Among the coral outcrops of the island of Rota in the Marianas Islands, off the Philippines, lies the wreck of a Spanish galleon, the Santa Margarita. This is a reconstruction of her disastrous last voyage, beset by an extraordinary sequence of typhoons and storms, of the Santa Margarita on her way to Acapulco in the spring of 1601. Based on what little is known of the ship's journey - overloaded cargo, bad-blood amongst the crew and a curse - we are told a halting story of greed, horror, deprivation and unimaginable hardship in the north-west Pacific Ocean from the handful of survivors rescued from the wreck.