Check box #5 - Living the dream

I hear often, “Living the dream” or something similar and it is just as often true but as is with most things in life, it doesn’t come easy. The reality is that living and sailing on a boat is extremely challenging and a full time job. My response to someone’s saying “oh, you’re retired? Is “no, I’m not retired, I’m a sailor”. There is always a “list” of things needing to be done on the boat. Sometimes, something simple such as sand and varnish the teak on Evening Star but other times, as occurred a few months ago, it may be a failed rudder which involves a long series of tasks that are required to complete the work. But there is always a “list” and I typically am busy doing something on the list 4-5 hours a day. In addition to that there is the constant planning and studying the weather and routing.

It is essential to know what the weather is and what is coming. And I really mean essential. If one is going to be anchored, it must be protected from the wind, seas and tides. And what is a protected anchorage one moment can be a terrible anchorage a few hours later should the wind direction and velocity changes. Make a bad decision or plan poorly and it can cost you your boat. And when sailing from one place to another, route planing is absolutely critical and must take into account many factors including wind direction, wind velocity, sea conditions, currents, tides and depths. And even after studying for hours multiple weather forecasts, the route, times, etc. things often don’t go as planned, such as what happened less than a month ago when we were going through a narrow cut with treacherous currents and sea state, the engine died and suddenly the boat and safety of those onboard were in immediate peril. We managed to get a sail up and ended up sailing eight hours to a place where we could continue through a wide cut and sail up behind a small island and drop the anchor.

Yesterday was a day that illustrates well what can be involved while living the dream. We were anchored at a spot that offered good protection the day and night before but the wind was going to shift 90 degrees and increase to 15 with gusts over 20 knots. However, by yesterday evening the wind was supposed to really pick up and be blowing 20-30 knots by this morning while swinging around 180 degrees over a 12 hour period. This meant that we needed to find safe harbour that would provide protection from the wind and seas building up that would follow. After a couple hours of studying the weather forecast, the area that we were in and where the best place to move the boat, my plan came down to essentially checking off 4 boxes. (1) we had to get the anchor up in a strong wind without the aid of our anchor windlass which failed a few days before and wouldn’t be fixable until we got back to the states. This meant (1) hauling up a 60 lb anchor with another 100 lbs of chain while our 28,000 lb boat pulled against the anchor and chain. (2) Having to go through the Whale Passage which is a narrow cut between the Atlantic Ocean and the Sea of Abaco which is notoriously dangerous. (3) Timing our arrival at the channel going into the White Sound at Green Turtle Cay on a rising tide in daylight and finally (4) either find a mooring or spot to anchor in a small harbour that would undoubtedly be already crowded with other boats that were also trying to find safety from the coming bad weather.

So after more studying, I decided we needed to leave at 2pm to hit the Whale Passage right at low tide to minimize the current that would be going through the narrow cut from the tide as well as when the wind would have the least affect on the sea and hight of the waves going through. This would give us just enough time to get to the White Sound to catch the rising tide and make it through and into the harbour without running aground. Evening Star’s draft is 7 ft and the channel is only more than 7 ft on a higher rising tide. And the last challenge would be finding a good spot to anchor although I really doubted that one of the few moorings there would not have already been taken by our late arrival and finding even a good spot to anchor would undoubtedly be a challenge.

So at 1pm yesterday afternoon we began working to get the anchor up, giving us an hour to accomplish it. I rigged up a line that clipped onto the anchor chain and ran it back to the cockpit and a large primary winch that I would use to pull the anchor chain in. With Mary Hannah’s invaluable help and a lot of hard, manual cranking, the anchor and chain were slowly winched in. Oh, a side note, I seriously injured my shoulder three weeks ago and the pain is constant and hard to ignore. So a lot of the winching was done with one arm as the pain was too much to for my bad arm to be of much use while Mary Hannah worked equally hard at the box managing the chain and line. And with great satisfaction, we had the anchor up and began to motor out of the spot at 1:55pm. Check box #1.

An hour and a half later we were nearing the Whale Passage. However, although the wind was blowing much harder than forecast and was making the passage and seas more chaotic that I would normally choose to go through, I decided that we would manage it given that there wasn’t a better alternative. And so we carefully steered and held our course with big waves crashing over the bow and blowing spray back into cockpit soaking everything and everyone in salt water. Thankfully, ten minutes later we were through and breathing a huge sigh of relief. Check box #2.

Now it was on to check box #3 which was simply to time our speed for the rest of the route and our arrival to catch the rising tide going into the White Sound at Green Turtle Cay. Easy peazy. We arrived right on time at 4:45pm and started into the channel. I’ve been in and out of this channel many times and know where the most shallow spots are. I started slowly and carefully steered in the middle of the channel for a short distance and then moved to starboard side of the channel to avoid a shoal spot on the port side. The seas had built up enough that the boat was rising and falling one and a half feet which gave us just enough lift to bounce across the shallower, soft sand spots and allowing us to make it all the way through channel and into the harbor. Check box #3.

Entering the harbor, as feared, the harbor was full and the spot I always seek due to its having great holding in a sand and clay area was already taken. And it appeared that every other spot where we might be able to safely anchor the boat was also taken. However, much to my amazement and surprise, there was one mooring without a boat on it and it was big enough to hold Evening Star. Mary Hannah went forward with the boat hook and I carefully steered the boat to the mooring and she gracefully leaned over the bow and hooked the pennant. I threw the boat into neutral and ran forward to help her pull in the heavy mooring line and hook it onto the cleat. And then it was done!! EXTREMELY relieved, I told Windy Sparrow “we’re home!!” as she pulled the engine stop and shut down the diesel for me. Check box #4

So, after being awake at 4am trying to figure out a way to get the anchor up in strong winds without the electric anchor windlass and many hours of studying, planning, checking and rechecking all of the variables, we were now on a mooring in one of my most favorite places in the Bahamas - Green Turtle Cay. After straightening up the cockpit a bit, we lowered the outboard motor onto the transom of the dinghy and decided to motor over the the Green Turtle Club & Marina to let Sunshine the amazing tripaw adventure dog relieve herself and celebrate with a cold drink. Ended up meeting another sailor and talking sailboats for a short bit before Mary Hannah and Sunshine said it was time to head back to the boat. As we walked down the dock to the dinghy, I noted how the sky was getting pretty dark off to the west and it looked like a hard rain was coming.

The distance from the dinghy dock back to Evening Star was maybe 200 hundred yards, about two football fields. Half the way back in the dinghy we were suddenly hit with rain and extremely strong winds. 50 yards from Evening Star I could barely see the boat through the wind and rain. Going by one boat a dinghy tied to the back of the boat was literally flying in the wind before flipping upside down. With the engine at full throttle I was barely able to get back to Evening Star and shouted to Mary Hannah over the wind and rain to just get the line on cleat before we were blown back away from the boat. Thankfully she was able to quickly get the dinghy tied up and we scrambled up into the cockpit. I flipped on the wind speed indicator and saw 45 – 50 knots of wind (nearly 60mph). Now the harbour was a crazy, chaotic scene of rain, wind, boats swinging and straining against their anchor or mooring lines. And then suddenly a 45’ catamaran near us started dragging its anchor backwards heading for the shore. Every skipper was now behind their wheel with engine running. And then a 40’ monohull started dragging its mooring and began swinging and moving wildly nearly hitting one boat but then it appeared the skipper had managed to get the boat to respond to full throttle and he started to move away but then just as quickly the boat spun around and went bow first into another 40’ boat right in front of us. The weight of the two boats was too much for the one mooring and now the two boats were dragging and heading for us – less than 100’ away.

All at the same time another big catamaran started dragging its anchor right down the channel heading to sea. Another catamaran was dragging backwards but somehow managed to get it through a narrow little inlet and into shallow water where it appeared their anchor grabbed and held. Through the howling wind we would hear someone screaming and shouting as couples were trying to coordinate bowlines with steering and maneuvering to avoid running into other boats or end up on the coral covered shore. The VHF radio was full of chatter, mostly unintelligible due to too many people trying to use the same channels at the same time. Against the dark sky, a huge brilliantly bright bolt of lightening flashed and a huge booming crackling thunder followed seconds later. And then the two boats right in front of us separated as one boat cut the mooring line and freed itself. For a moment he swung and headed straight for us but then managed to turn away just in time to avoid ramming us. But with the one boat free and gone, the 42 ft monohull was now swinging within a few feet of our bow. The skipper on the boat did an incredible job of motoring and steering to keep his boat off of mine as time and again his boat would lurch and swing back almost into to us before his engine would power them forward just in time to avoid a serious collision. And right in the middle of all the mayhem and confusion and now 60 knot winds, pelting rain, boats dragging and moving wildly, Mary Hannah went by me and was up on the bow, hanging on with her GoPro camera videotaping the chaos! All the time, our mooring held despite Evening Star’s straining and pulling against the mooring pennant and over and over I kept thinking how fortunate we were to be on this mooring.

Finally after a half an hour or so, the wind began to drop and things began to settle a bit. Looking out around the harbor, very few boats were where they were less than an hour before. I was as soaking wet as if I had been swimming with my clothes on. We went below and started to dry off and change into dry clothes. With the wind still blowing 25 knots and rain still pelting the boat and dodger, I thought to myself how much time and thought and planning had gone into planning our moving the boat into “safe harbor” and the 4 boxes that I had to accomplish and check off. And how happy and relieved I was as we headed to the marina less than an hour before happy that the hard part was over, unaware of a new, 5 th box to check. Never saw the #5 box coming……

Heard from a couple of boats later that the winds clocked over 65 knots. No one was hit by lightening and very little actual damage was sustained by most boats. The squall that hit us was not predicted and no one saw it coming until it hit without warning. All day today I have repeatedly thought to myself how truly blessed we were to be on this mooring when it hit. And so it is….. living the dream.