Joyce Holland on wandering the dock
March 6th by Joyce Hiolland
I've been wandering down to the dock lately. I stand there and stare at Code One and feel an itch I can't bring myself to scratch. We haven't been out on her in so long, I'm starting to feel sorry for her. I know, anthropomorphism's are absurd, but mankind has been calling boats 'her' and 'she' long before I came along, and it works for me. So there. I think she cries.
Tony runs the engines in place, we wash her down and keep up the bright work, but we don't move her a nautical mile. I admit it, we had a bad voyage. We were going to head south and got as far as the armpit of Florida just off Carabelle. I now refer to it as the 'hairy armpit,' for reasons you will soon understand. Actually, it's a gorgeous place, it just left me with a mental scar.
Things did not go smoothly from the start on this trip, but I won't bore you with the mundane details, one of which involved swarms of Yellow Flies. Aggrrr… Anyway, I've been setting anchors since I could swim, but we foolishly made the switch from line to chain and my expertise went out the porthole. To say it's different is an understatement. A length of chain is great, but all-chain is evil. Trust me.
We tucked in behind a spit of a barrier island and planned to cross the Gulf the next day. Nervous about the crossing and excited at the same time, we decided to get close to the harbor exit and anchor, so we would be ready for an early morning take-off. Because Tony knew I was uncomfortable with the new chain situation, he came forward and we set it together. Or so we thought. It later became clear that we had simply made a nice tidy little pile on the sea floor, which held us in place because there was no wind or current. Happy as oysters, we rowed the dinghy to shore and scoured the beach for treasure, then returned for cocktails and dinner. Lovely.
Except, we went to bed…and woke up on the other side of the bay. What got our attention was the sound of cars horns on Highway 98. That and the fact that we began rolling in the surf. We hit the deck running. It would have made one heck of a video. The winch would be too slow, and I didn't know it was humanly possible to haul up that much chain in a matter of seconds, but we did it. We cringed as the boat bottom kissed the between waves. We experienced the strange phenomenon called time-lapse that sometimes comes with a close call. Time stood still. Powering out of the surf was one of the most harrowing moments of my life.
Our grand adventure had short-circuited due to drama overload. Did we keep going, no way. We couldn't get home fast enough because we desperately wanted to deep six the anchor chain. Okay, so I mean take it off, but I seriously wanted to drop it off the end of the dock. There is an interesting side to this saga, we dredged up some pretty weird stuff on our way across the bay…and the Intra coastal Waterway. The stuff of nightmares. Critters, traps, clothing, and some undefinable items that would make a forensics scientist shiver with excitement.
The bad news/bad/news? Code One hasn't moved in over a year. The good news–we are determined to do it soon. Honest.
Joyce
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I've been wandering down to the dock lately. I stand there and stare at Code One and feel an itch I can't bring myself to scratch. We haven't been out on her in so long, I'm starting to feel sorry for her. I know, anthropomorphism's are absurd, but mankind has been calling boats 'her' and 'she' long before I came along, and it works for me. So there. I think she cries.
Tony runs the engines in place, we wash her down and keep up the bright work, but we don't move her a nautical mile. I admit it, we had a bad voyage. We were going to head south and got as far as the armpit of Florida just off Carabelle. I now refer to it as the 'hairy armpit,' for reasons you will soon understand. Actually, it's a gorgeous place, it just left me with a mental scar.
Things did not go smoothly from the start on this trip, but I won't bore you with the mundane details, one of which involved swarms of Yellow Flies. Aggrrr… Anyway, I've been setting anchors since I could swim, but we foolishly made the switch from line to chain and my expertise went out the porthole. To say it's different is an understatement. A length of chain is great, but all-chain is evil. Trust me.
We tucked in behind a spit of a barrier island and planned to cross the Gulf the next day. Nervous about the crossing and excited at the same time, we decided to get close to the harbor exit and anchor, so we would be ready for an early morning take-off. Because Tony knew I was uncomfortable with the new chain situation, he came forward and we set it together. Or so we thought. It later became clear that we had simply made a nice tidy little pile on the sea floor, which held us in place because there was no wind or current. Happy as oysters, we rowed the dinghy to shore and scoured the beach for treasure, then returned for cocktails and dinner. Lovely.
Except, we went to bed…and woke up on the other side of the bay. What got our attention was the sound of cars horns on Highway 98. That and the fact that we began rolling in the surf. We hit the deck running. It would have made one heck of a video. The winch would be too slow, and I didn't know it was humanly possible to haul up that much chain in a matter of seconds, but we did it. We cringed as the boat bottom kissed the between waves. We experienced the strange phenomenon called time-lapse that sometimes comes with a close call. Time stood still. Powering out of the surf was one of the most harrowing moments of my life.
Our grand adventure had short-circuited due to drama overload. Did we keep going, no way. We couldn't get home fast enough because we desperately wanted to deep six the anchor chain. Okay, so I mean take it off, but I seriously wanted to drop it off the end of the dock. There is an interesting side to this saga, we dredged up some pretty weird stuff on our way across the bay…and the Intra coastal Waterway. The stuff of nightmares. Critters, traps, clothing, and some undefinable items that would make a forensics scientist shiver with excitement.
The bad news/bad/news? Code One hasn't moved in over a year. The good news–we are determined to do it soon. Honest.
Joyce
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