Charter Sailing Log - Cat's Paw

We were back for another long weekend to take the 2nd ASA Sailing course "Basic Coastal Sailing" with the help of a professional captain, Captain Richard Widmann. We had chartered the boat, "Cat's Paws" (sistership of Double Play) , from Florida Yatch Charters located at the Miami Beach Marina. The objective was to continue learning how to sail a 37' cat so that we could begin bareboating with the kids throughout the Caribbean.

The crew this time was just Isabelle, the 2 kids, myself and Captain Richard. As with the previous trip, the captain did very little work on the boat, essentially just providing guidance and instruction when required while testing our theoritecal knowledge, and watch how we handled the boat. This is really what it would be like when we would bareboat as a family.

A clear day with 15 knots of wind, and we were off south down Biscayne Bay. But by the time we got to Featherbed Bank, the wind had died to less than 5 knots, and we motorsailed through the East and West channels, and decided to anchor off Coon Point on Elliott Key. Now one of the advantages of cats is that you can anchor up close to the beach. Not a good idea this time. There was no beach (because Andrew had washed it away), and with no wind, the mosquitoes were out in force, so we decided to anchor far from the "beach" and go swimming with "Oscar" (our friendly man-overboard fender).

The 2nd day we motored out to the Atlantic side through Ceasar's Creek just south of Elliott Key, and anchored for lunch and some snorkeling in Hawk's Channel at buoy 21G. This was actually part of the training (i.e. practice anchoring). We then went back inside through AngelFish Creek, and anchored NW of Pumpkin Key in light SSE winds.

During the night, the wind shifted SSE to NNE at 15 knots, now leaving us exposed to the 3-4 mile reach of Card Sound which was kicking up about a 3' chop, and on a lee shore. The anchor was holding, and the conditions weren't that streneous, so we all retired for the night.

5:30 in the morning, and ...

At 5:30 in the morning, I felt the motion of the boat change to a sidewise roll. Didn't like the feeling so I stuck my head up the hatch. Very interesting, all the other boats were motoring forward out of the anchorage! NO. Were drifting, the anchor having let go. A quick assessment showed the anchorage wasn't too crowded, we weren't in danger of hitting any boats, and we still had plenty of room to drift for now. So got Isabelle to start the motors, while I tried to let out some more scope. Now the captain wakes up, and also looks around. We agree that the best thing to do is bring the anchor up, and move to the south side of Pumpkin Key, re-anchor and have some coffee. That accomplished, we discuss how we handled the situation, and are actually happy with the actions we took. Hindsight says that we should have re-anchored the minute the windshift occured since we knew it would last a few days.

The morning sky was a dull grey with rain in the forecast, but all around us in the anchorage were feeding dolphins. That got the kids up real fast. By 8:00, we set off north to Miami with the wind NNE, so we had to tack all the way back to Miami. Through the channels we had to motor sail to keep within the channel (water depth falls quickly to 1'-3' outside the channel). It's while motorsailing throuhg the channel, that we were joined by two dolphins who started swimming between the hulls of the boat. Given our low speed, we had the kids go up front on the trampoline with the dolphins just a few feet below them !! I've seen it in the movies, read about it, and finally it was happening to us. The rest of the sail back to Miami was cold and wet, but I loved every second of it.

A different trip this time, with a combination of good coaching from Captain Richard, and some challenges which boosted our confidence with handling the boat. Just what we were looking for.

CeBe WebDesign November 12, 2007