November 9. Today started with a fizz and ended with a thud……….

This morning when I got up to walk the dogs I decided to turn on the heat to warm the boat for Christy. I started the generator to make 110 volt electricity for the boats heating system. The heat was running for almost 5 minutes and it shut off. I did a quick scan and realized that I never turned the generator feed switch on.

So I had started the generator and never connected it to the boats electrical system. So when I turned on the heater the only source of power was the boats batteries, as the generator was running, but not connected. This involves the inverter sensing the need for power, then it turned itself on and started converting 12 volt power to 110 volt. The only problem with this was that the heater draws a ridiculous amount of power from the batteries. Technically, we can’t even run the heat unless the generator is running (or we are plugged into shore power) so as a result of my oversight I burned a 200 amp fuse in the main inverter power supply line. It wasn’t the end of the world as we had a spare fuse onboard, but it was a classic case of not paying attention to what you’re doing and it coming back to bite you in the ass. So I’d been bitten on the ass and it was not yet 0700 hours.

Once back out through Saint Catherine’s Sound, it was south for Saint Simon’s Sound. Saint Simon’s Sound is a class “A” inlet that we’ve transited before. It’s big enough for cruise ships and such so the passage through will be easy for us. Or at least that was the plan…….

While Veranda and the Freedom’s were sailing south along the coast we struck up a conversation with another sailboat running south about thirty minutes ahead of us. We were making excellent time and as a result the Saint Andrew’s Sound (the next inlet) was now within our reach. The only problem was that the Saint Andrew’s Sound is kind of a crappy inlet, at least by our standards.

The boat in front of us assured us that it was not as bad as it seemed/looked and that they’ve done it dozen’s of times. The wind had practically died and the seas were virtually flat so we decided to give it a go. Stupid, stupid, stupid……..

We passed our intended stop at Saint Simon’s and keep on going for another hour. We didn’t even have to alter course. When we got to the deep water buoy we turned into the channel and headed in. The first mark was a green, we left it to port and started scanning the horizon for the second mark, a red.

I plotted the course to the second mark on the chartplotter so we knew where the mark was supposed to be. As we headed in the direction of the second mark the sea state changed dramatically. Where the second mark was supposed to be was row after row of breakers. Finally we saw the second mark. We couldn’t believe what we were seeing. The second mark was in the middle of a five hundred yard wide wall of breaking seas.

No wonder we couldn’t see the mark, most of the time it had been hidden by the rough water. We still couldn’t believe what we were looking at. I called the boat ahead of us that had just transited this area 35 minutes ago and asked if that really was the second mark or was it a warning, marking a shoal.

I already knew the answer, but he confirmed that it was indeed the second mark. He was amazed to hear that we actually had white water as when he went through, there was none. Okay fine, f**k me, here we go.

We were still 3 miles from shore and I saw 3 feet of water under us, in 6 foot breaking seas. We had 300 yards of holding our breath in front of us until we reached calm waters. We got about 50 yards from the red mark and KABOOM, a wave lifted us high and unceremoniously slammed us onto the bottom. Hard.

We hit with such force that I was thrown forward against the wheel. Everything in the boat jumped up and redeposited itself 5 feet forward of where it started that day. The next wave lifted us again and we were waiting for the next gargantuan slam and it didn’t come. It was like someone was teaching us a lesson, take anything for granted and you’ll get bitch slapped. When we got to within 10 yards of the mark we hit the bottom one more time, like a little reminder.

Once in through the sound, we turned south and traveled down the ICW for about half a dozen miles before entering Brickhill Creek. It was a great place for the dogs and sleeping was easy for all, especially after today’s events and the needed happy hour that followed……….