Terror on the high seas.

Bob headed up to the marina office to part with several thousand dollars. Did I say this island was expensive? What cost $150 for a dive in N. Carolina cost $650 for a dive there and that’s not including the $800 to change the shaft. Anyway we’re so glad to get off this island after a 10 day layover.

July 4^th 7:52 AM 692 hours.

It was a beautiful day as the guide boat led us out the cut to open water. Yes, we had a better tide this time and we learned that these buoys move a lot so don’t trust them. While in port, we found out about the free guide boat service and we made sure to use it for this departure. Nevertheless, things got a little tense as the guide boat led us over one spot in the reef where the water under the rudder shallowed out to a scant 2.8 feet. We all had those tense knots in your stomach as we held our breath and finally reached the end of the reef and saw the water depth creep up to 30 feet. As a wave of relief overcame us, Bob and I looked back and remarked “We’ll never see that channel again.”

We slowly spun the diesels up to their running RPMs since this was the first time out with the new shaft and props. I checked the engine room looking for any water leakage and to see if the new shaft was spinning true. Back on the stern, I felt for any abnormal vibrations. Good news, everything was humming along just fine. We made our way to the first waypoint and continued on in the lee of the Caicos for another 28 nautical miles. At the end of the Caicos islands we changed our heading and were on a straight course directly for Ocean World in the Domincan Republic some 145 nautical miles away across open ocean with no way out. This is the part of the trip that we feared most. We would be out of contact with anyone for about 100 nm.

Now that we left the lee, the waves were a bit bigger but certainly nothing unmanageable. A few miles further and we had to slow our speed from 20 knots to 17 knots. Not unusual but the waves seemed to be getting bigger and we were beginning to take a few over the bow. Bobby’s glasses kept getting full of salt spray making it very difficult for him to see so I took over the helm. Little did I know, I would never leave the helm that day until we were in port. It was around 10 AM give or take a Caribbean ½ hour. We held course for another hour or so and the waves stopped growing even though they were still nasty enough that I had to do a little tacking to get through some. At this point we were pretty well committed so we continued onward. If we turned back now we’d have to travel 45 or so miles back to Turtle Cove. The idea of traversing that cut again sent shudders up our spine. The waves seemed to relax a bit urging us further. At about 110 n.miles out from the Dominican and 62 n.miles out from Caicos the wind started to pick up and the waves started to grow again. The wind speed climbed to around a constant 25 knots and the seas were a steady 6 to 8’, some with sharp windward sides causing us to crash downward as the wind continued to pile up the water. The helm was now constantly getting a barrage of water and our homemade computer covering to protect it from the water was in serious danger of failing completely. We decided we needed to protect the computer from further damage since it contained all of our navigational information that we would need to complete this trip. So Bobby, in the roiling seas unplugged the computer and slowly inched his way across the back of my chair trying not to get launched over the railing toward the stairs where he sat down and step by step moved himself and the computer while shielding it from the constant barrage of waves and spray toward the safety of the cabin. Eventually Bobby climbed on his hands and knees back to the bridge and told us that everything was fine, the computer was still working. Another bit of relief. Another hour or so and the wind gusts were incredible. We started to encounter trip sets of waves in the 12 to 15 foot class. As we tried to step over these waves the front corner of the bow and the rear stern of the boat was out of the water and you could faintly hear the diesel rev as the prop left the water. All too many times the boat would simply fall sending a shudder through it that would cause us all to quickly send a glancing look at each other to see if we were ok. Somewhere about now we completely lost power on our starboard side and the RayNav unit I was using for guidance completely shut down. Our first concern was that the engine might could would shut down if the solenoid controlling the flow of fuel to our diesel lost power. If we weren’t so knocked about, we would have had the clarity of mind to remember that the solenoid does need power to remain open although it can be forced open manually. That would have been a moot point anyway in this sea. So, Bob and I just shrugged our shoulders and hoped for the best. Electronically blind, I would have to hold a compass course to our destination some eight hours away. In a sea without current or wind my course would be 155 degrees, in this sea and conditions I rolled the compass back and forth from 120 to 180 degrees in a desperate attempt to kindly cut thru the waves. The seas and wind were so bad now that blue water from a first wave of a set of three would just completely blind me as I held on for the next two waves that were just behind this one. All I could do was pray that the next two wouldn’t cause us to get in a serious situation. The wind was knocking the tops of the waves off so hard that my face was stinging from the spray and I ingested so much salt water that my doctor would have a fit with my sodium intake. The back of my head was beginning to get a really weird feeling and when I reached back to find out why, I found it was covered in serious crust of salt. We were all frozen to our stations as the sea tossed us about like a rag doll in a dog’s mouth. This was the ?third? time we would not eat anything all day. Bathroom breaks were impossible. Although no one talked to each other about our necessity until after our endeavor was over, it was an inevitable. I’m sure as we quite coyly released our first warm relief at our stations, it became easier afterwards. There was so much water on the bridge no one could possibly notice. About every half hour or so, Bobby would brave the elements and descend from the bridge to the cabin to verify our course on the computer. Fearing for Bobby’s safety in what always seemed like an eternity, he would return to the bridge like a little sea lion and announce “Gary, you’re on course!” As we would learn later, Gina was pinned in the front seat on the bridge getting drenched about every ten seconds, praying to every god she could think of when Bobby or I would let out an expletive thinking “Please don’t listen to them listen to me !” Land was nowhere to be seen. A few flying fish, a few dolphins and a couple of humpbacks were all we saw when we could see. I, for one, actually entertained thoughts of “how can we cut that dinghy free quickly, can I tie a fender to that gpirb quickly enough, will I ever see my loved ones again, where are the life jackets, what I wouldn’t do for a big Hatteras with an air conditioned bridge.” Painful seconds turned into painful minutes and more importantly into painful hours. Suddenly Gina called out “Land!” Bob and I quickly started scanning the horizon and around 2 o’clock we could see a mountain in the haze. Bob made his way back to the cabin and checked the computer. Back on the bridge, he told us it was probably Haiti and we had another 20 or so miles to go. Well, it wasn’t such a great sighting since it is the last place we wanted to land but at least it was land. Since we were nearing land our thought that the seas would let up proved to be as much of a dream as a weatherman’s forecast. The sun thru the dense haze was on its’ descent to the horizon. Somewhere out in front of us was Oceanworld. We thought about our friend Kemuel’s warnings. He told us to be very careful because there was a lot of garbage floating downstream from the rivers on the north side of the Dominican. A delivery captain we met in the Turks substantiated that when he told us of a refrigerator that went floating past him just a few days before. We just had to hope that in the low light we would not hit anything. Another obstacle comes from some yarn’s that still abound about pirates but today they weren’t even a thought since who would be foolish enough to be out in this stuff. The waves shrunk back to a steady 6’ to 8’ and the spray over the bridge subsided to every minute or so. Bobby scooched back down to the cabin and when he came back he said we were within a half mile or so of the entrance. Scanning the coast for something that might lead us to Oceanworld we spotted these little beacons of beauty that shone thru the evening darkness. That must be the entrance to Oceanworld ! And that big mausoleum of stone and light must be the marina. We approached the cut thru the reef carefully, guided by the first lit buoys we had seen since the U.S. Turning the seas to our backs, I struggled to keep the push of the sea from pushing us out of the narrow channel. Reaching the end of the channel, we were slightly confused when we saw a fork but we were able to quickly assess the situation and make a navigational correction to bring us into the marina basin. Very weary, I unclenched my fingers from the helm and shuffled my bare feet from the uncomfortable nonskid they had been planted on for the last several hours and handed the helm back to Bobby for docking maneuvers. We had forgotten to make a reservation ahead of time, it was now 8 PM and apparently no one was there, so we attempted to tie to the face dock. That’s when the Navy guy met us with two “dock hands”. He in his best Spanish tried to tell me we couldn’t dock there and me in my best English tried to tell him we needed to tie up just for the evening. Gina to the rescue. She was able to converse with him enough to find out he wanted us to tie up a bit further in the marina. We obliged and made our way toward another slip. The wind was still horrific and we ended up nosing the boat into the slip rather than the usual backing in. We finally got ourselves tied down and Mr. Navy guy wasn’t about to give us a minutes rest. He wanted on the boat now to check us in. We were just finding out now for ourselves how much damage and how much was thrown about the boat but we scrambled to find a couple of lights to put on so we could do business. Palm tree had become a disaster again with loam spilling all over the deck. I cleared a passage so Mr. Navy guy could board as he stepped thru the muck on the deck. The cabin was in total ram shackles beating anything the Jersey coast could have meted out. I guess feeling a bit of our pain, Mr. Navy guy offered to remove his shoes. Bobby exasperated just said “Forget it, just come on in.” Passports and all that paperwork stuff later we gave him a bunch of Diet Cokes and bid him adieu to the morning. We tried to make the power cord reach the power post, nothing doing. The cable just wasn’t long enough. So the heck with it. (ok, that’s polite) We ran the genny for a while knowing that when we shut it off sleeping was going to be anything but comfortable. After cleaning up a bunch of the mess, we toasted a safe landing with wine and feasted on spam sandwiches.

Pictures to follow.