Luis Alejandro Velasco was a sailor aboard a Colombian destroyer that was caught in heavy waves, causing eight crew members to be washed overboard. Velasco managed to find a raft and spent ten days adrift at sea without food before washing ashore on an unknown coast, later discovered to be Colombia. He was initially greeted with affection but later received military honors and money from publicity agencies for surviving his ordeal alone at sea on the raft. The story is Gabriel Garcia Marquez's first major work and tells of Velasco's experience of being shipwrecked and drifting for ten days before making it to shore.