By Don Carnes
Although experience had taught me better in past years, I had not sailed for close to 10 years when I decided to buy a new 40-foot boat and hurriedly prepare it for a short cruise down the coast with a local sailing club. We were to sail from Galveston to Freeport, TX and sail we did, and now that the sailing is over it is time for reflection for the crew of Dor-i-lee unanimously agrees that this sail will be remembered as one of our greatest adventures. Given the fact that it was our first offshore excursion as the crew of a newly acquired sailboat, we actually faired rather well and had an exciting time to put it mildly. In fact, I am certain that each narration will enhance our exploits, until we become legends among our peers—at least in our own minds! We are hoping however, that any future trips will be slightly less exciting or I may be trading my newly acquired boat for a motor home.
As it turns out the weather was much more severe than we had prepared for, which led to a serious situation due to my failure to properly secure the anchor. Without wanting to go into too much detail about the events leading up to this predicament let's just say that an anchor that was not adequately secured fell off the bow of the boat, while we were pitching and rolling in heavy seas. I quickly realized that this was the source of the loud bang that had unnerved me earlier. With each wave that the boat encountered, the anchor was literally thrown upward and then downward, repeatedly crashing into the hull with a terrifying force.
| 
|
|
Timeless chronicles of perilous events describe how some brave, but none-the-less foolish person, reacts without regard for personal safety. I would like to acclaim that I am a brave soul, but the reality of the situation left me with little doubt that brave or not, something had to be done. Any hesitation could provide the time necessary for the
anchor to do serious damage to the boat, thereby placing the crew and myself in jeopardy. Having traversed from calm waters to extremely rough seas, I was ill prepared for the task at hand. Without benefit of gloves, a
life vest, or a tether, I quickly moved to the bow and wrestled the
anchor back on board, all the while hanging on for dear life. I will admit that slight exaggeration here could be possible, but I was convinced that I was enduring what had to be a differential in vertical displacement of at least 10 feet. Thus the weight of the
anchor alternated from extremely heavy to feather light, depending on our direction of travel.
Once I had the anchor securely in my lap, I assumed a death grip on the bow rail, slowly realizing I did not have a plan of action beyond that point. So I sat there contemplating my bravery, wandering what the heck to do next, all the while ingesting seawater and getting drenched each time the bow buried into the next wave. I would have given the boat to the sea gods at that point, if they would have safely deposited my crew and myself back on solid ground. No such luck, however; even the sea gods wouldn’t come out in conditions like this.
Fortunately, one of the other crew had sprung into action at the time that I had gone forward and moved into position behind me. After assessing the situation, Dennis went back to the cockpit and returned with the tools necessary to loosen the shackle. This was quite a feat in itself, considering our precarious hold on the bow rail and the degree of pitching we were forced to endure.
 |
| "It suddenly occurred to me to throw the anchor overboard, which Dennis quickly adopted as an excellent plan, considering the fact that it wasn't his anchor." |
|
Between swells, I was able to pass the
anchor to Dennis, which still left us without a reasonable plan of how and what to do with the darn thing. It suddenly occurred to me to throw it overboard, which Dennis quickly adopted as an excellent plan, considering the fact that not only was it not his
anchor, but he was the person sitting there with this big chunk of steel in his lap. Without further encouragement and a courteous exclamation of how it was my
anchor, Dennis heaved the thing as far out as he could manage, which brought a sigh of relief from everyone.
The rest of our trip was uneventful, but challenging. Although nothing could be as challenging as wrestling with that
anchor, we literally raced along at an average speed of 8.2 knots for most of the remaining trip, arriving at our berth exactly 12 and a half hours after our departure from Kemah that morning.
Upon pulling into Bridge Harbor Marina, I was amazed to discover that most of my peers in the club had motored down the ditch, in lieu of going offshore. At first I found this to be incredulous, thinking we were supposed to be die-hard sailors. I enjoyed teasing the other members about mistakenly joining a motorboat club when I thought I had joined a sailboat clubIn any event, once my bubble re-centered itself from the intense sailing, I began to realize that given the same circumstances next year,
Dor-i-lee will be headed up the ditch with the rest of the group.
In my defense I would suggest that since this was our first trip with the club and considering that we were one of the last boats to depart, the crew and I did not realize that not sailing offshore was an option. I guess everything in life is an option, including paying taxes (you can pay taxes or go to jail, but it is still an option, except being born and dying. Being the new kids on the block, we were willing to endure the rough seas, rather than face the possible ridicule of driving up the ditch, just to discover everyone else had gone offshore!
About the author: Don Carnes took up sailing in 1978 and began a long standing history of learning by experience. His first boat was a 24-foot Cal that he learned to handle by running it aground several times, having some very hard landings, and narrowly missing a drilling platform. As life would have it he went 10 years before he had an opportunity to sail again on several charter sails with a local club. Bitten once more by the sailing bug, he couldn't resist temptation and bought a 1990, 40-foot Hunter Legend, which he has managed so far to keep away from any drilling platforms.
If you'd like to contribute to Our Readers Write section, please send your submissions to submit@sailnet.com. 
Linear Mode
