Wet Voyages

Many sailors in the Pacific Northwest, having experienced one of the mildest winters in recent memory had assumed that perhaps this April would offer an early start to the relatively warm, leisurely cruising days of summer. As often is the case when you insult the weather gods with such a ridiculous notion, they decided to seek revenge. And out there amongst the intricate waterways of the inside passage was a small sailboat and teenage sailor that provided the prefect target for their frustrations.

When I headed out of my home port, bound for Desolation Sound, I had done enough sailing to expect some challenging weather this time of year, and had even wished for a gale or two for a little excitement and for a bit of a change from the fickle winds I had been dealing with on recent sailing excursions. But when you are on the ocean you must be careful what you wish for. Just two days out of Port Angeles, I found myself in the middle of the worst storm to hit this part of the coast in thirteen years.

The trip had started quite well. I had left the marina early that morning and headed out with a beautiful sunrise and calm seas. There was too little wind to sail so I motored across the Strait of Juan de Fuca and up Haro Strait between San Juan Island and Vancouver Island to Sidney. There I cleared customs into Canada and motored a couple miles across the bay to the anchorage at Sidney Spit. I knew we were in for a bit of a blow but I was in an adventurous spirit and didn't know at the time just how bad things would get.

The boat I was sailing was my parent's Truant 33, a good solid boat for these waters with the exception of two things. First, her pilothouse, which is quite nice most of the time to get out of the nasty weather, but with it's large windows exposes a weak area for bad seas to smash into. And secondly, her tendency to roll in rough water or with a large following sea. It's not usually dangerous, mind you, but in a real nasty blow can make for quite a wild ride.

That evening, the weather was calm and there was little sign of the advancing tempest. But it was April Fools Day, and the joke was on me. It was the calm before the storm. Soon the barometer made a steep drop and the weather rapidly picked up to gale force. By 3AM I was permanently out of bed to make sure the boat was not washed onto the beach.

All that day, I was constantly working to ensure the boat did not drag anchor and get bashed apart on the beach. As the wind and waves increased, the strain on the anchor and chain became incomprehensible. They always say to keep the strain off the windlass which I did with a short line with a hook on the end. This line exploded because of the strain and all the pressure was on the windlass. Without the line holding the chain in place, all 250 feet of it pulled out and jerked with a sickening jolt on the end of the anchor chain, which had a big ring on it to keep from pulling out.

By this point we had drug anchor quite some distance and were far too close to the beach. I had to motor full on against the wind and waves just to keep as much pressure off the anchor chain as possible. Eventually, when the chain came off the windlass and was pulling all across the deck it caused damage to the teak toerail and bending the bow pulpit. The wind had made it impossible to hear almost anything and I was using the ski goggles I brought to be able to see at all into the wind.

Later, just to make things worse, it began snowing. I don't know the strength of the wind because the anemometer broke, but it was really bloody strong. The seas made life uncomfortable but since we weren't offshore they didn't have the opportunity to grow to dangerous heights. And so it continued for the rest of the day and well into the night.

After the storm was over and we were safely docked in Tsehum Harbor I realized I was safe from the storm but was now in equal danger from my parents probable reaction to the storm damage to the boat! The anchor, a hefty plough style anchor, had so much strain from pulling against the storm that it had bent! There was the damage from the anchor chain that had scratched gel coat and done considerable damage to the woodwork near the bow. A stanchion holding up the lifelines had also broken from the seas. Fortunately, my parents were glad that I was alright and my father and little brother came up for two days to help with repairs. I am very grateful for this timely assistance. I was just glad I wasn't the poor bugger who's boat plowed through 10 megayachts before crashing into some millionaire's beach-side resort!(I'm only partly kidding.)

The very first thing I saw the morning after the storm was the bow of a sunk boat being towed by a tug out of the harbor.

In the end, dozens of boats were either sunk or beached in the storm and in places entire marinas were decimated. You could hardly use the radio because mayday's were going off all over the place and it was a miracle no one was hurt. After a few days of work on the boat, I shoved off and again pointed our bow north. But that's another story.

Here's a few pictures from the more enjoyable parts of the trip.










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