navigator, Willem Cornelis Schouten, believed to be the first commander to successfully round the cape in 1616. (Magellan a century earlier traversed between the islands and mainland.) Schouten simply named it after his birthplace in The Netherlands: Hoorn.