I can’t even write about this without some of the anxiety returning. About 8:30 pm, we noticed the wind picking up as we were thinking of retiring to our cabin for the night. The national weather service provides extensive weather reporting for the Florida Coast and adjacent waters, but tonight all they seemed to talk about were severe thunderstorms, accompanied by winds and hail, all of which were expected to go north of us. Or so we thought. The late forecast was revised to include the waters of Florida Bay just a few miles away. We decide to proactively roll down our cockpit enclosure and take the cushions below to avoid getting them soaked.
About 10:30 we were awakened by the creaking of the bulkheads below indicating the boat was rocking on its anchor. We turned on the GPS weather radar and the screen was lit up with vivid oranges reds and purple, surrounding our anchorage. Yikes! We decided to camp out in the cockpit as the wind picked up and registered gusts above 30 knots. The gusty winds caused the boat to start swinging on its anchor, which is not a good situation. Jack proactively started the engine and idled it in neutral to be ready if the anchor dragged. A few minutes later The GPS speed indicated that it indeed was dragging.
There was only one boat anchored nearby that we noticed also had its running lights on indicating that it was moving, its anchor not holding either. Our biggest concern was that we did not drag into the very shallow water indicated on the charts about 1000 feet from our position. As the boat twisted in the wind on its now dragging anchor it was next to impossible to steer just into the wind to stop forward or backward motion of the boat. It seemed as it turned into the wind it would whip past the eye of the wind and start to slip sideways. Our GPS and depth sounder were our salvation in handling this situation. After about 45 minutes of this Jack realized he needed to pull the anchor to have better control of the boats steerage. I hesitated to let him leave the cockpit in the storm with the wind meter indicating 35 knots, but it needed to be done. We both donned our life jackets, and he crawled out on deck and hoisted the Bruce anchor while I added power and attempted to keep the boat moving away from land and shoals. Once on deck he could see the anchor was covered with grass and ropes a consequence of dragging. Meanwhile the radar became more colorful as the rain increased and the wind howled in the shrouds.
With the anchor not hindering our movement, we motored about a mile off shore. When the winds started decreasing to low 20’s Jack went back out on deck and dropped the Danforth anchor. I held my breath as it caught.
We allowed the anchor to settle and the boat motion eventually stopped. A wave of relief washed over us along with quite a bit of rain as we collapsed onto the cockpit deck to spend the night. When it stopped raining I brought up towels, cushions and blankets to make it as comfortable as possible. I checked the tachometer when we shut the engine off. It had been running for two hours. Totally wound up neither of us fell asleep for another hour or so, talking and rehashing our actions, mistakes and successes. We both finally drifted off, (to sleep) the boat still rocking with winds reading in the high teens, low 20s. We awoke just after 6 am to still seas and calm winds just before sunrise on a lovely Florida morning. The boat was washed clean of salt. While I started the coffee we checked today’s weather forecast, expecting a nice quiet trip up to Shark River.
The forecast warned of small craft warnings, showers and numerous thunder showers this afternoon and evening along our route. An eight hour motor sail to Shark River did not seem like a sensible plan. We waited until a polite hour and called Charlie to see how Wyvern managed the night. They also dragged anchor, but were not near land or shoals, so handled it. Wearily, we informed them we were sailing to Marathon to spend a few days on a mooring until the winds settled and the seas and storms subsided.
Tonight, in Boot Key Harbor we are rolling with the wind anticipating some more stormy weather, watching lightning in the clouds. We are safe and secure and tied to a mooring. I hope our sailing companions found a spot where they can get some sleep. They are out of cell range so we will have to wait for their return to civilization to find out.