By the time the fleet escaped from the storms and arrived in Spanish waters, it had become apparent that they were too poorly supplied to conduct the mission properly and that they were too late to engage the West Indian treasure fleet because of the storms they had encountered; in any case, the treasure fleet had used a more southerly passage than usual. Cecil chose to assault the Spanish city of Cádiz and after successfully sailing to the Bay of Cádiz and landing his force, he was able to take the fort that guarded the harbour of the city. However, he soon found that the city itself had been heavily fortified with modern defences, and he then began to make serious errors. Spanish vessels that were open to capture were able to get away because most of his forces waited for orders and did not act. The Spanish ships then sailed to the safety of Puerto Real, in the easternmost anchorage of the bay. The ships used in the assault were also largely merchant vessels conscripted and converted for warfare, and the captains or owners of those ships, concerned about the welfare of their ships, left much of the battle to the Dutch. The attack on and capture of El Puntal tower proved a mistake, as that fortification did not need to be captured to be able to attack Cádiz. When Cecil landed his forces, they realised that they had no food or drink with them. Cecil then made the foolish decision to allow the men to drink from the wine vats found in the local houses. A wave of drunkenness ensued, with few or none of Cecil's force remaining sober. Realizing what he had done, Cecil took the only course left open to him and ordered that the men return to their ships and retreat. When the Spanish army arrived, they found over 1,000 English soldiers still drunk; although every man was armed, not a single shot was fired as the Spanish put them all to the sword. After the embarrassing fiasco of Cádiz, Cecil decided to try to intercept a fleet of Spanish galleons that were bringing resources back from the New World. That failed as well because the ships had been warned of danger in the waters and so were able to take another route and returned home without any trouble from Cecil's ships. Disease and sickness was sweeping through the ranks, and since the ships were in a bad state, Cecil finally decided that there was no alternative but to return to England although he had captured few or no goods and made little impact on Spain.