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Friday, April 21st - Green Turtle Cay, Bahamas
ZIA and her crew have some lasting memories of our visit
with the Rezvani's. The effects of our first brush
with Mother Nature's darker side that they were unlucky
enough to experience with us, have dictated our
movements since they departed on Easter Sunday.
The damaged daggerboard, while not integral to the
boat's viability, is a nasty bit of damage that needs
repair.
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Joe contacted the boatyard that built ZIA and confirmed
that we could lift the dagger out by using a halyard.
We were a little worried about this, as it is a lot of
weight to be hanging off the top of the mast, but Sud
Composites told us they do it all the time. We
made our way back to Marsh Harbor on Easter Monday, only
to find everything closed as it is an official Bahamian
holiday. We contacted Marsh Harbor Boat Yard on
Tuesday and arranged to come by on Wednesday morning to
haul out the dagger. Although we hoped for a quick
turn around, they were swamped and told us it would be a
week before they would have it repaired.
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No
worries, we still have plenty of the Abacos to see and
we can sail or motor just fine minus the dagger board.
Luckily, this setback occurred after a whole eight
months of living on the boat. We still did plenty
wrong in the face of our first nasty storm, but it could
have been a whole lot worse. We saw the storm
approaching clearly on the horizon. There was no
doubt that it was going to pummel us. We felt
pretty sure that our anchor was secure, but then again,
it had never been tested in extreme conditions. We
talked about setting a second anchor, but I, foolishly,
claimed that we would be able to see if we were dragging
and deal with it if and when it occurred. Luckily,
Joe decided to deploy a second anchor minutes before the
storm hit. In fact, once the brunt of the system
was overhead, we couldn't see diddly squat. The
shoreline, which was a mere hundred yards away on three
sides, completely disappeared in the midst of the rain
and the wind and the waves. How naive we were!
Hope and Ramin were great. Hope was stuck with the
thankless task of keeping the kids calm, and trying to
stay calm herself, down below. Joe and Ramin were
out in the elements, trying to keep tabs on the boat in
the middle of 50 knots of wind, torrential rain,
thunder, lightening, and building seas. I was
sitting at the nav station, trying to figure out if we
were dragging anchor, attempting to keep tabs on what
was happening both inside and outside the boat.
We had dumped a bunch of anchor chain before the storm
hit. There was no one around us, and the more
chain or weight you have holding you in place, the less
likely it is that you will drag. In the middle of
a crowded anchorage, this is not an option, since you
also have to worry about swinging into the boats
anchored around you. If you have more chain or
rode out than they do, and the wind shifts more than
about 30 degrees, you risk the possibility of swinging
into a neighboring boat. Unfortunately, the extra
rode did not give us enough confidence in our anchor.
As the wind built and visibility diminished to basically
zero, we engaged the engines full throttle ahead, hoping
to counteract the force of the wind blowing us
backwards. At some point, we motored up and over
the anchor. The hundred feet of chain that we had
out was now snaking underneath the boat from the bow to
some point behind us and beyond, to who knows where.
As luck would have it, when we idled back on the
engines, the anchor got caught up on the port dagger
board, which hangs down about six inches lower than the
hull. The full force of the wind pulled us taught
against the anchor chain, which began slicing its way
through the tough fiberglass of our dagger board.
I don't remember exactly at what point we realized that
this was happening. I had come out into the
torrential rain to help Joe and Ramin. We were all
totally drenched as if we had jumped into the water.
It was freezing and too loud to hear each other more
than a few feet away. At some point the worst of
the storm passed and we began to feel like we could do
something positive to fix the situation. The kids
were freaking out, clinging to Hope for reassurance.
I'm sure Hope was down there thinking "This is just
great! I spend eight months looking forward to a
vacation and here I am, fearing for my life."
It
took Joe and Ramin about an hour to free the anchor
chain. It had sliced its way through about a third
of the dagger board. We had to reset the second
anchor so that we were resting on it, and the main
anchor had enough slack in it for them to work the chain
out of the dagger board. After about a half hour
of exhausting effort, gulping for breath and diving down
to work the chain free, Joe put on the scuba gear.
He and Ramin, buddy breathing off the tank, managed to
work the chain back out through the rough slash it had
cut in the fiberglass. Joe had to cut some of the
ragged edges away with a hacksaw. I steered the
boat so the angle was right for pulling it out.
Hope kept an eye on the guys while they were in the
water with the engines running. Natasha and Leila
were in charge down below. It really was a team
effort to resolve the situation and we were all hoping
another squall didn't hit us in the middle of it.
The adrenaline was flowing and everyone worked together
beautifully. I can't imagine what it would have
been like without Hope, Ramin, Natasha and Leila to help
us through the crisis.
The wind soon mellowed out, although our nerves were
anything but mellow. The day was young! By
10:30am we had faced and survived our most harrowing
experience yet on the boat. The worst of the
weather was behind us and the kids were ready for a
change of scenery. We set sail for a new venue.
The Rezvanis were real troupers, out catching what few
rays managed to make their way through the clouds.
We landed in Treasure Cay by mid day and headed for the
beach, full of optimism. We were driven back by the
sand, blowing like needles into our skin. We found
refuge in a good game of Rummikub, a movie, and dinner
on the boat. It had been so long since we had
spent time with our good friends, we weren't going to be
beaten down by crappy weather and life threatening
storms!
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The rest of the vacation was total bliss. Good
friends, good spirits and improving weather conspired to
provide the nirvana we sought. It is so worth the
effort to connect with the people you love. There
was talk of changing flights and extending the stay, but
reality beckoned the Rezvanis back home all too soon.
We maximized our time together and promised to keep in
touch and see each other again soon. After 20
years of friendship, it will take more than an ocean to
keep us apart.
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In
the mean time, we are out here, a little humbled by our
experience but not at all deterred in our commitment to
continuing with our cruising adventure. We
continue to make plans for a passage to Europe in
mid-June. My family has made arrangements to meet
us in Portugal in August for a Fisher family reunion.
Joe's sister and brother-in-law are also planning a
visit. We are frantically researching the
possibility of wintering in Spain. We had been
seriously considering living on the boat in a marina in
Mallorca and checking the kids into a local school, only
to discover that Mallorca is part of the province of
Spain where Catalan is spoken. A totally different
language from Castellano, or "regular" Spanish, we are
now back to square one trying to figure out where to go.
We might just wind up pulling the boat out of the water
and renting an apartment for six months on mainland
Spain. It will certainly be easier to find a place
for the boat "on the hard" than it is to find a place to
keep her and live on her over the winter. The
possibilities are endless, and exhilarating. I
just hope we don't make any more rookie mistakes that
interfere with our future! We have so much more to
learn.
Peace and love to you all,
Christy, Joe, Cassie and Juliana
PS: Lots of good photos of the Rezvani clan on the
photo pages.....
Next entry
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Many thanks to our
friend Craig Homenko for his assistance in setting up
the website.
We also would like
to thank our buddy Scott Brunner who has been kind
enough to host the website on his server.
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