An Error To Regret

Little Shark River, Everglades
25 20.25 N 081 06.59 W

In yesterday's blog, I wrote that Tarwathie's progress was slow because her bottom was foul. Libby insisted that we must have been dragging a lobster pot. We stopped and peered over the side, and fished with a boat hook but we couldn't see anything. I said, "No. It must be fouling."

When I finished posting that blog, I stepped out on deck. Then I saw that we were making only two knots of speed with full throttle and full speed! Impossible. I was forced to admit that we must be dragging a lobster pot. Libby also said that the tiller felt strange. I tried it, and the rudder would hardly move.

My remedy was to stop the boat, and to put it in full reverse. Sure enough, with only 4-5 seconds of reverse, the rudder suddenly freed up. We cautiously put it in forward again, and we moved right away. In fact, we were suddenly doing 5.5 knots. I looked behind us. There wasn't a lobster pot float, there were four of them. I suppose that we dragged a pot, and that pot caught another trap and another and another. Libby looked me right in face, stuck out her tongue and said, "Naaaaah." I
deserved that. Anyhow, it was an error I would come to regret. How? Read on.

We approached the entrance to the Little Shark River close to sunset. I was in a hurry to get in before it got dark. We were late because of the day's delays with charts and with lobster pots. However, a big and very distinct cold front approached us from the Northeast. I can't remember ever seeing such well defined cold front clouds before. We know that as cold fronts pass, to expect a shift in wind direction, and strong winds. Nevertheless, I peered in to the distance and I couldn't see any
evidence of strong winds. I decided it was a weak front. Besides, we were only 1.5 miles from the entrance to the river and 2 miles to a secure anchorage.

The front passed. WHAM. The wind went from zero to 33 knots in an instant. Boy oh boy did I judge that one wrong. Third bad call today. We dropped all sails. I thought we could motor the last 1.5 miles. Nope, that didn't work. We have never been able to hold Tarwathie's bow into the wind with wind speeds as high as 33. She loses steerage speed. That forced me to turn the helm over to Libby while I went forward to set a stay sail. Boy did I get soaked. The wind was blowing spray over the
bow continuously. With the stay sail set, we still had a hard time making that last 1.5 miles. It was nearly direct into the wind. By slewing to windward and leeward, I was barely able to keep up enough speed to steer and to clear the shoals up ahead. It took us 45 minutes to cover that last mile. After rounding the shoal I was able to fall off the wind a bit, and then we were making 6 knots into the river. The only trouble was that now it was so dark that I couldn't see anything except
the top of the tree line. We depended on our GPS chart plotter to navigate to the anchorage.

I don't mean to over-dramatize our adventure. We weren't in danger, and we had other options. We could have tacked and headed toward Key West and deeper water. We could have hove to. We could have dropped the hook and sat at anchor; the water was only 8.5 deep where we were. As it turned out, the strong winds only lasted for a bit more than an hour. After that it settled right down.

This morning we moved several more miles deeper in to Little Shark River. After lunch we'll take the dinghy and explore the Everglades better. The nature is wonderful here, and so far we have seen no sign of other people or other boats. We have the whole paradise to ourselves.