Luckily, Zanshin didn’t break free of the mooring overnight. This morning it is overcast and there’s a good breeze coming through the anchorage. Strong winds came at 09:00 and it’s a gusty day now. When the 20+ knots battered the boat, I had the engine on and worried about the mooring holding. Not just the frayed eye, for which I had a backup, but the attachment below the water. It had looked solid when I dived it, but one never knows.
I’ve got a bit of confidence in the mooring, now that it has withstood stronger gusts. If the wind does die down this evening I might feel comfortable and go ashore after all.
Noon
The day went by quickly while at work, then at around 15:00 I saw a boat through the side porthole come by quite close. I went up top and saw a DYC charter boat come by quite close with a lot of crew. They were heading towards the reef at speed, so I thought I’d watch. They turned in time and motored away from Sandy Island, then dropped anchor within 30 feet of my bow.
Hafenkino
The anchorage is huge. One can go more than 1000 feet away from shore and still be in shallow water. So there was no reason to get this close. I’m on a mooring, which means I swing quite differently from a boat at anchor. I’d come within a boat’s length of the moored boat behind me during the previous night. Despite it being a gusty day and I’m moored, now this boat anchored pretty much between us!
Even had we both been anchored, this was far too close. I gave them some time to decide for themselves but when it looked like they were going to stay, I waved and called (we were so close I didn’t need to shout) to go to VHF69. I’d heard German, so conversed in that language. I told them that if they remained where they were, we were guaranteed to collide in the night. They asked about the winds, which get shifty and variable at night. I said that I have a different swing circle on a mooring than they at anchor. Instead of arguing, I just said that they’d been warned and the insurance would take care of the rest; then went back to work below.
Sometime later I heard them raising the chain, but they were very close (as in almost passing the Grey Poupon from one boat to another range) so I fired up my engine and reversed away. It turns out their windlass had stopped working. For about 20 minutes I kept out of their way while they pondered their predicament. They finally opted to use some of their plentiful crew to pull up the chain by hand. It took them another 2 attempts to anchor and one very close call to the reef before they finally got settle. I don’t think that they’ll be coming by to apologize…
Evening
The weather isn’t great, but the winds have died down and it’s no long a gusty day while moored here at Sandy Island. Nonetheless I’ll remain aboard tonight and head ashore with Marjorie and Mark on the morrow. As dusk and sunset approach the clouds have lifted and spread and tonight’s sunset promises to be something special. The setting here at Sandy Island is idyllic, despite the gusty day. The process of sunset was indeed wonderful, and I’m putting up several images because I can’t just select a subset of them.
