Anchor Retrieval Expedition ’07 (A.R.E) (CB)

CB 19 April, 2007
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Ok, this story took place a couple weeks ago, the last weekend of March.

It all actually got it’s start late last summer. August 2nd to be exact. To summarize, last August during our vacation in the San Juan Islands, we sailed into Blind bay on Shaw island to see our friends Scott and Angie on thier boat “Ghost”. Scotty had somehow gotten his anchor absolutly stuck on the bottom. Despite our best efforts, we could not break the anchor free. The only option we were left with was to cut his anchor chain and mark the spot with a buoy, with the wishful promise of returning one day to retrieve the anchor.

Over the winter we would get togather have a few beers/rums and retell the lost anchor story to each other or any innocent bystander that happened to be standing too close. At some point between the end of September and the beginning of March a plan was hatched to retrieve the anchor. That plan, along with more than a few others for retrieval trips were suggested and forgotten about. Some time in March a solid plan had come togather. Emails were sent, phone calls made, and work schedules updated. We decided to do it.

Initially there were to be 12 expedition team members, but as with such things, the final epiditionary force numbered a solid 4. We forged on none the less.

When “A Day” finally arrived, me and Scotty left Seattle early (10:30am) to get up to Shaw island and setup base camp. Dave and Rich would follow later in the afternoon with the dive gear and dinghy, which was all packed into and on top of Rich’s truck.

We got camp setup in no time and the first beers of many were opened. We made a few important logisitical decisions, such as which tree would be the designated “Pee tree”. This is an important step in setting up a base camp on any major expedition, trust me. We got the firewood gathered and a fire built, as well as scouted out the beach below the campsite. Not one beer was spilt at all during this crucial initial phase. Not even the one I was carrying as we climbed down the cliff from the campsite to the beach below.

Dave and Rich arrived to a well found camp and we settled in for a long night of bullshitting, beer drinking and music. Dave and Scott on Guitar, Rich on the Ukelallee and me on Harmonica. Oddly enough we did not see any wildlife at all the entire weekend. Not sure if it was due to our “music” or that Shaw island just does not have a raccoon problem.

After pounds of bacon and eggs cooked over the fire we headed to the dive site. While Dave and I got our dive gear sorted out and put on. Rich and Scotty took the dinghy out to the spot where Scotty thought the Anchor should be. They returned just as we were suited up and reported that they found the bouy we left last summer and that it was still attached to his anchor chain. Scotty even brought his underwater video camara and was able to spot the chain on the bottom and that is was drapped over some sort of cage.

Suggested dinghy load limit be damned, we all loaded into the dinghy along with all the dive gear and puttered out to the site of the anchor. We had so much wieght in the dinghy, that water was pouring in over the sides and well as through the centerboard hole in the bottom like a fountain. After me and dave slipped over the side in to the water, Rich started bailing like mad.

We followed the buoy line down and spotted not a cage but an entire sunken 50 foot fishing boat. We did not expect that. The Anchor was jammed underneath the keel of the boat and the anchor chain was wrapped up and around the front of the boat. We were able to unwrap the chain easy enough. But getting the anchor it’s self unstuck from the bottom of the boat was a real pain in the ass. Pushing and pulling on it kicked up a huge mess of silt and mud with made it impossible to see what we were doing. We worked at it for awhile then surface to formulate a new plan and go back down and try again. I was able to attach a line to the anchor with a D-ring and we used the dinghy and engine to try and pull the anchore free but that did not work. After that we needed a break and a new tank of air. So Scotty towed us back to shore.

Once on shore, Rich headed back to camp in the truck to get the fire stoked up so we could warm up when we were done. Me, Scotty and Dave headed back out for a second dive. We were actually going to just go out and retreive the line and reattach it to the buoy and write it off as a failure. But once out there we decide to get the anchor not matter what.

This time instead of pulling from just one side of the boat. I went on the Starboard side and pushed as Dave went to the port side and pulled. The anchor popped right out after a few minutes of effort. SUCCESS!!! We surfaced and Scotty pulled the Anchor up and into the Dinghy. High Fives all around. A quick dive down to try the float to the boat as a warning to others and we headed back to shore and camp.

We talked to a local that lived across the road from the beach and he told us that boat sank about 5 years ago and has been there ever since. It is not marked on any charts, so I informed the coastguard and NOAA of it and hopefully it will be marked on future charts.

We headed back to camp to warm up and celebrate our success, with more music, beer and chili!

What a great weekend!! And as always, I have pictures, but have not uploaded them yet.

Posted in Adventures, CB, Maps, Scuba, Weekend trips | 1 Comment

A cheesy story about what living on a boat means to me. (CB)

CB 20 February, 2007
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You know those little opening conversations you have with people from time to time. The people that you either meet in passing or for the first time at a party or maybe you work with them but don’t really know them. These conversations always start with the same questions. The first question after you exchange names is typically, “Soooo, what do you do?” At this point their explaination usually starts to sound alot like Charlie Browns parents talking, Waaaah waah wah, wahhh wahh wahh waaaaa? That last “waaaaa?” is my que to snap out of my train of thought wondering if my fly is unzipped or trying to scratch my ass without it actually looking like i’m scratching my ass (you know that little “wiggle, flex, leg shake move) and tell them what it is I do for a living. It’s equally as boring, but it’s all part of the dance.

The next question is usually where do you live? They’ll give me the name of the part of town or world they live in. I’ll usually dig around in my memory for the name of a bar close to their house that I’ve been to or something to keep the conversation going. Then they’ll ask me where I live. I normally just tell them, Ballard. Which is the Seattle neighborhood I live in. If they push it and ask what part of Ballard, i’ll tell them I live in Shilshole Bay Marina, on a boat. Then I get to ramble on and on.

The first question I usually get after telling someone that does not live on a boat that we live on a boat is “Don’t you get cold?”

What the Fuck? What kind of retarded question is that?? I can only assume that in that person’s mind they are picturing a bass boat or canoe of some sort. But then I have to think, how could they possibly think that I live on a bass boat?

The second question I get is, and this one is more resonable. “How big is your boat?”.

Ok, this one makes sense. This is a logical question. I’ll tell them it’s a 38 foot sailboat. And they usually reply with “Wow! That’s really small! How do you live like that?” A rude but understandable response. Some people think it’s cool, but will confess they could never do it. But the majority of people absolutly cannot fathom it.

I try to explain that we have a all the aminities of modern life. A full kitchen, sans microwave (by choice). We have shower, shitter and sink in the head (bathroom). Two bedrooms….tiny but comfortable. A couch, dining room table with seating for 7 or 8. A desk, closet and plenty of storage space. Flat screen HDTV, XBox 360 and 2 laptops with highspeed internet. All this and more with 76 feet of water front property. And a fuckin HEATER! But it just does not seem to matter. It’s not a house….a big house. None of that matters. It’s still a boat, people would except it better if I told them I lived in an R.V., a urine soaked doorway in Pioneer Square or in a rusted out van down by the river. But not a boat for some reason.

People that live on boats know the secret. People that love boats, or own boats know the secret. People that live on the hard, dirt dwellers, do not know the secret.

For reasons unknown boats, sailboats to be specific, for me are, for lack of a less gay word, magical. We live on our boat just like we lived in our house. But I never ‘loved’ the house. I liked it, but truth be told it was really just a place to store our crap and to watch T.V.

Our boat on the other hand is a bad ass vessel that will take us around the freakin world and back. Houses cannot do that. You buy a house and your stuck. That’s it, your always going to be the exact same distance from any other point in the world. We can untie five lines and unplug the shore power and in less than 10 minutes have the engine turned off and the sails up. That is my favorite part. When the engine shuts down, and you can hear the water rushing past the hull and feel the wind and boat keeps moving. I know theres science behind it, but to me….it’s magic.

Even a simple sail to a cove 10 miles away, can seem like a voyage that legends should be made of. Sure I could hop in the Jeep and drive to that same cove. And that exact same cove would bore the shit out of me. I most likely would not even consider going there in the first place by car. But if I sail there in my boat, that is a whole nother story. It may be a light wind day, and it takes hours to cover that 10 miles. No bother, grab a book and sailbag or that comfy beanbag my buddy Scotty made for me for xmas and plop down and chill out, maybe take a nap and let someone else steer. Or maybe its blowing 20 knots and it’s on the nose. We now have to make our boat that is relying soley on the wind to move, steer it against the wind to get where we want to go. Maybe a storm is coming. Maybe it’s raining. Maybe it’s a perfectly sunny day with the wind pushing us along to our destination. Either way it’s a challenge, an old school challenge that sailors love tackling over and over.

When we do get to the anchorage we now have another challenge. You don’t just park the boat in the walmart parking lot, unless you go to a marina, but that presents it’s own challenge. You now have to set the anchor and make sure all is right and your not moving. Stow the sails and get the boat squared away. Then….chill. At that point there’s a feeling that we earned that spot in that little cove. We worked for it. As happy crappy tourist trappy that little town maybe, it feels like we just blew in from a million miles away and are discovering the new world. Like Lief Ericson the Viking stepping foot on some foriegn land looking to pillage and plunder, or Captain James T. Kirk beaming down to a strange planet with a couple red shirts in the landing party. That is my other favorite part of sailing.

The answer to this whole post could probably have been summed up in one very simple statement/question. That question is, You know how Han Solo felt about the Millinieum Falcon, or how much Captain Malcom Renolds loved Serenity?(best TV show EVER!) Well that’s how I feel about Palarran. It’s our ticket to our idea of freedom and until someone much smarter than me gets off their ass and discovers hyperdrive or warp speed. This boat will have to be my spaceship.

Posted in CB, Dock, Palarran | Leave a comment

At least nobody saw that right? (CB)

CB 19 February, 2007
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I wrote this story last year about this time for a contest in 48 North, which is a free sailing magazine here in the Pacific Northwest. The contest was to write an article about an anchoring issue you may have had on your boat, good, bad or otherwise. I ended up tieing for 3rd place or honorable mention. I thought I’d repost it here for you guys to read. Click here for the other stories that were submitted.

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This story took place a few summers ago, on our 27 foot Catalina “StrangeCrew”.

Tawn and I decided to invite a few friends down to the boat for a Saturday afternoon sail, some cocktails followed by a nice relaxing evening anchored out in front of the Seattle waterfront listening to the Indigo Girls at one of the “Summer Nights at the Pier concerts”.

Things started out fine, everyone we invited accepted. And on the afternoon of the party we shoved off right on time from our slip at Shilshole Marina and motored out into Shilshole Bay. We raised the sails, killed the engine and set a course for Elliot Bay. Somewhere along the way Tawn finds a relatively private moment to voice her concerns about what my plan was for anchoring. This was actually a valid concern, considering the fact that in the two years we had owned the boat, (our first boat) we had never anchored before. She also pointed out that we did not have a working depth sounder on board either. There may have also been something about me being an idiot but it was windy that day and I probably just misunderstood her.

Fast forward just a bit. We just finished dropping all sails and firing up the engine. One of my buddies digs the anchor and rode out of their storage spots and with Tawn’s help, gets it all rigged up and ready. While all this is going on, I’m looking for the perfect anchoring spot. Which, at this point in my anchoring career consist of the spot on the water with the fewest boats near it. There are no such spots of course, but undaunted I pick a area nicely triangulated by two large and expensive powerboats and a sweet 40-foot sailboat. OK this is it, this is as good as spot as any. How hard can this be? I wondered. Just drop the anchor over the bow and back down onto it until the boat stops. The wind picks up a little. I yell to Tawn on the bow to drop the anchor. She does, the wind picks up a little more and the anchor keeps dropping, all the rode has played out and is now at the bitter end, which is made fast to the Sampson post on the bow…..You didn’t really think this was gonna be a “We forgot to tie the anchor off” anchoring story did you? Come on, give me a little more credit than that. Back to the story, having never anchored before Tawn yells back to me, “I think it’s on the bottom??” Which I think sounds about like the sort of thing one would say at this point in time. So I do what all the books about anchoring tell me I should do, I put the engine in reverse and wait to stop moving backwards………and wait……..and wait……..oh crap! We’re not stopping and that big shiny (expensive) power yacht is getting REALLY close. Ever so lovingly to Tawn I say, “What did YOU do wrong?” Granted saying this in front of 6 of our closet friends, 15-20 people on neighboring boats, and oh yeah, 500 or so concert goers, who are watching our antics while waiting for the concert to start, may or may not have been the smartest thing to do. But now was not the time to worry about that. I had a boat to anchor.

My buddy hauls the anchor up, I reposition the boat and we try again. With the same results, only this time I do the hauling and dropping and Tawn is manning the helm.

On the fourth or fifth try, Tawn has a brilliant idea, why doesn’t someone yell over to one of the other boats anchored nearby and ask them what the depth is. Genius, shear genius, why didn’t I think of that?…oh wait…I can. I acted like I didn’t hear her and yell over to one of the other boats anchored nearby and ask them what the depth is. She knows I’m full of it, but for the sake of our friend’s comfort, she lets it slide……or did I actually pull it off? One of the other boats must have been having some sort of trouble also, because I faintly hear over the wind someone’s wife on another boat calling her husband an idiot. Sound really does travel on water. But I digress; we get four different responses from three different boats on what the depth is that range from 45 feet to 98 feet. Thank you?!

By this time I’m sensing some distress coming from the guests onboard…..what do to……what to do? I know now how the rest of the great nautical heroes through out the ages must have felt in similar situations, alone at the helm in the heat of battle or in some uncharted corner of the world in the middle of a storm. How would Lord Nelson handle this I thought, what would Captain Cook do. Capt’n Ron HELP ME!!!!

I made a command decision. I announced we would motor in closer to the piers. The water would be shallower and therefore easier to get the anchor on the bottom. The Captain has spoken!

We motor in, drop the anchor and backed down……..we stopped moving! Yep, the CAPTAIN has spoken!! A great feeling of relief washes over me…….and I hear one person up on the pier clapping. I look up and it’s a friend who’s at the concert. COOL! I’m awesome. I gloat for a bit……to myself. After all, I planned this to happen.

After a few minutes me and some of the crew decide (and by decide I mean we dared each other) to dive in for a nice refreshing swim……this lasted about 6 seconds and we all climb back aboard. The crew did so via the swim ladder. I, being the captain decided that it would be best if I climbed in via the stern, using the outboard as a sort of ladder, instead of waiting to use the official swim ladder. After all, should I die of hypothermia, who would get the boat and all aboard her home? So up and over the stern I went.

Just as we get dried off and warmed up, a power boat is going through the same pathetic attempts at anchoring that we went through earlier. So I did what anyone in my position would do, I judged him…….and none to silently either. We mocked him and toasted his ineptitude, not so he could hear mind you, but just loud enough to grab the attention of Neptune. It was a about this time that his anchor grabbed a hold of my anchor line and pulled my anchor free. I deserved it……I know that now. He promptly dropped my anchor as he motored off at a high rate of speed. And I could swear that I felt my anchor grab the bottom. I know I felt it, we were not moving at all. After all, the anchor was in the exact same spot as before. Of course it would hold, the Captain has SPOKEN! And Neptune and Tawn laughed, not loudly, but they did laugh.

“Is the pier getting closer?” Tawn said.

“What?, No!?” Said I. “Enjoy the evening and quit worrying so much” I offered.

Oh crap!! WE ARE DRAGGING ANCHOR! The Captain is Screaming.

The pier is now within fifty feet of the stern of the boat. I can almost look straight up in to the nostrils of a few hundred concert goers watching the events play out like so many NASCAR fans waiting for a crash. We bolt in to action, I run forward and start hauling the anchor up like a man possessed. Tawn fires up the engine and slams it in to forward. We are now broadside to the wharf, 30 feet away and getting closer!!

“Turn the FREAKIN tiller” I scream. I look back and she is. It is hard over to starboard and we are still going forward and to starboard towards the pilings.

With a look of shear terror in her eyes, Tawn yells to me: “Why is the boat not turning.”

The wharf is now about 20 feet way. I’m looking up at the underside of it. A sight no man on a sailboat should ever see. The pilings are opening up, they actually look like giant teeth. I feel like Luke in the garbage compactor on the Death Star…….”R2D2……Were can he BEEEEEE!!”

R2D2 is not gonna help me. I run back to the cockpit, my friends have long since disappeared below. I now have less than 20 feet before we slam into the wharf. I have a flash of insight, everything slows down, I feel like Neo in bullet time in the Matrix. THUMP, THUMP, THUMP, I can feel my heart pounding in my ears. I look towards the bow and see Tawn standing at the starboard shrouds ready to fend off (god I hope she doesn’t try that). I look down into the cabin, my friends staring wide eyed back at me. I look up at the crowd……..they want me to fail. I know it.

One hand on the tiller, hard over to starboard, the other hand reaching down, lifting the engine well cover. A quick flick of the eyes tells me that the engine has been pivoted so it is forcing the boat to turn to starboard no matter what the rudder is doing. Now how could that have happened??…….OOoohh yeah……No time…….bullet time only last so long. I yank the engine over the other way, bending the outboard’s little tiller in the process. The boat spins hard to port, just like it should. And we brush by the wharf with less than 15 feet to spare and out to sea…….or at least out into the nice openness of Elliot Bay. Time returns to normal, the wharf shrinks away, R2D2 got the compactor shut down and the opening band begins to play……

Let’s never speak of this again!

Posted in Adventures, CB, Day Sails, StrangeCrew, Tawn | Leave a comment

Swab the poopdeck ya Scurvy dog! (CB)

CB 11 February, 2007
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After the last story about the raccoons on Blake Island, which by the way took place about two years ago, I thought we should venture back over to the island see if the situation had improved any since we had been there last. Unfortunately for you the reader, it had, and the Ranger is alive and well. There were no raccoon related incidents this week. Actually, we had this weekend trip planned long before I posted that story, but what a lovely segue.

The plan was to sail over Friday night after work and meet up with our friends on their boat Ghost. There were a few other boats from the marina planning on going over as well, so it was shaping up to be a pretty fun weekend.

My buddy Dan and a friend of his Erin were going to crew over and stay with us for the weekend on our boat and we were giving another friend of ours, Rich, a ride over as well. He was gonna stay aboard Ghost and crew back with them on Sunday. We had a great time on the island, drank alot, ate way too much and did some hiking/Geocaching and I went clamming for the first time. Oh and our alternator died on us as well, which made for a slightly colder, damper weekend than it should have been, but it’s nothing a couple boat units and busted knuckle or two can’t fix/replace.

Hang on….hang on, Ya know what, that last paragraph made me change my mind as to what this post is gonna be about. Actually not the whole paragraph, but one word used twice in a certain context changed my mind. The word I’m talking about is the word “crew”. Go back up and reread the first two sentences of the previous paragraph…seriously….go ahead, I’ll wait…….

…….

Done? Good.

Now did you notice that I said that our friends Dan, Erin and Rich were going to crew over with us and Rich was going to crew back on Ghost? Crew! Our friends were going to crew over with us. Not join us, not ride over, not hangout on our boat, but crew. They had gone from a chill little weekend to being unpaid crew on a boat. What the…?

In real life I’m a 39 year old Network Engineer that goes to work in an office in the year 2007. But the second I step aboard my boat or tell a story that involves mine or a friends boat, I immediately become a salty one eyed sea captain from the year 1807.

Back when we had a house it was: “Hey come on in, make yourself at home! Beers in the fridge.” Now it’s: “Welcome aboard, go below and stow your gear in the aft cabin. Rums in the locker…..Beer? It’s still in the fridge” (which is in the galley instead of the Kitchen). I said I became a salty sea captain, not lice eating Neanderthal.

Tell someone to tie a loose rope off!? HA!, That would never happen, not on my boat. It’s “Could you sheet in the Jib a bit” or “heave on that halyard”. Step off the boat and I’ll be the first to ask you to hand me that pile of rope, unless one end is attached to the boat, then it’s a line. Weather its the bow line, stern line or midship spring line all depends on which one I need and believe me, when I ask for it, i’ll let you know exactly which one and which cleat to make it fast to.

If were riding around in my jeep, I’ll turn a corner and not utter a word. I could careless if your ready for it or not or if you spill your Big Gulp all over your lap, but when I decide to change direction on the boat and the sails are up. You will know well ahead of time. First I’ll pose the question, “should we tack”? Or “I think I’ll tack”, which means some crew member (Friend) will grab the leeward working sheet (rope tied to a sail) and wait for more orders from the Captain (me…yeah right). Then comes “Ready about!?”, which means “are you ready for me to turn the damn boat”. This is followed by the command, “Helms a lee” or “I’m turning the damn boat”. Then “Break” which means, they let go of the leeward sheet (rope) and they or another crew member grabs the formerly loose windward sheet (rope) and hauls (pulls) it in tight as it becomes the new leeward working sheet (rope). On our boat we also say at the last minute, “Grab the burrito!”. I’m not sure of the prevelence of burritos in the 1800s on sailing vessels, but this one is our stupid inside joke.
At this point I’m content, but the other captain on the boat (Tawn) will then call for the sails to be sheeted in and trimmed so all tell-tales are flying (this make boat go faster). She’s grew up racing boats. If you translated this to 1800s captain styles. She’d be the rich and successful merchant captain with a fast sleek ship that got all the cargo from point A to point B in the fastest time possible. I would be the rum soaked pirate capt’n that bounces from port to port looking for nothing to do. This is what makes our boat work as well as it does.

Left is port. Right is starboard. A window is a porthole but it’s pronounce portal. The steering wheel is the helm but it could be a tiller. We piss in the head. Try that on land and your probably gonna get your ass kicked, depending on whose head it is. A knot is a unit of measure, not a tangle of rope. On a boat, each tangle of rope (knotted line) gets it’s own individual name and each one has a purpose. Land is “the hard”, and we go gunkholing on weekends, tying not to gunk to many hulls.

On land I could careless about little details such as these, but somehow on a boat it all makes sense and I get into it. And as far as I can tell, power-boaters are not as afflicted by this as much as sailors are.

There is not a reason for or an answer to this post, but come down the dock sometime and we’ll splice the main brace (have a drink) and I’ll tell you all about the sailing lexicon, or at least as much as I know or can make up.

Posted in CB, Palarran, Tawn, Weekend trips | Leave a comment