Sunday, May 17, 2009

We were up at 5 am to try to retrieve our anchor and line. Gale had marked it with a small red buoy last night and we could still see where it was. We didn’t want to leave the anchor without trying at least once to bring it up during slack tide. Maureen drove the boat and approached the buoy so Gale could snag it with the boat hook. She carefully maneuvered the boat as Gale pulled the line and chain in. After about 30 minutes the anchor finally pulled loose from the sand and we had our anchor back on deck.
After listening to the weather reports, we decided to wait one more day to let the winds die down. While at anchor in the early afternoon, we thought we would do some reading and relax for tomorrow’s sail. Suddenly Maureen noticed a sailboat drifting towards us! The tidal waters were swift and this sailboat had broken free of her anchor and was heading for our boat. We knew no one was aboard the boat as we saw the family leave earlier in their dinghy. We did the best we could to keep the boat from damaging ours, but she had crossed our anchor line and was now bumping up against our boat. Soon we saw there was nothing we could do so Maureen went to the radio and called the Coast Guard for assistance while Gale stayed topside trying to keep the boats apart. This was no easy task – the boat we were dealing with was a 39 foot Beneteau (sailboat). It was only a few minutes before the Coast Guard arrived and they quickly assisted us to get free from the drifting sailboat. On a lake, this would not have been such an event but being located near an inlet to the Atlantic, the tidal waters and wind were extremely strong which made it a very difficult situation. It seems a day can’t go by without some unforeseen event taking place! I guess that’s why we called this our Adventure.
At 5 pm we were sitting in Blue Heron ready for a glass of wine and some grilled pork chops. We hope for a quiet night and a good night’s rest as we plan on heading up the coast at dawn.