A Sail of Two Idiots (51 page)

Because the balls didn't have the lines needed to attach the mooring to our boat, we needed to use the dinghy to get situated. We dropped the dinghy, Michael motored around to grab a plastic loop on the mooring, and I fed him the lines so he could tie us off. This was a piece of cake. But then Michael let go of
Jacumba
, the dinghy motor died, and current started to take Michael out to sea.
Déjà vu …

Pros at this, thanks to our Antigua experience, I knew that I would have to get to Michael before he passed the rear of the boat. So as he was floating past, I threw him a line and pulled him in. No problem. Time to go back to bed. We didn't even get excited about that kind of stuff anymore. We barely even had to communicate throughout the whole thing and were in bed within the hour. Was that good or bad?

The next morning we pulled up the limp rope on the bow and confirmed that the splice where rope and chain should meet had disintegrated. Normally, we had anchor chain out and attached our bridle to that, but because we had space in the harbor, and there were weird, gusty winds in this anchorage, we put out extra rode this time, which included rope. We hadn't used this section of our anchor tackle in a long time and should have checked it first. That kerplunk we had heard was the anchor rode and the makeshift rope bridle we had created that had dropped into the water.

I retrieved the GPS coordinates of our original anchor spot off our chartplotter and transferred them into our handheld GPS. We planned to dinghy to that location, where Michael would dive down for the anchor chain, grab the end of it, tie on a fender, and leave it floating there. This way the location would be marked, and no one would anchor there until we could hoist our anchor and rode back up. Then after Michael came home from work, we would pull up the whole contraption and see what had happened.

That's exactly what we did, but not without a little dinghy drama. Every time we put
Spud
into neutral, it died. (We were still waiting for the new outboard propeller.) Okay, so we wouldn't put it in neutral. We motored right where we needed to be, and Michael dove and found the end of the anchor chain, but the line to attach the fender on the surface was too thick to pass through the chain link. While he was underwater fumbling with that, I was going around in circles trying to keep the motor running. I freaked when Michael unwittingly swam too close to me, and I threw the motor into neutral so I didn't chop off his head or foot. Of course, the engine immediately died.

I don't know if Michael didn't notice or didn't care, but he dove again while I floated away. He did manage to get the rope tied tightly
around
the chain link, but when he resurfaced, I was halfway out of the anchorage pulling and pulling at the engine cord. I started rowing back, thinking how incredibly stupid this all was, when a nearby boater rescued us by dinghying over to me, then towing me to Michael, and then towing both of us back to
Jacumba
. All this before 7 a.m.—ugh. Have a nice day, honey!

When we couldn't get the dinghy started in order to get Michael to work, our new friend returned and offered to take Michael ashore. We returned the favor by giving him a car ride to town for some parts to fix
his
boat problems.

That evening we motored
Jacumba
over to the floating fender and hoisted the lost anchor and chain by wrapping the fender's line on our electric anchor windlass and letting the windlass bring it all up. Once done, we motored back to the mooring.

Not that we were happy about the involuntary drift, but it happened at a good time. During our last St. Martin trip, we had bought some new chain to replace the oldest section of our anchor rode. We kept putting off this chore because it required splicing the chain and rope on our anchor rode. Splicing is complicated, and we didn't know how to do it, so we procrastinated. We still didn't know how to do it, but Michael's boss did, so now was the time to get the job done.

Although we eventually completed the whole process—new chain link, new splice, and new markings—we decided to stay on the mooring. This way, we would keep our anchor chain nice and clean and take anchor-chain scrubbing off our chore list.

Two nights later, Michael's instincts kicked in and he got up when sea conditions seemed to be getting rough. It was my turn to be woken up by the words
“We're on the move.” Back to the bow at 3 a.m. Our lines were still attached to the boat, but the other ends were no longer attached to the mooring. We were about a mile out. Sigh. (Involuntary float number two.)

We started the engines and motored the 20 minutes back to the island (we had been drifting a long time). The mooring ball was still there, but the loop that we had tied our lines to had come undone. Would we ever sleep again? Not for long!

Ten days later, the entire mooring (including its ball, chain, and the very large screw-like thing that goes into the seabed) came detached from the sea bottom and sent us along the cliffs at 5 a.m. I had heard a clank but thought it was a nearby boat lifting anchor, so I didn't check on it. (Remember LESSON 23, Trust your instincts.) When we awoke at 6 a.m. for me to go running and Michael to go to work, we discovered we were coasting down the shore.
Very
close to shore. This unplanned excursion put us just a little over a boat length from hitting a rocky cliff. (Involuntary float number three.)

Well, looky there—a neat little cave in the side of the cliff we didn't know existed. Is that a bird's nest? Hey, Michael, can you push us off that wall so I can turn us around? Yikes!

As I motored us back for the umpteenth time so we could
anchor
, Michael detached the worthless mooring contraption and gave it a certain kind of salute as it bobbed closer to the cliffs.

Poor Michael. After each of these early morning incidents, he then had to go to work.

The boat on the other mooring wasted no time anchoring either. No idiots them! All moorings have since been removed.

By now it was mid-August and we had gotten into a routine, which included a boat bottom scrubbing about every two weeks. If you have antifouling paint, you usually don't have to do this (and shouldn't), but because our paint hadn't held up,
there was lots of marine growth on the hulls. Sea creatures were also making our hulls their homes because we had become
Jacumba-
At-Anchor again and weren't moving. Sailing helps keep the boat bottom clean.

What was fun about not moving the boat, though, was that our man-made reef attracted guests: a school of squid. I can't tell you how many generations we watched grow up and be eaten by the barracuda that also came to share the shade of our hulls. The squid were curious and would come over to wherever I was scrubbing and engulf me. Every morning they'd come out from under the boat as if to say hi and then go back under. We enjoyed their company.

Tropical Storm Ana, however, was not a welcome guest. When I first saw the blob form southeast of us on various Internet weather websites, I became obsessed with watching its movements and reading the forecast discussions. We asked fishermen and boat charterers where they took their boats during storms and were told Dieppe Bay, in the northwest corner of the island. The big charter catamarans had moorings there for that purpose; the fishing boats anchored and hoped for the best. We had checked out that anchorage during a moped excursion and knew it was a tough but manageable harbor entrance. There wasn't much swing room, though, so we'd have to go over early, and that would mean a long commute for Michael.

The island marina, 30 minutes northwest in Basseterre, forced boats out during hurricanes because their breaker walls were not enough protection from hurricane-induced seas, so that was out.

We weren't too keen on the haulout place farther northwest either. We would have to dig holes for our keels/rudders/saildrives and fill the holes ourselves with concrete (and embed tie-downs in the concrete). Most other boaters in the yard weren't doing that, which meant their vessels would go flying if the winds were high enough. They and the rest of the loose items on their boats could become missiles and do more damage to our boat than the storm itself. Plus, the haulout Travelift had broken during the last hurricane, and boats were marooned on the hard for months before the Travelift could be repaired. We couldn't afford that, nor would we want to live in the yard for so long. That option was out.

I could sail quickly to Antigua or St. Martin and haul out in a better facility, but that would be expensive, and Michael would have to find a place to stay. Outrunning a storm at sea brought its own complications. Let the nail biting commence.

As Ana got closer, I realized that although we would likely be right in its path, the winds would be relatively minor, 30 to 50 knots. That was peanuts. We had been anchored in winds of that strength in the Bahamas and other places several times. We felt confident about staying where we were. Confident but not stupid, however, we packed up a few important things and gave them to a friend on land, just in case.

It was time to prepare the anchor. We let out all the chain, set two anchors, and then, not satisfied with just our simple kellet this time, added a loaned anchor and some extra loose chain. We put it all in a bag that we hung from our main anchor
chain to keep as much strain off the anchor as possible. The kellet bag probably weighed about 100 pounds. We also had almost 100 pounds of anchor on the seabed plus the chain leading to it. Bring it on.

Tropical Storm Ana hit (south of us) in the middle of the night (of course) with winds a steady 35 knots with some gusts just under 50 knots, but seas remained low, so we weathered it well. The lightning made us nervous but was short-lived. That was it! What a relief!

Except that Hurricane Bill made an appearance shortly thereafter. Worse, he couldn't make up his mind where he was going. That storm got humongous (a Category 4) and could have been a really big deal had it not gone north of all the islands. Whew!

We did get swells that made us green for a couple of days, but we were
not
complaining.

As a matter of fact, we were celebrating. What?! Someone was interested in our boat. One of the divers involved with the mooring installation had mentioned
Jacumba
to someone he knew who had been itching for a weekend boat.

Did we have a deal for him!

One day we got back to
Jacumba
after doing laundry and were met by the interested party and his son. Would we mind showing them the boat? Mind? We couldn't get them on board fast enough. This was also why I kept the boat ready to show at all times. A few days later, they came back again with the whole family (including grandparents). No problem!

The good news was that he was serious and there would be no broker involved. The bad news was that he was lowballing us. We would barely cover the loan if we agreed to what he was asking. Negotiations ensued.

We even took them sailing once so they could get a feel for the catamaran (a first for them). There were a few glitches—the zipper for the sail cover came off in our fingers, the new clutches were hard to open, the traveler was stiff—but Mr. Buyer didn't seem concerned about any of these things. He did know about boats (monohulls) so he understood. Tip: You definitely want to sell to someone who knows about boats—they're more realistic than the more idealistic first timers. But they're also more likely to lowball you.

By the end of August, it was official. We had a contract! Yippee! Yahoo! We also had a deposit, a date for a survey (on St. Martin), and the excitement of knowing we'd finally be moving onto land soon.

Come on, everybody! Join hands, jump up and down, and scream like prepubescent little girls at a Justin Bieber concert. Come on men, you too! You know you want to.

A
lthough we were jubilant, our days were now filled with boat tasks; trying to find a place to live; giving information to Mr. Buyer so he could get his paperwork done; allowing various technicians representing the buyer on board to check engines and rigging, all while keeping an eye out for any more hurricanes heading our way. All went pretty smoothly, but slooooowly.

We struck one task off our list when we found a place to live. We got lucky when one of the villas in the same complex where we had spent Christmas became available. Construction was just being completed, but the unit was due to be ready by the time we were. And we'd be able to get another cat!

Now it was time to get the survey out of the way. We were feeling confident. We had done well in our last survey, and Mr. Buyer's technicians had been happy with what they found (I told you the boat was in good shape!), so this would just be a formality.