By Dr. Robert E. Plucker
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| Photo by Jean E. Straatmeyer |
Our boat, "Echappee II" had had a spell of
engine overheating near Deception Pass, and had been towed in to Anacortes for
repair. After it was fixed, I was able to talk my good friend Floyd into going
along with me to sail back to our moorage in Utsalady Bay on the north end of
Camano Island. It's not all that easy to find a sailing companion in January,
but Floyd was my man. Not much actual sailing was done as there was little
wind, we had maybe ten miles to go, and we were glad that the little 12 horse
Yanmar perked along as if it had never been sick.
From Anacortes Skyline Marina, we headed back through
Deception Pass, south through the Skagit Flats, across Dugwalla Bay and on to
Strawberry Point. There was snow in the air by the time we got to Dugwalla Bay.
By the time we got to Strawberry Point it was snowing hard enough to form
floating slush in the water. I had never seen it snow that hard before. After
Strawberry Point the snow pretty much disappeared and we could see across to
Utsalady Bay, our destination. We had no trouble finding our mooring buoy among
the dozen or so that were there, so we tied up, busied ourselves with
straightening up below, left our life jackets aboard for the next sail, and
Floyd climbed over the side to get into the tippy (Greta III) dinghy to row to
shore. I took a last look around and followed him into the dinghy.
At exactly the worst possible moment, Floyd rose partly
up to change his position in the boat, and at the same worst possible moment my
foot came down into the dinghy getting both of us off balance. Of course we
were both dumped into the 40 degree water. This is the same water that we had
always heard could kill you in twenty minutes or less from hypothermia. This
was not a good thing, as the mooring buoy was probably more than 100 yards from
shore, and with heavy January clothing on, our chances of getting to shore
alive were not good. Utsalady Beach is not in a well-inhabited area, and the
chances of anyone seeing us struggling in the water were poor. The one good
thing was that there is a boat-launching ramp there, and fairly often people
come down to launch boats to go fishing. But of course you can't rely on
somebody coming at exactly the right time to save your life from the cold, cold
water. Floyd and I did the only thing we could do; hang on for dear life to the
dinghy which was upside down. It had floatation chambers; Floyd and I assuredly
did not.
The obvious thing to do would have been to get back
aboard Echappee, right the dinghy, bail it out, and row to shore. Echappee had
no permanent swim ladder, so we had nothing to grab to pull ourselves back
aboard. Somehow we seemed to be unable to reach the mooring line to pull
ourselves up over the bow, and the current was bringing us always further away
from the boat, but not closer to shore. What to do? We tried to right the
dinghy and actually succeeded momentarily, but had neither the equipment nor
the sense to try to bail out the water before attempting to climb in. I had
actually gotten into the swamped right-side-up dinghy, but there was no
stability and down I went for the second time.
While we were clinging there, Floyd's wife, who had seen
us starting to cross from Strawberry Point, figured it was about time for us to
land, and so she drove down to the beach, and was mystified by the sight of
these two guys struggling in the water, yelling now and then. It didn't dawn on
her at first that the two guys were Floyd and me flailing about.
By this time I was having serious worry about our chances
of living long enough to be rescued, but it was about then that a car pulled
up, towing a trailer with a boat on it. Floyd's wife, having seen to her
horror, just what and who was in the water, ran over to the two guys with the
fish boat and, Floyd and I presumed, got them to go out and rescue us. It
seemed to take forever for them to get the boat actually in the water and the
engine started. All this accomplished, they roared off, not toward us, but away
from us!
I never could figure out why they did this, but they made
a wide circle, came back, hoisted us unceremoniously over the side, and dumped
us into Floyd's warm car. Floyd and his wife lived only a mile or so from
Utsalady Beach, and there were two showers in their house so both Floyd and I
could stand under a lot of hot water without having to wait for the other.
Finest shower I have ever had.
Whenever I tell this story, I like to say that Floyd
could probably have swum to shore, as he was a powerful swimmer. I could maybe
have righted the dinghy again and have luck enough to make it to shore. But
Floyd could not bring himself to leave me, and I wouldn't leave him, so both of
us would have drowned. And maybe that is just what would have happened if it
had not been for the two guys who chose that cold snowy afternoon to try to
catch a fish, or pull up a crab pot, or whatever they had on their minds.
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| photo from: www.gillsailinggear.com |
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