A Trip To Remember

Last weekend was sad, and Tuesday even sadder still, for we took the final voyage on our boat.  We are moving it to a better sales location on the Chesapeake Bay where it will be stored in drydock until sold.  Yuk.

Our boat isn’t just a boat.  In the finest Walter Mitty tradition she was, variously, a well-armed coastal patrol boat with deck-mounted twin .50 caliber machine guns, a fireboat with full rescue capabilities, and a luxurious megayacht worthy of billionaire Paul Allen. In reality, however, our boat is a 38′ aft cabin motor yacht with a flybridge, three cabins, twin diesels, dual zone air conditioning, and satellite television. One of the smallest boats you can own and still legitimately refer to as a yacht.

Oh, how we loved her! We showered her with gifts: flat screen TVs, DVD players, new bridge radios, boat hooks, lines, rear deck canvas – the list goes on and on. And in exchange she rewarded us with sun filled weekends visiting exotic ports of call and unexplored coves and inlets, endless boat parties with good friends, and lazy afternoons at the dock.

But, alas, all good things must come to an end. It used to be that we could take a boatload of friends to Alexandria and back and just pass the hat for fuel – $10 a person or so. That was when diesel was a $1.35 a gallon in 2002. When fuel spiked to $4.50, she sat at the dock and I didn’t want to go near her because it just hurt too bad. Now we’ve just moved on.

The good thing was that we would get one final, long voyage through new waters. Out trip would take us down the Potomac to the bay, and then up the western shore where we would overnight at Solomons on the Patuxent. The next day we’d finish the voyage by crossing the shipping lanes to go up the Eastern Shore, passing the Choptank area and then heading into the Eastern Bay and then on to Kent Narrows. All told, it would be about a 180 mile journey.

The last week we watched the weather every day. Rain or cold we wouldn’t mind – it was all about the wind. The Chesapeake is much longer than she is wide and has deep water so she can produce some legitimate heavy seas, especially in a good north or south blow. Unlike the ocean, where a four-foot swell would just be a gentle rolling action, the Bay would have a four foot chop with whitecaps: real hull pounders. So we watched. And waited.

By Thursday the forecast was shaping up. Temps would be in the 60s and cloudy with 5 mph winds. Hooray! Our trip was on.

Out intrepid crew would consist of yours truly as Captain, my spouse the Admiral (I may run the boat but be assured, she gives the orders!), and fellow boat owners and friends Anthony and Denise.

Saturday arrived cooler than expected and cloudy, but thankfully dead calm. We met at the boat at 7 am as planned and were underway by 8. The first 20 or so miles were in known waters and the trip was smooth. Down towards the 301 bridge, however, visibility started dropping. By the time we got to the Cobb Island area you couldn’t even see Colonial Beach – visibility was less than a mile. Something else was apparent, too: our radar unit was not functioning normally. Lovely, just lovely.

Denise and Anthony kept a sharp lookout while I manned the helm. We picked our way through Kettle Bottom Shoals and set course for Coles Point, our first fuel stop. The channel markers at Kettle Bottom are about one mile apart and run that way for five miles – easy pickings. But as we exited the last pair of markers the fog really set in and we realized, as we set compass bearings, that the compass was, umm, well, off by about 30 degrees.

How do compasses become “off”, you might wonder. Trust me, you are not the only one. We were all scratching our heads pondering the same question, eventually giving up and resigning ourselves to having to translate every heading manually. Yuk. And thank God for GPS chartplotters.

By the time we rounded Coles Point visibility was down to a quarter mile. I turned and headed for shore and stared ahead into the fog. Anthony called out the depth while I switched between straining for a glimpse of land and monitoring the chartplotter. I was getting nervous and so was he. Finally, with about 800 yards to shore I could start to make out the tree line. We could then get some of the details and I was finally able to line up on the small channel into the marina area.

Fueling a boat our size is simply an exercise in patience and requires a certain financial mindset. With twin one hundred gallon tanks and diesel at about $2.45 per gallon, well, you do the math. I figured about 70 gallons per tank to fill it, and I was right as far as the starboard tank was concerned. But when we started pumping the port side, things were different: 70 gallons came and went. Then 80. Then 90 (Omigosh do we have a freaking fuel LEAK???), and finally, at 96 gallons, she was full. Yikes! We had come within about 10 minutes of running out of fuel on the port engine. In fog. With a suboptimal radar. And a goofed up compass. Sheesh! Best I can figure, we hadn’t completely filled the port tank to begin with. Did I mention that the port-side fuel gauge didn’t work, either?

With her belly full, we set about fixing a bit of food for ourselves, and finally got underway again at about one o’clock, heading about due east for the mouth of the Potomac. Visibility was decreasing, and at times there was no horizon – just water fading into the mist. My guess is that it was down to a quarter mile.

By 2:30 or so we reached Point Lookout – surely some of the most treacherous water in the bay. Except, thankfully, for today. Not only was there no wind, but it was slack tide and nearly dead flat. So we headed north, hugging the western shore of the Bay, and made for the Patuxent staying just outside the channel markers to avoid any shipping traffic.

The channel markers on this stretch of the bay are about five to seven miles apart, so a bit of dead reckoning navigation is in order. We’d line the GPS up on the next marker, get a bearing, and try to hold it. At fourteen knots, seven miles is about 30 minutes of peering into the fog and watching the compass, with the last five minutes frantically spent trying to locate the marker so we didn’t run into it.

Our path would take us near a set of markers and obstructions known locally as “the targets”. A seeming odd name, until you realize that just nearby is Patuxent River Naval Air Station, and “the targets” are just that: Aerial bombing practice targets. Our course was set such that we’d pass within a half mile of them on the starboard side.

All was well, except that with the fog, larger body of water, and it being March and all, it was now much colder. Like about 45 degrees. The weather had been forecast for the lower 60′s, but we knew it would be cooler on the water, but this level of chill was unexpected, and a light drizzle was now falling. We were cold. No, scratch that. We were chilled to the bone.

I was hunkered down at the helm with my jacket up around my ears so only my nose and eyes were showing. I was looking more at the instruments than ahead. The admiral was at my right, a but hunched over herself, and Anthony was at my left, peering ahead. The cold was really taking its toll.

Anthony was saying something I couldn’t quite understand and I looked up and to my horror, there was a large yellow marker about 50 yards ahead. We had drifted off course and run up on the targets. I shouted an expletive, yanked the wheel and threw the boat into a turn. We veered left and avoided the marker by about 35 feet. Not a hair-raising close call, but close enough. At our speed, another fifteen seconds later and it would have been a different outcome.

As I was turning the boat I asked Anthony why he didn’t say anything. He said he thought I saw it, but he was getting ready to grab the wheel if I hadn’t made the turn. The Admiral was just too cold and wasn’t watching. My response was to tell everyone to never assume I see anything – call it out if you see it. In retrospect, the cold had taken made its mark – we were all chilled to the bone and our vigilance had suffered.

About a half hour later we arrived at the mouth of the Patuxent. We maneuvered around the outer markers and lined up for the entrance. Our destination was Spring Cove Marina. I picked up the radio mike.

“Spring Cove Marina, Spring Cove Marina, Spring Cove Marina. This is motor vessel [omitted]. Over.”
“Roger [omitted]. This is Spring Cove Marina. Switch to Channel 68, over.”
“Six eight, roger.”

I fiddled with the radio knob.

“Spring Cove Marina, this is motor vessel [omitted] on channel six-eight. Over”
“Roger, captain. I see you have a slip reservation.”
“Affirmative, Spring Cove. We are inbound at red two. I estimate our arrival in about two zero minutes.”
“Roger, captain. Call us when you get to red 8.”
“Will do, Spring Cove.”
“Spring Cove clear, switching back to 16.”
“[omitted] clear, going back to one six.”

We wound our way to Solomons and up the creek towards our destination. The marina never answered our second radio call, but the fuel dock was well marked and we stood off while another boat cleared, and then headed in. We had made it with about 20 minutes to spare: It was 4:40 and they closed at 5:00.

We did it.

In the next post, I’ll tell the rest of the tale as we finish the voyage to Kent Narrows.