I awoke to wakes slamming into the back of the boat, the wind is still coming from approximately the same direction and is light, so I might have a better chance at finding my lost dive ladder than Michael did with his dinghy. The skies are overcast and promising a bit of rain. While drinking a breakfast coffee and checking my picture from the previous day the rains set in with a vengeance and I was soon on deck wearing just my swimming trunks and brushing the decks in the hopes of getting rid of much of the chain rust flakes. Although it is subtropical here, it does get a bit cold in the rain when there’s a touch of wind so I was happy to be back below decks to warm up. Of course now that I’m dry and below decks with the hatches shut it is now quite warm.
As the rains have set in with a vengeance, I’ve started cleaning up on the inside. Every cabin (including their respective bilges) need a thoroughgoing cleaning with Pine Sol to get rid of the storage smells. I started aft but it seemed that I was dripping sweat on every surface I cleaned so I postponed that task until the rains stopped and I could open the hatches for some ventilation. After my training class on offshore first aid I had gone and purchased first-aid supplies that fit into two large neon-red soft cases so I re-stowed my existing equipment and ended up discarding a lot of expired drugs (including 3 Epi-Pens that had not only gone past their use-by date but had turned cloudy) and bandages in the process. The rains have stopped now and I’ve fired up the generator in order to power the dive compressor. The winds have shifted so I am going to have a difficult time in finding my ladder. I think I will tie a rope to my anchor and do concentric circles for a search pattern, since visibility is going to be even worse today after all the rain. I’m not too sanguine about my chances of retrieving the ladder, but perhaps I’ll find Michael’s dinghy again and can take a picture to show him that it has once again been discovered.
Unfortunately the wind and wave combination is making the boat roll rather uncomfortably and I would like to move from here to another anchoring spot, but I can’t do so until I’ve made my ladder retrieval efforts. If I had internet connectivity here I’d check up online to see how much a ladder and corresponding transport costs would be. I’m afraid I’m going to have order one and pay the rather steep mailing fees.
So far 4 full tanks of air and no luck in finding the ladder. The visibility is limited to about 5-10 feet at the bottom, which is only 20 to 30 feet. The first tank was wasted in a random pattern which wasn’t likely to succeed, but the following 3 tanks were spent more efficiently. I tied a rope to the anchor and swam circles, letting out another 10 feet or so each time I passed the anchor chain or under the boat. I have found surprisingly few items, just a couple of beer bottles, a pot, a bikini top with 3 wooden clothespins still attached and quite a few starfish. The last circle put be just under “Zanshin” so I’ve covered the area where the ladder should be. Between the time I anchored and when I noticed the missing ladder I’d shifted position by 180° so I’m going to do some more circles from a bit closer to my original position using my dinghy anchor. I want to keep umbilically attached to the boat underwater since there are no physical landmarks underwater and there is a steady stream of boats big and small coming through this anchorage area and I have no wish to surface in the path of one of them.
On one of my dives I noticed Rocking B come by the anchorage and gave them a wave from the water. I called them up later on the VHF but they weren’t listening at the time and after dark they came by for a couple of minutes looking for a specific boat tool (which I didn’t have). I’ll catch up with them tomorrow.
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