It was about a year ago one morning early that the wife and myself set out from our local marina that was shrouded in thick pea soup fog.
What makes this memorable was the fact that I could see this foamy wake in the water as I left the marina. There was another boat just ahead of us somewhere and the fog was thick enough that we were unable to see the channel marker buoys. This means one of two things.
You are in the middle of the channel and you are OK
You have missed the turn and you are about to become an insurance statistic.
The GPS showed me that we were OK, so I started following along on the foamy trail left by the boat ahead of me.
Suddenly…. O bugger…. Out of the fog loomed a channel marker on my right as we are heading out……. The marker is green, and not red as I expected it to be…..
Red to port when you go for a snort (drink) i.e. I am way out from where I am supposed to have been
Both the boat ahead of me and myself have strayed out of the channel and we are about to find out exactly how shallow things can get around there.
It was at this point that I heard him make contact with the reef. Threw the wheel hard over and got back to the channel as quick as I can. Slowed down and eventually got to the other boat to see if we can render some assistance. He declined saying that the one engine was not sounding good so he was returning to the marina once the fog lifts. That was where we left him, barely three hundred meters outside of the marina.
This weekend I saw that 42 footer up on a trailer by the slipway. The first time it has moved in over a year.
Not a pretty sight below the water line. I dont even want to know what the repalcement costs are going to be.
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