November 17, 2009
Aboard No Boundaries
The alarm went off at 4AM yesterday. Actually it goes off at that time every day now.
Some retirement this is! If you want lazy days and restful nights, do not retire and go cruising on a sailboat.
We eventually talked ourselves into getting out of bed. It was cold – we have no heat since leaving the marina. We must manage our electricity wisely. (If we had a propane heater, then we would need to manage the propane wisely, too. It’s always something.) It was dark – we were not in downtown Baltimore any more. In fact, we were in St. Johns Creek, just off the Patuxent River at Solomon Island. We made 78 miles on Sunday, in the hope that such a firm break would assure us of not winding up in Harborview again at day’s end.
The cockpit panes were covered with condensation. Larry wiped them down while I got coffee going. We planned our strategy, and shortly after 0530 we were turning into the channel of the Patuxent. I had remained on deck to shine a flashlight on the day markers as we passed them on our way out, but at this point I went below to log our position. When I went back up to the cockpit, I grabbed the absorber we were using to wipe the cockpit panes. As I stepped out to the aft deck, I saw a boat behind us with flashing blue lights.
You know how you get all nervous when a cop with red lights flashing comes up behind, and then you heave a sigh of relief when he passes you and continues down the road to bother someone else. Larry and I watched this boat approach and we felt pretty sure it couldn’t be about us. Who know we were even here? And who cared?
As it turned out, it was the Coast Guard, and they cared a lot. They cared so much that they boarded us and asked us to show them all sorts of things. I wondered later if we had waited to leave until Tuesday, or maybe Friday, would they have made their quota for the week already? I don’t really know how it all works.
The good part was that the two young men who boarded us were polite, professional and thorough. They simply asked us to show them that we were in compliance with Coast Guard regulations – like carrying our registration, possessing the proper life jackets, and so forth. When they were done, they entered all the information into a Palm Pilot and printed us a receipt with the image of Larry’s signature on it.
We appreciate everything the Coast Guard does. We certainly could not complain about being boarded, although I sort of hope that if it happens again, it will be in daylight. Still, it is a good thing they are doing, and it was really nice to meet some of them personally in a situation where we were not in danger. We all count on the Coast Guard every time we go out on the water. Even though it unnerved me to be boarded, it was not a bad experience at all. I take this opportunity to say to one and all that if the people we met are representative of the Coast Guard, our country is well served.
Nonetheless, after they stepped over the lifelines and back onto their own boat, I breathed a sign of relief. It was just like spelling in the third grade. I always knew those words, and I could spell them forward and backward, but I worried every single week that I would miss a word. I was soooooo glad when the test was over. That is how I felt when our boarding was over. We looked behind us as they left and saw them approach another boat just entering the river. It was somebody else’s turn in the barrel. Whew!
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