The One That Almost Got Away

After a long run of 166nm from Bahia Tortuga to Magdalena Bay we were excited to drop hook,rest, go to the beach, and make a nice dinner. It is super frustrating when “plans” don’t come to fruition especially when one is sleep deprived from an overnight passage. 

As we entered the protected bay, the winds picked up to 20 knots on our nose as we dropped anchor. We quickly got the dinghy in the water so we could take Nanuq to shore for his business. The beach inside Mag bay is an easy beach landing with the dink (no crashing waves to surf over). Keep in mind Mag Bay is the size of SF bay but has very little development other than some fishing outposts. There was a bit of fetch (choppy seas) in the bay but we persevered and got to the beach. Nanqu ran around, happy to be a terra firma and complete his doggy transaction.

We found beautiful shells, soft sand and solitude which was quite nice. As we headed back to the boat, winds picked up again. We had a splashy ride back to the boat and decided to leave the dinghy tied up to the side of the boat as it was too windy to get the dink on the davits (davits are what is used to pull the boat out of the water). We went down below to sort our evening out. It was quite bumpy as the boat hobby horsed at anchor making it difficult to move around. We were disappointed that we would probably not get a restful night of sleep after being up for over 30 hours. I came up to check on our position when something didn’t look right. The dinghy had broken loose from the boat and was drifting quickly away, out towards sea!!!

In my calm voice (totally not!) I yelled (screamed) for all hands on deck. Within minutes we had 125 feet of anchor chain hauled up and we turned the boat to chase our dinghy. John pulled a great Starsky and Hutch move as he jumped into the dink as I positioned the boat along side. Journey had the boat hook which she used to hold onto the dink until lines were tied. After towing the dink back, re-anchoring, and methodically lifted the dink onto the davits, we were exhausted but the adrenaline was pumping through our veins. 

The night continued to have winds of 20 plus knots and the fetch kept us hobby horsing. We continued to do anchor watch every few hours but did manage to get some decent sleep. 

It is these experiences  that although challenge us, it also teaches us team work.