(Warning: If you suffer from heart disease or high blood pressure or you are, in general, anxious, please reconsider reading this next log entry.)
10/21/04 – Storming Green Beach. We spent two lovely days anchored off Green Beach, Vieques, swimming and snorkeling in the clear blue waters. Green Beach is one of the most popular beaches on the island (for boaters and landlubbers alike). It is a stretch of sand on the west coast of Vieques that offers more than a mile of coral reef snorkeling in gin-clear water. A favorite with the local boaters, the beach can get crowded on the weekends. We had the place to ourselves during our midweek visit.
Green beach, along with two thirds of Vieques, was under U.S. Naval control from the Spanish American War in 1899 until 2001. (Of course, we all remember The Maine and Teddy Roosevelt storming San Juan Hill.) Because of the high profile political protests of the late 1990s, Vieques is no longer used for naval training exercises and target practice. While under Naval control, the majority of the time it remained closed to the public. It was said that Green Beach was the primary beach used by the Navy to practice the invasion of Grenada. Therefore, except for a few unexploded ordinances at the south end of the beach, it is a pristine beach, virtually untouched by development for over a century.
We had planned to leave after spending two lovely days anchored in relative tranquility. Our anchor was dug in and set for the prevailing easterly winds, and the light offshore breeze begged us to linger. It was Wednesday afternoon, and the forecast was not calling for stormy weather until midday Thursday. As we basked in the afternoon sun on the trampolines, Ron and I decided to stay overnight and leave in the morning. It wasn’t that far to our next anchorage, and besides, Ron was still a little under the weather and could use the rest of another night at anchor.
About 3:30 in the morning, rainwater dripping from the hatch above our forward V-berth awakened me. The rain was coming down heavily and the wind seemed to be picking up. In the distance, I could hear claps of thunder. I figured the hatch was left partially opened, so I got up to check it. From the inside, it looked securely closed, so I concluded that the blowing rain was finding its way through the lip of the hatch and into the cabin. I went back to bed and drifted off.
By 4 a.m., the wind was really howling and the rain was coming down in sheets. I got up a second time, and, peering out into the cockpit all I could make out was a deluge of rain. There was no visibility in the pitch blackness of the early morning. I returned to my bed and began counting the seconds between lightning flashes and thunder. I never got more than a 3-second interval, with most being two or less. The storm was directly over us, and I had never heard thunder, nor seen as bright or sustained lightening as this. The flashes were brilliant and the sound was truly awesome.
Suddenly, the boat’s motion changed, taking on a strange sideways roll. I woke up Ron and asked what he thought of the boat’s motion. He was awake, but seemed unconcerned, and said that he had felt the same motion the previous night, but when he checked last night, the motion was due to a passing boat. He assumed the same was happening again. I continued to lie there for a few more minutes, but felt something was not right. I rose for a third time and went back up to the main salon.
By this time, Ron was up too. I decided to break out the high illumination spotlight to better access the situation. As I aimed the spotlight to shore, I was horrified to see how close we had gotten to the beach. The illumination revealed rock ledges sticking up through the heavy breaking surf. I recognized these flat rock ledges. Nina and I had walked the beach that day and I had commented on their expanse and proximity to shore. It looked as though we were very close to the beach. Before I could get the words out, we heard the crunch of fiberglass bottom against coral and rocks. We were sideways to the shore and grinding against coral, rocks and sand. Ron quickly jumped into the helm seat and fired up both engines in an attempt to motor Irie away from shore.
The sickening sound of bottom against tops of rocks is unforgettable. The high-pitched rapid beeping of the warning signal from the depth sounder, preceded scraping sounds then a thunderous thud of keels against rock. Irie shuddered and lurched with every bump against the bottom. A few times, an engine propeller stopped dead and the engine stalled as we hit bottom. If this were to happen to both engines at the same time, the boat might have been dashed onto shore. These hits were by far the most harrowing. In addition to being pushed ashore, a strong hit to the sail drives could cause an unstoppable breach to the hull.
Fear momentarily paralyzed me as I watched Ron, doggedly attempting to maneuver the boat away from the rocks. I suddenly felt completely helpless and out of control until Ron said something to me. I don’t remember what he said, but it snapped me from my near panic state. In fire fighting you are taught that the calls you respond to are “not your emergency.” This may seem callous, like you are expected to lack empathy for the victims, but its main purpose is to keep you focused on helping the victim, whose emergency it is, and to keep you and your crew safe by not becoming part of the emergency. Unfortunately, this time, it was my emergency. I had to use all that I had learned in my training to regain control and aid my husband in saving our boat from this awful situation.
The rain was relentless in its intensity. The wind blew the rain through the cockpit and into the open door of the main salon. At the helm, Ron was drenched to the bone in a matter of seconds. I ran below to retrieve the foul weather gear. It was difficult to keep my balance in the pitch and roll of the grounded boat. I assisted Ron with his rain gear as he desperately tried to keep the boat off the rocks. The sound of the hull grinding against the bottom seemed deafening --my stomach churned. We struggled to maintain our collective cool. It was every boater’s worst nightmare, but this was far worse than a bad dream.
In the midst of this pandemonium, Haley came into the main salon, hysterical, thinking the violent noises she was hearing was the mast collapsing. Her bunk sat right over the port keel, propeller and engine. In the calmest voice I could muster, I told her we were just scraping bottom and Dad and I would take care of it. I then asked her to go and bunk in with her sister until we told her it was safe to come out. Nina’s bunk was a forward berth and was, thus, somewhat shielded from the frightening sounds of our grounding. (Later, Haley told us that my calm words reassured her, and she was actually able to rest while Ron and I continued to wrestle with the elements. I was happy to hear I had been reassuring, although, looking back, I can’t imagine how that was possible.)
Thunder and lightning enveloped us. The din produced by the thunder, crashing waves, wind and rain was deafening. A few bolts of lightning hit very close to Irie. The only benefit of the lightning was that with every flash, we were able to see our unchanging proximity to shore. Ron tried motoring up the shore, down the shore, and away from shore, but every attempt at escape led only to more ear-splitting bottom grinding.
It was now 4:45 a.m., and it was still pitch black. Even with a four hundred thousand candle-watt spot light, all we could see on shore were a few palm fronds hanging over a white reflective sign about 20 feet from the boat. I braced myself in the cockpit and held the light on the sign to help Ron keep his bearings. He used it as a guide to motor straight out from shore. As long as he pointed the boat directly away from the beach, he was able to keep the boat from hitting the rocks. However, it was as though we were in a hole, hemmed in by the coral and rock, unable to make any seaway. Ron kept the engines steady at 2200 rpm, close to full power. Our lack of forward progress completely baffled us, but we were off the rocks and that would have to be good enough until there was enough light to fully assess the situation.
We desperately needed daylight — without it, finding our way free was impossible. I asked Ron when the sun would rise. He read 6:17 a.m. from the GPS. That meant we would get some dim light by 5:45 a.m. at the earliest.
Ron spent the next hour motoring us straight from shore while I kept the search light aimed at the sign on the beach. It was by far the most grueling hour of our trip thus far, and one we don’t ever care to repeat. In the face of disaster, Ron and I remained level headed. We did not panic, nor did we ever give up. It was clear that all those hours of fire training had really paid off for me. And Ron? I credit his lack of panic to his steely Czech disposition.
Despite the chaos of that dark hour of motoring, we seemed to settle into a routine, and I suddenly felt a pot of hot tea was in order. We were both soaked to the skin, even with our foul weather gear on, and Ron was shivering at the helm. My arms and legs ached from holding a rigid stance while I held the spotlight on shore. Ron had gotten his bearings and was completely focused on the compass heading he was using to continue to motor away from shore. This relieved me from my spotlight duty and I went into the salon and made tea.
By 5:55 a.m., the dim early morning light allowed us to actually see more than just the cockpit and what fell within the searchlight beam. As Ron continued at the helm, I went forward to assess the situation. I was startled to see that the anchor rode was trailing backwards under the boat. With a flashlight I followed the rode astern and saw that it was wrapped over and through the rock ledges within a boat-length from shore. I attempted to dislodge the anchor chain using the boat hook, but failed because it was wound too tightly around the rocks, and because Ron’s motoring kept the chain taut. It was now clear that our anchor was keeping us on shore. Our own anchor had betrayed us and had held us a mere twenty feet from shore. The only way out was to cast the anchor and rode overboard so that we could motor safely away from the rocks and coral.
Casting off the anchor presented a number of difficulties. First, the chain was hooked to a bridle. This connection was now under the boat and strained backward as we motored away. To get at the bridle hook would require shifting to neutral and the possibility of drifting back onto the rocks. Second, the entire anchor rode would have to be carefully threaded out without fouling. This was no easy task in the bucking sea. Third, once completely free, we might be unable to retrieve the anchor, rode and chain –losing these would be expensive to replace and leave us vulnerable in the short-term (of course, compared to losing the boat, loss of only the ground tackle would be minor).
Despite these obstacles, it was our best course of action. Ron shifted to neutral just long enough for me to unclip the bridle. To our extreme surprise, I was able to unclip without any further bottom grinding. I then carefully heaved all the rode from the anchor locker and fed it out as Ron continued motoring away from shore. We began to move ahead away from the beach. Several times, the rode did tangle, but each time I was able to set it free.
Once the bitter end of the rode was reached, I released it, but Ron held onto a section of the rode at the boat’s stern so that he could tie a bumper to it so that he could attempt to retrieve it later.
I broke down and cried as I watched the bumper fade into the now distant shore. Tears of relief that our struggle was over.
It was now 6:15 a.m. The storm had passed and left us with drizzle and light wind. While Irie drifted safely offshore, Ron took the dinghy and went to retrieve the anchor. I waited on Irie and readied another anchor in case we couldn’t retrieve the first.
Ron found that the anchor was entangled around the rock ledges at the shore line. The pop-up squall had caused the wind to clock around to the northwest, pulling out our anchor and dragging Irie straight into shore. Ron managed, with a struggle, to untangle the anchor, chain and rode from the rocks, drag it aboard the dinghy, and motor it back to Irie, where we put it back in its proper place.
The rain had nearly stopped and it was now calm. We were drifting quietly a half-mile off shore in deep water. The first calm we had experienced since we were rudely awakened into our nightmare.
Emotional and physically exhausted from this experience, I made oatmeal and coffee and we regrouped to determine our next steps. We needed to access the damage caused by our beaching, and the suspense was killing us. We knew there would be damage, but how much? We were heartsick over the thought of any damage, since we had just spent many dollars repairing and reconditioning the bottom and propellers at the boatyard in Fajardo.
Ron dove each side to assess the damage while the girls and I awaited word on deck. The keel damage was not bad, but the props looked very dinged up and would need work, he said. After Ron climbed back aboard, we talked about it and made a decision to return to Fajardo and have the boat hauled for a complete assessment and repair.
AFTERMATH
We were unprepared for the arrival of this unpredicted and unannounced storm. (We are still not sure how one should be prepared for the unpredicted.) It felt as though we had been sucker punched. Or maybe it was a "cosmic dope slap" for being too content. Our anchor was set for the prevailing winds (out of the southeast), and had been blown out in the gusts of these ghastly northwest winds. We later learned that the storm had dumped over three inches of rain in one hour. The same hour we struggled to keep Irie off the beach.
We had successfully dodged several major storms this busy season, but it was this brief unnamed, unpredicted one that had gotten us. Cruel irony.
Later that morning, Nina asked, “Daddy, were you ever scared?” Ron replied, “No, I was not afraid for me, but I was scared for Irie.” Ron and I agreed that our family was never in any immediate personal danger. The fact that shore was only a few steps away would have made it possible for us to escape to land easily. The girls surprised us by saying the thing they worried about the most was if Irie was too badly damaged, we would have to cut short our trip. We were pleased to hear their reaction was not solely one of fear, but instead of concern for missing out on the rest of the experience. I guess the kids put it best: we were all afraid of a premature ending to our fantastic Caribbean adventure.
During this trip, we have experienced what we believe to be the extreme of human emotion and feeling. This early morning experience had been no exception. We have never felt so unsure, uncomfortable, overwhelmed, exhausted and stressed. On the other hand, we have never felt so competent, comfortable, relaxed, rested and satisfied. Ron is always rattling off a quote from Thoreau that he was forced to learn in high school. Perhaps he recites it for more reason than simply because he had to memorize it. Thoreau wrote that he “went to the woods to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and not when he came to die, discover that he had not lived.” Last night’s experience certainly provided an experience in living life to the fullest.
Funny thing is, when we first bought Irie, I had vowed never to become attached to her. I had been attached to Haley’s Comet, our first sailboat, because she was our first. We had made many memories sailing her on the Chesapeake Bay with our family and friends. We had purchased her when Haley was only two years old and I was pregnant with Nina. Since the boat was named for her, Haley often referred to it as “MY Comet.” I like to think that a little piece of Haley’s Comet is with us, sailing along in the form of the proceeds from her sale to finance this trip. But I still miss her and I cried the day we sold her.
I had decided my connection to Irie would be different. She was a boat we would own for a year or two; we would sell her at the end of our sailing trip. I viewed her only as a vehicle on which to explore the Eastern Caribbean. That night on Green Beach had changed everything. As we fought to save her from being wrecked on the rocks, Irie had become my boat, “MY Irie.” I will likely cry the day we sell her.
10/22/04 – Healing Time.
We had planned to continue our exploration of Vieques and then move on to Culebra for at least a week before heading to the Virgin Islands. Our Green Beach incident certainly changed this, but we weren’t going to let it get in the way of our trip. I put in a call to Island Marine, the contractors whom we had just left, to see if they could fit us in for a second round.
I called and got Jennifer at Island Marine right away. She was very sympathetic to our situation and even remarked how the storm we had experienced was unpredicted and how it was unfortunate that we had been caught in it. She said they were very busy (we had waited a month for our first appointment) but she would see what they could do. After all, we were “repeat” customers. I wondered aloud if they gave “frequent hauler” miles. I said it felt like we had driven a new car off the lot and had immediately gotten into an accident.
She called us back in about fifteen minutes, and put us on the schedule for the next Monday. We were very grateful and relieved to be able to get the work done before moving on down island. We had toyed with the idea of finding another boatyard and contractor farther east, but rejected that idea in favor of having the boat hauled sooner and having a complete evaluation done. Since it was still only Thursday morning, we decided to continue East along the Vieques coast to the town of Esperanza. We would spend the weekend there and then return to Fajardo for our second round of bottom work.
By 11:00 a.m. we weighed anchor and headed East. The storm had worked up the wind and seas, and of course, whipped back around to the South East. We experienced a familiar sail into the trade winds, once again taking 20 knots on the nose. I spent most of the time sitting on the coach deck reflecting on the events of the early morning while Ron sat at the helm silently piloting Irie to the seaside town of Esperanza. The girls used the time to catch up on their sleep and dozed in the cockpit. The familiar rhythm of the sea gave us all comfort and allowed the healing to begin.
The anchorage in front of the town of Esperanza on the island of Vieques had several Department of Natural Resources moorings. They were available for use first-come, first-serve basis, at no charge. We decided after our experience at Green Beach, we would be most comfortable tying onto one of these moorings. We had heard these moorings were mostly reliable, but should be dived on to check out, just in case.
Ron dove down to the mooring anchors. Most moorings in the Caribbean are fixed to the bottom with either a steel auger or sand screw twisted into the sand, or a stainless steel eyebolt that is cemented directly into the coral pavement. This one was a sand screw and appeared to be sound. We attached the floating mooring line or painter to a short bowline and onto Irie. Ron found the mooring to be sound, and we settled in for an evening aboard Irie.
This was our first experience with a public mooring and given that the wind decided, as if on queue, to kick up for the night, Ron elected to sleep in the main salon to monitor our mooring, just in case. I slept in the forward berth and found my sleep to be fitful, to say the least. Let’s just say after the Green Beach grounding, we were all feeling a little bit edgy.
The next morning, our visit onshore to Esperanza began with a trip to the bakery for what had become somewhat of a comfort food for us - ham, egg and cheese sandwiches. The owner was a former Bostonian and was in a full lather over the Red Sox’s victory over the Yankees. She said she had a feeling the “Curse of the Bambino” would be broken this year and the Red Sox would win the series. (And as it turned out, she was right.)
The waterfront of Esperanza was well-developed, with several guesthouses, a number of restaurants and small boutiques lining the narrow street that ran along the concrete boardwalk (or Malecon). The bright blue Malecon was built on the high rocks above the shore and extended along the entire length of the downtown area. We visited several of the shops and picked up a few Christmas gifts.
At Kim’s Cabin we chatted with the owner, Jim, an older gentleman and a seasoned sailor. He had spent many decades sailing the waters of the Caribbean and had settled on Vieques as his permanent home. We guessed he opened the habadashery shortly after becoming a landlubber again. He was quite a salesman and a real character and employed the “hard sell” technique in an attempt to get Ron to buy one of his 50 dollar batik print shirts. It didn’t work.
When we mentioned our peril on Green Beach, he became extremely interested in our story, as any old salt would, and peppered Ron with questions on the circumstances of our experience. He said he had also nearly lost a boat in a storm on Green Beach. He remarked that the holding was notoriously bad there, especially in storms. Boy, did we know that.
Jim had retired from full time cruising quite some time ago. His last sailboat was sold to someone one month before Hurricane Hugo hit Puerto Rico. The boat was sunk in the storm. Ron chuckled and called him a “genius.” He had seen the Caribbean in some of its shadier days, when criminal activities were purported to be more commonplace. He admitted it’s a different world today and the sea is a safer place because of it. He could do without all the crowds, though. He said we would hate the Virgin Islands for the crowds. Crowds were something we could hardly imagine, given that our anchorage here in Esparanza was once again occupied by only one boat, ours.
After our window shopping was complete, we headed over to the Vieques Conservation and Historical Trust. It took us two tries to actually make it through the doors of this little yellow building, only to find out the outdoor marine life exhibits were closed because they had been damaged by Tropical Storm Jeanne. We browsed the indoor exhibits of Taino Indian artifacts and were headed out but were stopped by the resident marine life researcher. An engaging young man, he offered to show us what remained of the outdoor exhibits.
Upon learning of Haley and Nina’s interest in sea turtles, he immediately turned their attention to several turtle shells he had in a small classroom out behind the main building. He educated us on how to recognize one type of turtle from another by counting the number of scales on their shells. He was also excited to hear we had seen several turtles, probably hawksbills (in case you were wondering, they have four scales lengthwise across their shells) around our mooring. He later ran to catch up with us as we continued our tour of the town to give us a U.S. Fish and Wildlife pamphlet on Turtles of the Carribean.
We were happy to learn from him that most of the land formally occupied by the U.S. Navy was put into a trust and would eventually be turned over to the U.S. Department of Interior and probably become a national park. Good news, although there is the small matter of removing all of those unexploded ordinances.
Our stroll through town was cut short by threatening skies. Before the heavens opened up, we decided to duck into the nearest watering hole and chose La Sirena, an open-air bar and restaurant. We followed in behind a group of fresh-faced female tourists also looking for shelter and a cool beverage.
A woman behind the bar immediately began waving off the group of girls explaining that the restaurant was not open, she was not the bartender and the few patrons at the bar were her “friends.” She said they would have to return at 5:00 p.m. when the restaurant opened. When I heard this, I figured we would have to find another place to wait out the rainstorm. But Ron forged ahead and once the tourists were out of earshot, he used his keen negotiating skills to get us all a seat at the bar.
Carol, the wizened woman behind the bar, (you see, I can’t call her the “bartender,” because she insisted she was NOT), succumbed to Ron’s artful persuasion and agreed to give us a drink as long as it was something requiring little or no preparation. That would include no ice and no mixing. Since it was a beer we were after, we were allowed in and took a seat along with her friends at the bar. Later, Carol admitted she allowed us in because, unlike the female tourists, we didn’t look like we would be ordering any “blended drinks.” We took that as a compliment.
The friends sitting at the bar were Joyce and Jeff, a newlywed couple from Key West, FL. They had recently relocated to Vieques and were in the process of building a small Inn on the north side of the island. Joyce had worked as a financial consultant in Rosslyn, Virginia and grew up in Falls Church, Virginia. Jeff, her husband, had grown up in McLean, Virginia and had spent the last 15 years as a charter fishing boat captain in Key West, FL. Joyce took an immediate interest in the girls (she said she missed being an Auntie to her nieces and nephews back in Virginia) and spent time playing checkers and chess with them.
Shortly after we took our seats at the bar, the heavens did indeed open up and a violent rainstorm ensured. Carol rushed to shudder the bar from the rain, cursing the shudders as they refused to close properly. In the middle of the torrent of rain, Francois, the owner of the restaurant, arrived with liquor to restock the bar and supplies for the restaurant. He was assisted by Dave, a regular and local dive operator, with lugging the supplies from the car. We had seen Dave a few times earlier that day, helping other shopkeepers with their chores so we weren’t too surprised to see him passing by and pitching in to help Francois.
Dave lived in Vieques for the past 22 years and was working as a local guide for snorkel and dive operators. For the price of buying Dave a drink, Ron got the skinny on the best snorkeling spots in Vieques. Unfortunately, the weather never cooperated – the seas were too rough – and we never made it to the spots. But we were happy to buy Dave a drink. Later he sat with Haley for over an hour, tutoring her in chess. He also offered to lend us a hand if we needed him while we were here at anchor. He remarked he was called “the Dolphin” by locals because of his uncanny ability to stay afloat for hours and to free dive (dive without oxygen) to depths of 40 feet. Remarkable claims and after meeting him, completely believable.
A few beers into it, the conversation turned to the previous night’s storm. When they all heard we were on a boat, they asked where we were anchored and if we were safe. They were horrified to hear of our encounter on Green Beach but were not surprised given the violent nature of the storm. Painful to recount, but we were certainly given a much needed boost by this convivial group of Viequens.
After Carol was relieved of her “bartending” duties she joined us at the bar for drinks, dinner and more conversation. Even Francois acted more like a patron than an owner, sitting at the bar sipping his red wine and eating asparagus. Doing both, he said, in an attempt to be more “El-thy.” Francois, a reserved, pleasant faced Frenchman, had owned several restaurants in New York City before leaving it all behind to live the quiet life in Vieques. He shared the business and an apartment upstairs with his three brown Labrador retrievers.
Carol washed up on the shores of Vieques after having spent time living in California and then in Key West, FL where she lived on a houseboat. When she heard we were “blue water sailors” (the “real deal,” as she had put it) and live-a-boards, she remarked how much she missed living on the water. She was another old salt, and with an impish gleam in her eye she recounted her days of living on the water in Key West and piloting her beloved 17 foot Carolina skiff through rough seas from her houseboat to shore to get a loaf of bread.
She had moved to Vieques because she had grown tired of living in Key West. Key West, in her opinion, had become too sanitized in an attempt to appeal to the masses. She liked Vieques because of its eclectic qualities. And she liked working with Francois at La Sirena and watching the sunset from the bar over the Malecon. Every time she saw it set, she would say to herself “this is why I am here.” By the way, she WAS the bartender, when she wanted to be.
The night had grown too late and we needed to get back to Irie. We would leave the next day to make it back to our scheduled haul out. Dave and the others told us we should reconsider and stay in Vieques a few more days. Maybe we could come back after our repairs were completed? We would be back, we said, but not until Spring. We bid our friends farewell and headed out to our dinghy in the dark.
It had begun to rain again and the wind had picked up. As we approached the dinghy dock, we could see the surge had built and the dinghies were being dashed against the wooden dock. In the darkness, we had trouble making out our dinghy. In fact, our dinghy was no longer tied to the dock. Our hearts sank. Where was our dinghy?
In the torrential rain and blowing wind, the dinghy somehow had broken loose and had blown onshore and swamped. (Hey, is this beginning to sound familiar?) Luckily, a couple of Puerto Rican fisherman had seen her drift in and swamp. They bailed her enough to get her on the beach and then tied her to a tree. They were still nearby when we found her. They explained what had happened and then helped drag her back out into the water. Ron jumped in and started her in the heavy shore surge.
Fearing we would be swamped again if we all boarded it on the beach with the heavy break, Ron motored out past the shore break alone. We walked down the beach to where there was more protection from the surge. I motioned for Ron to make a landing. Ron held the boat back as the girls and I plunged into the surge. I still get an adrenaline rush thinking about it.
Nina and Haley did their best to fight against the strong shore break and wade out to the dinghy. As I hoisted Nina up into the dinghy, I could see the panic on her face. Later, when she burst into tears over the experience, Ron and I could only imagine what it must have been like for her, a tiny eight-year-old, to wade out into a four-foot shore break and toward a surging dinghy. Scary is what is was.
We managed to pilot the dinghy safely back to Irie, but not without snagging a small mooring line on the way out. Something Nina has always cautioned us against and definitely on her “Worst Case Scenario” list. (Seems like we are making considerable progress on that list.) Let me explain that Nina has always fancied herself the caretaker of our dinghy and continues to assume this role whenever we venture out in it. So the possibility of losing or damaging our dinghy is something she is deeply concerned over. And that is why she took that evening’s events particularly hard.
The Esperanza anchorage did have a persistant roll, but we were able to overlook this and enjoyed our last morning watching a dozen wild horses frolick on the beach in front of our anchorage.
Sad to leave the welcoming ex-Pat community of Esperanza but anxious to get Irie repaired, we left later that morning and had a fantastic three-hour sail to our anchorage at Isla Pineros.
10/25/04 – Hauling Irie . . . Again. We received a call early in the morning from Jennifer of Island Marine to say that the boatyard could haul us earlier than our 11:00 a.m. appointment. We said we’d be there as soon as possible and began to make preparations to depart from our anchorage at Isla Pineros. We were familiar enough with the hauling slip at the Puerto Del Rey Marina boatyard to remember we had to hang several fenders on each side of the boat. Irie’s beam or width was 22 feet and the slip was 26 feet. Not a huge margin of error. After we hung the fenders over the sides of the boat and secured everything in the cockpit and on deck, we were ready to weigh anchor. Ron and I had carefully set the anchor the day before. Ron had donned his mask and snorkel and swam down to ensure the anchor was properly set. This is often referred to as “diving the anchor.” It took some extra effort to pull up the anchor that morning, proving the time we spent setting it the night before had paid off.
The hauling went as smoothly as it did the first time. The travel lift crew recognized us and asked why we were hauling Irie again. The painful retelling of the story had begun. It would continue as we made our way through the boatyard and people recognized us and the boat.
As Irie was slowly lifted from the water, I had the urge to close my eyes. Instead, I stood at the edge of the slip, holding Nina and Haley’s hands and watching for the first glimpse of the damage. I gasped as I saw the scars across the edge and bottom of both keels. But what really caught my attention was the damaged propellers. I immediately began worrying about the sail drives. The propellers are attached to the end of the sail drives which connect the propellers to the engine. Damage to these would be an expensive and major undertaking to repair.
The travel lift crew moved Irie carefully back to the boatyard. Ron chatted with Benny, the lift operator as he walked alongside the lift and used a gigantic remote control to steer the lift to the Island Marine yard. I walked ahead with the girls and ran into a few of the Island Marine contractors. Each met us with an appropriate long face and expressed their sympathies over what had happened to us. The general consensus was, “Hey, it could have happened to anyone” and “At least nobody was hurt.”
I felt a certain sense of relief as I watched the lift crew block Irie and bring her to rest in the Island Marine yard. She was in good hands and we would quickly learn what we needed to do to get her back in the water.
The girls and I went over to the Thrifty Rental Car office to rent a car while Ron checked in with the Island Marine crew. I came back to find they had already pulled off the propellers and were examining the sail drives. Ron had given them all the painful details of the grounding. I was greeted by Rick, the lead contractor. I said I’d like to say I was happy to see him again, but I really wasn’t. He said that was understandable, given the circumstances. Rick said he would review any damage carefully and would call with his assessment. We took off in our rental car, a Deja Vu experience since it was the same car we had rented the last time we were in Fajardo.
We laughed that we had a second chance in Fajardo and would “do it right” this time. We had made a list of must-haves and found ourselves shopping at, where else, West Marine. We had eyed a pair of deck chairs in the catalog after we had departed Puerto Rico and the last West Marine. We found them in the store and best of all they were on sale, marked at 2-for-1. Maybe our luck was turning? Happily, we got out of there before we had a chance to scan the entire sale flyer. We would be spending plenty on the boat in the yard. We needed to economize.
I decided to start my economizing by getting a cheaper deal on a hotel room. We had stayed at the lovely Fajardo Inn the last time the boat was in the yard. At 90 bucks a night it seemed like a good deal the first time, but too much to spend on an unplanned return trip. I had heard they had a smaller building on the same grounds called the Scenic Inn. It was not well advertised but I decided to inquire over the phone. I found they had a room available for a family and quoted me a price of 80 dollars. Not a huge savings, but at least it was something. I asked what the difference was in the two properties. It seemed the main difference was that the television had no remote-control. Ok, we could make do with no remote.
We arrived later in the day at the Fajardo Inn. I again inquired about the rooms at the Scenic Inn. She again reminded me there was “no TV remote.” I told her I was Ok with that. But I did see that the posted rate was 60 dollars-a-night. She said, yes it was, but each additional person was 10 dollars. I reminded her that the two extras were children under 12. I also threw in the sad my-boat-is-damaged story. I guess that plus the fact that we were repeat customers did it and she gave me the room for 60 dollars-a-night.
The Scenic Inn was down the hill from the Fajardo Inn, so it required a walk to the main building complex or “The Big House” as I liked to call it to take a swim or fetch ice. A small price to pay for a 30 dollar-a-day savings. The room was very pleasant and clean, just as our room had been in the main building. The girls noted that it was actually bigger, just a little older. Oh, and the lack of remote for the TV? We adjusted nicely. Ron had his chair positioned next to the TV and we shouted “click” whenever we wanted to change the channel.
10/28/04 – Two Types of Captains. They say there are two types of Captains: those that have run their boat aground and those that haven’t –yet. In our case, at least this time, our grounding was not due to a navigational error. We weren’t underway at the time. Our anchor had dragged. So what was our error? We needed to learn from our experience. Ron and I grappled with this for weeks after the accident. We discussed it with ever sailor and yachtsman we came into contact with, hoping to find a clue to help prevent an accident such as this one in the future. There were many shrugged shoulders and a wide range of advice all the way from “I never sleep on the hook” and “I always throw out two or three anchors, just in case”; to “I just set my anchor and cross my fingers.”
Most thought it was just a matter of bad luck and there was probably little we could have done to prevent it from happening. Winds shift. Anchors drag. In the end, we knew we were simply victims of an unfortunate accident.
We have become fastidious in setting our anchor and use our GPS to alert us to any movement from our original anchoring point. So we aren’t as relaxed as we used to be about setting our anchor. And we shouldn’t be.
Rick called with his assessment while we were enjoying a return visit to the El Yunque rainforest. There was damage to both the starboard and port keels, but the damage was relatively minor. Nothing that some West Systems epoxy wouldn’t fix. The props needed to be reconditioned, but did not need to be replaced. The good news was that the saildrives were undamaged. All in all, the damage could have been far worse.
We made the best of it and continued to take in as much of El Yunque as we could. We returned for a third day, hiking once more to La Mina Falls – this time via the Big Tree Trail – for another swim under the waterfall. El Yunque is truly an enchanted place and was well worth visiting over again. Here’s a favorite quote from one of the films on conservation we watched at the El Yunque visitor’s center: “We didn’t inherit the earth from our parents. We are borrowing it from our children.”
As the week turned into the weekend, we were told our room at the Scenic Inn had been reserved by another guest and we would have to leave or take a room at the adjacent Fajardo Inn. We had debated leaving Fajardo and staying in San Juan for the weekend.
Our eviction made the decision for us and we took a room for two nights in Isla Verde, a well-developed beach community in the style of Miami Beach minutes from San Juan. We found a modest motel nestled in between the likes of the Intercontinental and other mega-resort hotels and steps to a beautiful stretch of white sand beach. A day of reexploring Old San Juan and a thorough combing of the beautiful and historic El Morro fort capped off our Puerto Rican experience.
After spending a week economizing on meals, we decided to splurge and spent our last evening at the upper end of the food chain. We were serenaded by Coqui frogs as we ate our Tapas on a porch of a restaurant housed in a beautifully restored mansion on Condado beach. And we toasted to Irie’s safe passage on the next leg of our adventure – the Virgin Islands.
Post Script. 12/4/04
Dear Family and Friends - I thought you’d like to know where the crew of Irie currently lies. We are in St. Maarten, having made the passage from the British Virgin Islands to here on December 2. Once Irie was relaunched on 11/2/04, we donned our “sailing shoes” and had a fantastic and busy month exploring the beautiful waters of the Spanish, US and British Virgin Islands. Our sail here across the fabled Anegada Passage was the last of the longest passages we’ll need to make to continue our trip down island. We are now officially in the Eastern Caribbean and are looking forward to exploring as many islands as we can down the chain to Grenada.
We had a few visitors during our time in the Virgin Islands. My parents joined us for a week in St. Thomas and St. John and Ron’s brother Dave and his family joined us for Thanksgiving in the British Virgin Islands. We enjoyed sharing our experience with them and they have both written guest logs that will be posted on the website shortly.
In the next few days we will be traveling to St. Barth’s and then on to Guadeloupe and finally Dominica for Christmas and New Years. Ron’s family will be joining us in Dominica to ring in the New Year.
Thanks to all of you for your continued love and support. We wish you all could be sailing with us – “what a perfect world that would be” – but until we see you again, here’s wishing you “Fair Winds.”
Ron, Nancie, Haley and Nina aboard Irie
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