The Further Adventures of.....

From shore, two other men and I watched Avalon drag her anchor into another moored vessel.  The owner of that boat was standing next to me.  There was a feeling of inevitability in the tableau.  We all knew that this was the beginning of what was going to be one hell of a blow.

White caps topped the two foot chop that had risen in the bay while twenty to thirty knot winds piled all that water up on shoals that lay nearby to the East.  Avalon was broadside to the wind, hard up against the prow of my friend's 42' sloop.  Both boats were now dragging into a third boat also owned by a club member.  This was going to be seriously entertaining.

R, the owner of the forty two footer and I had met at the club just thirty minutes earlier for non-boat related business when the wind caught our attention as it started roaring out of the West, driving low level clouds into the late morning sun.  High up, heavy dark clouds raced to the South. 

R and I look at each other, both saying almost at the same time "everything for a reason", and started preparing our cloths and personal gear for a wet crossing in a canoe.  There just didn't seem to be any other choice.  Get out there and untangle some lines now and hopefully power to another anchoring point, or see three seaworthy vessels go aground on heavy shoals of rip rap and oysters.  I figured we'd be swimming before we got to the boats.

I went to my Jeep and unloaded my cell phone and other perishables from my pockets while R did the same.  Then, trying not to think about what we were about to do, I followed R to where he kept his canoe.  R is an experienced sailor who is licensed to transport up to 100 tons and is the only sailor here who I've seen bring his boat into the slips under sail.  He is also young and just a little crazy.  I've got about half that. 

We grabbed his canoe, a 16' Coleman with a transom.  A canoe in white water chop with a twenty to thirty knot wind.  This was starting to look like a really bad idea and we didn't even have the canoe in the water.  At the dinghy dock we were well protected by a mangrove breakwater.  Just beyond the basin opening, the water of the bay heaved and surged.  Maybe it wasn't quite that dramatic, but it sure seemed like it at the time.

We climbed into the canoe, double checked our safety gear, looked at each other, smiled, shrugged and started paddling.  Getting to the mouth of the basin was easy, getting out proved to be a challenge.  When the wind hit us the canoe heeled and rocked.  I got off the thwart and planted my butt on the keel while I felt R do the same.  We started to really paddle  We were committed now.  If we tried to turn about the wind would roll us.

Ten minutes with the wind off our starboard quarter and we were in position to drift into R's boat.  It had seemed like half an hour.  The wind would puff and blow and howl and stop and start, sets of waves two and three feet high would roll and pitch the boat.  We were in a fight.  Somehow it seemed worth it.  Exhilarating, frightening, joined in mortal battle yet not doubting that we would get done what needed doing.  I was alive!

Once along side R's boat we grabbed line and stood up in the canoe, grabbing the beam rails of the ship above us.  Then it was just a matter of climbing, grabbing rigging and hauling ourselves up a slick surface that bucked and rolled like a live thing.  Timing the waves helped with the climb, letting the lift of a swell help boost.  We were a couple of hairless apes clambering over the rails and onto the deck.  Then we just sat there for a couple of moments to catch our breath.

We didn't take long.  Every moment was another moment closer to shore.  Every wave was another impact between boats and the tangle we were on was heading for another boat.  There was some work to be done and we had to do it quick.  A fast inspection of anchor line showed that Avalon's rudder had ridden over R's line.  To untangle this mess we had to use Avalon's anchor and release R's.  That meant a faster drift to shore and less time to avoid the shallows.

I scrambled forward across R's boat, grabbing rigging and safety lines and got to the bowsprit where I could climb out over Avalon.  The only way to untangle this mess was from the decks of Avalon.  Both boats rocked, bucked and twisted, the hulls beating up against each other.  There were no halfway measures about this.  I had to commit to getting on Avalon, placing myself beyond the point of return climbing down.  There would be no climbing back up.
 
R Got his anchor line release and handed the end of it over to me with a large float on it so we could get it back later.  Before I could drop his line I had to first untangle it from my rudder.  I had to get some slack.  Nearly two hundred feet of three quarter inch line wound up with me in the cockpit, and over a period of a few minutes I managed to get it tangled up with Avalon's aft stay and the tiller.

All of this, three sailboats, two men and hundreds of feet of anchor line and chain, was being bounced, rolled and shaken in high winds and heavy chop. We were about four to five hundred yards from a lee shore, in about nine feet of water with the wind grabbing and pulling at every surface.  It was stacking the water up against the shore causing a short, sharp chop that sometimes overcame wind direction.  I was glad I had put my glasses in my pocket before we got in the canoe. I don't think I even missed them.

R's anchor was still holding and attached to my boat at the port side jib sheet winch.  His boat was no longer held to the storm initiated raft up, drifting toward shore while R pulled himself along deck lines back to his cockpit.  His boat has a fifty horse diesel for power.  That was enough to pull him away from the shore and into a safer anchoring position.  I was port beam to the wind and still in contact with the third boat, held in place by two anchor lines fore and aft.  The forward anchor line was the one that had let loose.  I soon found myself coming stern on to the wind.

Seeing that my keel and rudder now cleared the third boat's anchor lines, (she had two out), I went forward to release Avalon's anchor.  Stern to the wind, Avalon bounced and cork screwed.  Most of the trip forward and back was done on hands and knees.  I don't remember being scared.  I was too focused on what I had to do.  If Avalon was going ashore, so was I, and I really didn't have a choice.  There would be no rescue.  There just simply wouldn't be time. 

Now, ya gotta remember;  I'm closing in on sixty real fast.  The spirit is willing but the flesh is starting to complain.  By the time I got to the bow pulpit I just simply had to take a break.  I had already done a lot of pulling an pushing, with all parts of my body.  Take a few minutes to catch my breath, plan the next moves.  Braced up into the bow pulpit railing I squat/sat and looked around.  It was like something from a movie.

All around me the water was a dirty brownish/greyish/greenish maelstrom of windblown chop.  The wind was trying to create tall waves while the shore threw them back.  They seemed to collide under Avalon with a wild short chop that had no real direction except up.  When the chop got around two feet the wind would tear it's head off and throw it toward the shore.  I started to laugh.

This kind of shocked me for a second until I realised that I was having a ball.  This is what I came here for.  To come alive again in the face of a challenge, to totally commit to something and give it everything I have.  It was like I was back in combat again only this time it was to save, not kill.  I was ALIVE!  Totally connected, completely involved.  This is seriously sick behaviour and I really must do something about it.  Maybe next week.  Right now I'm having too much fun.

I released the forward anchor line and let Avalon's bow swing toward shore.  Now she was effectively going backwards at twenty five knots with gusts of up to forty.  This was when the bimini tarp caught the wind and started acting like a sail.  This was truly a case of poor planning.  That thing was one of the first items that should have been dealt with.  Out with the knife and hack, hack, hack until all the nasty blue and silver plastic fibers are gone and below deck in the salon, making the sole as slick as damp ice.  Note to self; below deck slick.

Earlier, while R and I were preparing our boats for handling, I had started the outboard to make sure it would run.  I was gonna need it.  There would be no sailing this day.  The outboard is mounted on a scissors type arm that hangs off the stern of Avalon.  It's an ugly thing and destroys the lines of Avalon's hull, but it's what we have.  At the moment it was spending most of it's time under water.

It was going underwater because Avalon was anchored stern to the wind.  This is what sinks boats.  Get enough water broaching the stern and it'll be Niagra Falls into the cabin.  Bye bye boat.  The simple economics of it would not allow me to restore her after that.  Running aground, maybe.  I was trying to avoid both.  I want to keep that boat.  Right now she provides the most cost effective way for me to learn how to sail and handle myself with the sea.  She was doing her job.  I had to do mine.

There was no way for me to know if the motor would restart.  There was no way for me to keep Avalon anchored like this.  It would kill her.  The only choice I had was to release the stern line and hope that the motor would start.  I looked at the shore gauging the wind direction.  If the motor didn't start, I has heading in that direction.  There was a long beach almost directly down wind of where I was at.  Also almost directly down wind was a large breakwater with docks and power boats.  Decisions, hopes and prayers.

Earlier I had untangled R's anchor line from my backstay and tiller and it was in a semi neat pile at the stern.  A cocktail of fear and exhilaration ran through me as I released the line from the jibsheet winch.  I guided it over the side as the wind carried Avalon toward the shore.  The last of the line went over the stern, without the float.  Shit!  I had untied the float to give me a free end of line to untangle the mess and had neglected to re attach it.  I had just lost R's anchor, chain and line over the side in an old mooring field.  We'd be lucky to recover it.

Now that Avalon was moving with the wind and waves, the motor was now spending most of it's time above water.  Time to see if it starts.  I mentioned before that the outboard hangs off the stern of the boat.  It's also well below the toe rail.  That means that when I want to start the motor I have to lean halfway out of the boat and down to grab the starting line and pull.  This is where I might get to swim.  There would be no getting back on the boat.  Did I mention that it was cold?  Wind chill seemed to be close to freezing.  Getting wet would be a real treat.

Bracing the tiller with my knees, I leaned out over the outboard, grabbed the starting line and pulled.  And then again, and again.  This was not looking good.  I had rebuilt that motor and it usually started on the first pull.  I reached down farther and pulled the choke out.  One more pull and no joy.  I had time for one more shot before I needed to prepare for grounding.

I rolled on a little throttle and then PULLED!  It started!  I gave it more throttle and with my feet pushed the tiller hard to port leaning half over the pitching, rolling stern nursing a cold outboard.  Come ON, you BITCH! Pull to the wind!  And she did.  And I apologised and promised and flattered her while we ran parallel to the shore.  We had a chance.

I gave the outboard about fifty percent and sat back up in the cockpit, determined to get Avalon away from shore and into deeper water.  The motor would still sometimes go under but somehow it kept running.  But, when we  headed a little into the wind, the relative motion of the boat to the waves and wind changed and the stern would rise out of the water bringing the motor with it.  Now the prop spent half it's time out of the water.  By this time most of the downwind shore was breakwater and docks.

Making the decision that here was better than there, I ran forward as fast as I could go and threw the cruising anchor over the side.  I fed out chain and then line.  It was moving on it's own almost faster than I could handle.  I grabbed the line hard, bracing myself on the pulpit rail with my feet, felt the anchor snub down and then held on while Avalon swung to the wind.  Like I was rappelling I took the extra line behind me with my left hand and cinched it off on the forward cleat.  One handed knot tying practice had paid off.

I started slowly paying out line until I had laid out about one hundred feet and then tied off.  I didn't know where we were on the tide table but we hadn't hit bottom yet.  Avalon has a draft of nearly five feet.  That meant that we were in at least seven feet of water.  Avalon was rising and falling with the waves nearly three feet.  Bounce, roll, dive, lift and buck.  No contact with the bottom and the anchor seems to be holding.

Time for a beer!  Oops!  No beer.  Time for some rum!  Oops!  No rum.  Time for a joint!  Oops!  No pot.  Time to call home and let Gail know I'm alive.  Oops!  The phone is in the car.  Time for a snack and some water.  I had plenty of fresh water, canned foods, coffee and tea aboard.  The batteries were at full charge and the propane tank was charged.  It wouldn't be comfortable but at least I would be able to stay warm and fed.

I thought about using the sideband radio but I knew that there was no one at the club monitoring the base there.  I braced myself in the companionway and watched the clouds fly across the sky and the waves crash and tumble over each other.  Every once in a while a wave would break over the bow sending spray down the length of Avalon.  This was like something from a movie.

Standing on the lower step and bracing myself on the companionway door frame my head just cleared the cabin roof, giving me a great view of the bay.  White caps, a howling wind from the West, a sturdy boat under my feet and an uncertain anchor keeping Avalon and me from going ashore in a hard way.  This was REAL.  That's the only way I can describe it.  I started to laugh, something that came from deep, deep inside.  I was very much alive and living and doing just the thing I had come to do. 

This was the most real thing I had done in years.  There were no questions about right or wrong, no moral grey areas.  This was about pure survival.  Now that the other two boats were secure and Avalon was in a (hopefully) secure position, I had time to reflect on what I had just done.  My knees got weak, I felt that old familiar twist in my stomach and then a REALLY bad need to pee.

As badly as the boat was bucking and rolling peeing turned out to be a challenge.  I can say with pride that the head sole stayed dry.  So did I.  This was another accomplishment of sorts and seemed to point to an idea that I was truly getting my sea legs and learning to live with the sea.  All the things I had read and been told and had seen on TV or the movies came to nothing more than dreams.  THIS was where the rubber meets the road.

In doing what I had done this day I had placed my life at risk for a small piece of fiberglass, aluminum and wood.  And a dream.  And I had won.  I bet it all on my ability to figure out what had to be done and then in the doing of it.  It was like combat.  It was like my first lay.  It was like..........nothing I had ever done in my life.  I had gone out in heavy winds and chop in a canoe with another man, climbed up on his boat and then made my way across that heaving deck to my smaller boat which was bobbing like a cork, timed my leap to my own cockpit, untangled anchor lines, fought with the sea to keep my boat and wound up here/now, laughing and drinking instant coffee while the weather raged around me and my little home.

I turned on the sideband radio and listened to the NOAH weather reports and realised that there was no way I was getting back to shore tonight.  Thirty to Fifty knot winds and the tide piling up on the lee shore just four hundred yards from where I was anchored.  I was not getting back to shore this night.  Now it was just me and Avalon and the sea.  Avalon was stocked as any home would be, so I was not without my creature comforts.  The only thing I was missing were intoxicants and that was probably a good thing.

Some months ago I had installed a stereo and good speakers in the salon, so on came NPR and whatever program they were running.  Always a good choice for pure listening enjoyment.  A little bit of This American Life, a couple of news breaks and then into the Jazz portion of the evening.  I was in hog heaven.  The galley was stocked, I had fresh water and semi palatable coffee, a soft bunk with heavy fleece covers and thick pillows.

Sleep was an issue.  I would sleep for about half an hour and then be up for two, cat napping it all through the night.  This was keeping watch like I was singlehanding it across the Gulf Stream, making my way from West Palm Beach to the Bahamas using an autopilot.  This was rough.  From time to time it became almost impossible to stay in the bunk while the boat rolled and bucked.  An appreciation for the saying "BB in a gourd" started growing in my mind.

The night passed and dawn came with little let up in the wind. If anything it had gotten colder.  Another adventurous urination and more instant coffee.  By now I had figured out that I wasn't going to get motion sickness so I read a few chapters in a SciFi book from my little library while I ate a breakfast of rolled oats with raisins, honey, cinnamon and crushed walnuts.  I like my food and I like it healthy.  I was also practising cooking in a bouncing, heaving, rolling galley.  Ya never know when that kind of skill can come in handy.

The wind showed no sign of letting up, the chop in the bay was just as bad as it was the night before, and R was on deck getting his canoe ready for heading into shore.  That's when I realised that he was insane and so was I.  He was my ride back to shore.  If he was going to put that narrow thing in the water and beat into the wind to make the basin, I was going to have to help.  I began preparations to get wet.  I also said a few prayers and curse words, knowing that the ride back to shore was going to be a LOT of work and spray.

By ten o'clock the wind was gusting and hitting lulls.  This was going to be a crap shoot.  I knew R was waiting for a lull to put the canoe into the water and then counting on it to last long enough for him to get to my boat, pick me up and then with the both of us, paddling like hell into the wind to get back to the club marina. 

I put my glasses back into a secure pocket, and watched as he let the wind drive the canoe up against Avalon.  He and I both knew that there was no way that one man in a canoe could fight that wind and chop.  He was taking a risk for me and I could do nothing less than stand up for it, no matter how badly I needed to take a shit.  This was one of those moments when you know that one false move will either put you in the drink or fill your drawers.  I was having fun.

Timing the waves I made a graceful (not) drop into the canoe and then it was elbows and paddles as we made our way back to the marina.  I have to say that R makes a great bunker mate.  I believe that I can count on him in a tight place and I hope he feels the same about me.  We worked hard at it, both of us used to canoes, though I was the novice in this environment.  Thanks, R.  I learned a lot and I hope I didn't make your life any harder for my inexperience.

Back at the club house, several of the older members were there to greet us.  Mostly it was about making sure that R and I were alright, and that there was hot chocolate and coffee for us to warm up with.  I have to say right here that I feel blessed that by accident or fate or whatever, I have found myself in the circle of Boca Ciega Yacht Club and the wonderful folk who spend their spare time there.  Never in my life have I ever felt so welcomed or accepted.  These are warriors tried and true, men and women who love the sea and sail and take care of their own.  Thank you.

Needless to say I had some dues to pay with Gail because I had not been able to tell her where I was at and that I was OK.  Once I called and heard her start with the concerned lover bit, I was giving thanks again that there was someone in my life that would go that little bit of extra effort for my safety. 

What I'm trying to say here is that I'm doing what I want to do, living the dream that has been with me since I was a wee lad and have found good folk with which to share it.  I am SO blessed.  Every day I try to remember to give thanks for all that is in my life.  I only hope that those who are in my life feel the same about me. 

Life is for living,
Money's for spending,
Folks are for loveing,
And that's never ending.
Take just what you need,
And pass the rest around.

As and addendum as well a necessity I've just gotta say this;

I learned a lot in this narrowly avoided disaster.  I learned that I still know very little about what has to be done to keep a boat safe during anchoring.  I know that I was given good advice and procrastinated.  I know that through my inaction the property of others was endangered and damaged. 

I have offered all restitution and apologies and am taking steps to insure that this kind of issue never repeats.  Sometimes you're the audience, sometimes you're the show.  This time I was one of the clowns.  No offence to clowns, but this is gonna take a little while to live down.

No one gets out of here alive, so live it like ya mean it.