Day 119, Year 10: Another Tough Day
Date: Friday, February 6, 2015
Weather: Sunny and Windy, Winds NE 15
Latitude: 26 27.603 N
Longitude: 081 57.530 W
Location: Anchored Behind Estero Island, Fort Myers Beach, FL
And I thought yesterday was a tough day. Well, today was even more challenging and frustrating. We went to sleep last night on the main cabin settees waiting for Windbird to right herself. About 1:30 am, we awoke to a boat sitting upright in the water. Mark went up to shorten the anchor chain in hopes that it would prevent us from going aground again, and then we went to bed. When I got up at 8 am and looked out, it was not the same scene as when we came in here yesterday morning. There was a mud flat right in front of us. That would explain why we were aground last night. By 8:30 am Mark was up and we were preparing to re-anchor. I then suggested that we call the mooring field office and just check to see if there might be a free mooring. We had been told not to call until afternoon, but I figured it couldn’t hurt to check. In fact, the woman in the office said that there were a few open moorings in the 50’s—just don’t take 52 and 55. So instead of re-anchoring we headed to the mooring field. That’s when the challenges and frustrations began. We called Lee and Lynda to tell them that there were moorings available and then we raised anchor and headed under the bridge. As we headed that direction, I realized that I had no idea exactly HOW to get the mooring balls numbered in the 50’s. I suggested to Mark that we should turn around and get ourselves better prepared, but he was sure he knew where he was going. So on we went. Once under the bridge, we either needed to turn left to go in the channel or go straight ahead through the mooring field. I was at the wheel and I voted to go left through the channel. Mark voted for going through the mooring field and he won. But just for about one minute. We almost immediately went aground, backed off, and tried again. We went a little further into the mooring field and went aground again. This happened three more times and finally we seemed to be really stuck. Another cruiser came over in his dinghy and pushed our bow around setting us free. He suggested that we go back to the bridge via the inner channel which he said should have plenty of water. He was right. We were back at the bridge and then took the outer channel which also had sufficient water for a bit. The markers ended and we weren’t sure where to go. In the meantime, Lee and Lynda had gone through the outer channel and had found a mooring ball. We called to ask for direction, but they really weren’t sure of the depths and reported that they didn’t see any other free moorings. We had been at this for out two hours at this point and just dropped the anchor right where we were to give us time to figure things out. Mark got in the dinghy and did depth soundings with our portable depth finder. He found a path to the far end of the anchorage and found one free mooring ball there. When he got back to Windbird we quickly headed that way, but we were too late. Someone else was faster and had attached a gallon jug with their name on it on the ball. As we approached to pick up the mooring line, we saw the jug. Then someone came in a dinghy and was explaining to Mark that he was saving this mooring ball for his boat that was aground. He would get to the mooring ball as soon as the tide rose. We could have just ignored him and taken the ball, but that is not the way cruisers treat one another. Then I put the icing on the cake. I was at the wheel and trying to turn to leave when I suddenly found that I was being carried by the current right into another boat. Nothing I tried worked and we had a bit of a crash landing. The other boat was fine but one of Windbird’s stanchions was broken over. By this time my nerves were already on edge from all the groundings and I just lost it. We apologized to the boat and headed back out under the bridge to the anchorage area from whence we had come. It took an entire morning and all we had to show for it was the broken stanchion and frayed nerves. Not a good morning.
Mark made many calls before he found someone who can weld stainless to fix the stanchion. I did research on other places that we might go and was not successful. So we decided to call Mary Ellen and Lee and invite them to come here to the beach to have dinner at Nervous Nellie’s right next to the dinghy dock. That way we could watch the boat and still do a bit of visiting with family. The accepted and we had a great dinner on the outside deck, all the while keeping our eyes on Windbird. After dinner we returned to Windbird and we are now approaching low tide. The NE wind is blowing us away from the sand bar and we are still upright. We’ll hope that we can get a mooring ball tomorrow so we can go stay a couple of days with Mary Ellen and Lee without the worry of what might be happening to Windbird. If that doesn’t happen, we will just have to do day visits. Low tide is early morning and late evening right now, so that leaves the hours in between free for visiting.
Mark’s brother lives up the Caloosahatchee River from Fort Myers and would love for us to bring Windbird up the river to visit with him. Unfortunately there are bridges between here and there that are only 55 feet high. Since our mast is 63 feet, that won’t work for us. So we’re trying to hatch another plan for visiting with Steve. We are going to try and take a deep breath tonight, regroup, and hope for a better tomorrow that will give us a safe place to leave Windbird while we visit. If that doesn’t happen, we’ll just have to come up with creative ways of visiting.
Note: I owe Sea Turtle an apology. I wrote in last night’s log that they were far enough in front of us as we came in here yesterday that they missed the high seas. That might be so, but they evidently had very strong winds right on the nose causing them to get waves over the bow of the boat. We had no headwinds. Again I’ll say, what a difference a couple of hours can make in a passage.
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| 150206 Day 119 Florida, USA–Fort Myers Beach Inside |
