Peril on the Low Seas
This is going to be a problem. The European and American weather models agree. On Sunday, January 31st, the winds will clock from the E to the SW overnight. The following day Monday, February 1st, the winds will continue their veer to the West and increase. Really increase. Gusts to gale force strength (in the 40 knots).
We have to get out the Berrys. Not really. Just emotionally. The forecast for the blow is out days in advance. I scenario dashes to New Providence and then the Exumas and then to a hidey-hole in the Exumas. Fanciful scenarios, requiring day long bashes into growing wind and seas. Dumb scenarios.
At least, we can make it to the southern Berrys. The east side of Frazer’s Hog Cay has good holding and protection from West winds, but it is open to the East through SouthWest. So I create two routes and log them into the chartplotter.
First, White Cay to the cut between Little Whale and Whale Cays on Sunday, the 31st. We can overnight there. It won’t be great, but it will provide some protection from the overnight winds, as they build and clock to the SouthWest. Monday morning, we’ll get away at first light and get to Frazer’s Hog before the front with its strong westerlies are expected to hit, at about 2:00 p.m.
Sunday is a bash, but a sailable one. We tack, at deep angles, to manage the wind and waves and to keep away from the islands to our lee.
The cut into our anchorage is lively, with 4’-6’ waves on a short interval, aligned with the SE wind. I motor SE of the cut, so I can approach it riding squarely down the face of the waves, to avoid losing control of Hiatus should she be thrown sideways by a wave. A resident at Little Whale sits in a golf cart and watches our entire entry. The thought passes through me, we’re in the stock car, and he’s waiting for a crash. Past the outer reef extending from Whale’s tip. Close, closer to the lighthouse on Little Whale, then a sharp turn to port into the anchorage. And, to relative quiet.
We set the anchor in 14’ at low tide. Add 3’ for high tide and 4’ for our topsides, and we need 210’ of anchor rode for a 10:1 scope angle. I want that security for the night’s increasing and switching winds. I dive the anchor. It’s dug in, not deep, but in. We retire to a mostly sleepless night. The wind’s howl in the rigging increases with its speed. I am up often to check our location on the anchor alarm app and to poke my head outside for a real-world safety check.
Monday morning brings more wind than predicted. It has moved to its foretold SSW direction, which will make escaping the cut far safer than our entry. But, today’s route will take us SW and then W around the corner and then the bottom of the Berrys chain. Just the directions the wind will turn to. We will be going straight into the wind all the way, with building winds. No sailing today. We will be forced to motor, with a scrap of main set, simply to steady Hiatus.
Two squalls pass, with strong gusts. Today will be a wet and cold sail. We don our fowlies. Radar shows a break after the second squall. It’s time to go. I leave the cockpit for the bow—and I don’t see our anchor rode.
With the strong wind, it should be shooting straight from the bow and forward to the buried anchor. What the? I kneel at the bow and find the rode slanting back and down along Hiatus’s hull. A pull shows it is bar tight. The anchor rode is wrapped around something on the boat’s bottom. The keel-likely. The propeller-lord, I hope not.
There’s only one way to find out. Off with the fowl weather gear and into the water. Yes, there’s one wrap around the keel. The rode then stretches out to the anchor. The propeller is not fowled.
How to unwrap the keel? If we had time, we could wait for slack tide, when the wind and current find their ying/yang and Hiatus floats easily in the forceless mix of balanced forces. But, that’s hours away and the blow will be upon us before we reach Frazer’s Hog. We could turn Hiatus, using her engine. But, there’s the risk of fowling her propeller, which would be a much bigger problem, a dangerous problem. I’ve cleared propellers before. With our conditions, the task could kill you. I could hang from the stern ladder with my snorkel gear on to watch our underside, shouting turn and motor on/motor off instructions to Francine at the wheel. This is getting ridiculous.
There’s only one safe solution that gets us away from this anchorage: cut the anchor rode, hope that it slides off the keel, and leave the anchor and rode behind. Our brand new anchor and rode system.
I climb back aboard to do the deed, head to the bow and…
Am I experiencing delusions borne of wishful and magical thinking? There is the rode, reaching lovingly from the bow towards the anchor. How? No time for critical thinking. My god, we can go. Francine puts the engine in gear and moves us forward. I press the anchor windlass switch. The anchor is coming up.
As we start this operation, the drone-view of our scene is perplexing. The tide is on the flood, rushing through the cut from East to West. The wind is from the SSW. The current’s winning. Hiatus lies West of her anchor, almost into the teeth of the wind. The wind has control of Hiatus’s stern, pushing it to the NNW. The net result is that Hiatus points roughly SSE, with her nose pointing roughly 90 degrees to the South of the angle her rode takes to her anchor.
Pulling in the anchor disturbs the forces’ equilibrium. We must have pulled her out of strong current into weaker current. Suddenly, the wind has control and Hiatus shoots toward the cut. I can’t take in the anchor rode fast enough to prevent slack. The rode slacks backward along Hiatus’s hull, toward her keel, toward her propeller. I yell to Francine to throw the engine into neutral. I continue to try to bring in anchor rode. It takes up hard. We are nowhere near the anchor. We have a wrap. Another goddam keel wrap. I cannot believe it.
We have already decided the right course. I tape the rode where I will cut it, to avoid its unraveling. Francine brings forward our little fender. I tie it off to the rode. The cut is made. Will it; yes, the rode and fender slide past the keel and we’re free.
And, there’s our anchor rode, bobbing to its fender. We feint a pass towards it, boathook ready to snatch and retrieve it. As we approach, we recognize the risk and back away. Today, if anything can go wrong, it will.
We pass easily through the cut and begin a four hour windward bash to Chub Cay Resort and Marina. We called. They have a slip for us.
There’s only one way to find out. Off with the fowl weather gear and into the water. Yes, there’s one wrap around the keel. The rode then stretches out to the anchor. The propeller is not fowled.
How to unwrap the keel? If we had time, we could wait for slack tide, when the wind and current find their ying/yang and Hiatus floats easily in the forceless mix of balanced forces. But, that’s hours away and the blow will be upon us before we reach Frazer’s Hog. We could turn Hiatus, using her engine. But, there’s the risk of fowling her propeller, which would be a much bigger problem, a dangerous problem. I’ve cleared propellers before. With our conditions, the task could kill you. I could hang from the stern ladder with my snorkel gear on to watch our underside, shouting turn and motor on/motor off instructions to Francine at the wheel. This is getting ridiculous.
There’s only one safe solution that gets us away from this anchorage: cut the anchor rode, hope that it slides off the keel, and leave the anchor and rode behind. Our brand new anchor and rode system.
I climb back aboard to do the deed, head to the bow and…
Am I experiencing delusions borne of wishful and magical thinking? There is the rode, reaching lovingly from the bow towards the anchor. How? No time for critical thinking. My god, we can go. Francine puts the engine in gear and moves us forward. I press the anchor windlass switch. The anchor is coming up.
As we start this operation, the drone-view of our scene is perplexing. The tide is on the flood, rushing through the cut from East to West. The wind is from the SSW. The current’s winning. Hiatus lies West of her anchor, almost into the teeth of the wind. The wind has control of Hiatus’s stern, pushing it to the NNW. The net result is that Hiatus points roughly SSE, with her nose pointing roughly 90 degrees to the South of the angle her rode takes to her anchor.
Pulling in the anchor disturbs the forces’ equilibrium. We must have pulled her out of strong current into weaker current. Suddenly, the wind has control and Hiatus shoots toward the cut. I can’t take in the anchor rode fast enough to prevent slack. The rode slacks backward along Hiatus’s hull, toward her keel, toward her propeller. I yell to Francine to throw the engine into neutral. I continue to try to bring in anchor rode. It takes up hard. We are nowhere near the anchor. We have a wrap. Another goddam keel wrap. I cannot believe it.
We have already decided the right course. I tape the rode where I will cut it, to avoid its unraveling. Francine brings forward our little fender. I tie it off to the rode. The cut is made. Will it; yes, the rode and fender slide past the keel and we’re free.
And, there’s our anchor rode, bobbing to its fender. We feint a pass towards it, boathook ready to snatch and retrieve it. As we approach, we recognize the risk and back away. Today, if anything can go wrong, it will.
We pass easily through the cut and begin a four hour windward bash to Chub Cay Resort and Marina. We called. They have a slip for us.
Mariner’s Notes.
In the following days, we generated an informative discussion on How to Avoid and Unwind a Keel Wrap on one of our favorite facebook groups, Bahamas, Land and Sea. A link is here. The solutions involve chain lengths, kellets, dinghies, tide tables, and swimming. The problem is current. The behavior and effects of currents is our sailing deficit area. But, we’re learning fast. Our problem at Little Whale was created by our long length of nylon rode.Long rodes are safe rodes. The greater your scope (length of rode), the lower the angle of the rode to the anchor, and the less likely that you’ll pull the anchor out when your bow is bobbing up and down to strong winds and large waves.
We’re used to our boats swinging on their anchors, keeping track of that and making sure that the anchor remains set as the boats swings around it. Boats swing at the end of their stretched out rodes.
But in a changing current, the boat can drift lazily directly over the top of the anchor, spinning around to the constantly changing forces of current and wind. That likely happened to us. Hiatus’s turning, with a slack nylon rode hanging from her bow, created our wrap.
From our reading, we had developed the notion that Chub Cay was not sailor friendly, that it preferred to cater to the large sportfishermen boaters who bomb over from Miami for a few days of deep-water fishing in the NorthWest Providence Channel. Maybe COVID makes a difference, but we found the staff there welcoming and helpful. It’s a lovely spot. We could have wished for less wind during our visit. The blow topped its predictions with winds pushing 50 knots through the area.
From our reading, we had developed the notion that Chub Cay was not sailor friendly, that it preferred to cater to the large sportfishermen boaters who bomb over from Miami for a few days of deep-water fishing in the NorthWest Providence Channel. Maybe COVID makes a difference, but we found the staff there welcoming and helpful. It’s a lovely spot. We could have wished for less wind during our visit. The blow topped its predictions with winds pushing 50 knots through the area.
We gave the wind and waves a few days to settle. On Wednesday Bob, who runs the dive shop--he’s from Chile, most of the dive shop staff are from Chile--with two of his compatriots sped me back to the anchorage in a small open deck fisherman, scuba gear at the ready. The fender was afloat. The anchor came up easily. No dive needed. Bob would only take fuel for the trip. Nothing else. Our thanks and respect go out to him.
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