At the anchorage off the southern tip of Tobago there are six sailing yachts, three motor yachts and a couple of excursion boats. Some are anchored, some are on mooring buoys—and one has broken free and is being swept out into the open ocean.
At dawn we approached Tobago, proudly carrying on deck the forestay and headsail torn away by a squall. Sleepily surveying the Caribbean lagoon, we spotted two dinghies motoring at full speed towards a 15-metre motor yacht drifting farther away.
Our captain had barely slept for two days.
And now, after dropping anchor and stretching every conceivable kind of awning over the deck, Andrei sank into the half-doze of well-earned rest, losing control of his cup of tea and biscuit.
“Andrei, let’s go and help too!”
“We’d have to inflate the dinghy and launch it... No, I don’t want to.”
“Can’t you see they can’t manage!” We shook the captain awake as we watched the yacht continue to drift away despite the two dinghies harnessed to it, pulling shorewards at full power.
“We won’t be any help either. The yacht’s heavy, with a lot of windage...” the captain mumbled as he drifted off.
But the children and I could not believe that someone’s yacht could simply be swept out into the ocean right before everyone’s eyes, with nothing anyone could do about it. After fifteen minutes of our most grandiose and ridiculous rescue plans, Andrei realised he was not going to get any sleep. The neighbouring dinghies were still circling the runaway yacht, but had given up trying to tow it.
“Andrei, come on... we’re... snowboarders! We have to help one another!” We may have stopped being snowboarders long ago, and the runaway yacht was no snowboarder at all, but this appeal from the film Yolki proved the final straw for the captain.
“Take down the awnings! Nastya—to the anchor!” And in one minute we took down and rolled up the awnings that had taken at least half an hour to rig, and cleared the unfinished coffee and buns from the deck.
“Russians never surrender!” Lada proclaimed, and Lady Mary raced off to rescue the motor yacht.
Meanwhile, the previous rescuers abandoned their efforts. One headed towards the fishing boats to pass on the baton, while the other turned back. We waved to both of them: “Come aboard!” But they interpreted our signal in their own way and calmly went off to finish their coffee. The yacht gone with the wind drifted farther away from the island.
On the Scene
From a distance, the motor yacht had not looked so big. But up close it turned out that we could not come alongside her in the wind and waves, because her freeboard was nearly twice as high as ours. We did not have a dinghy ready to launch.
“Who wants to go for a swim?” the captain asked.
“Well... I suppose I do,” the first mate mumbled.
The task was to loop our mooring line around their rope, which led down into the depths—either to the anchor that had broken free or to some loose remnant dangling below—and pass the end to the junior crew member so it could be led through the fairlead and onto the stern cleat.
“Tie a fender to the end,” the captain advised, and this proved very useful indeed.
Rescuing the Drowning
You might think there was nothing to it! Swim ten metres to the yacht and loop one rope around another. So there were waves, an ebb tide and a current... In practice, towing the 14-ton Lady Mary towards an unmanned yacht proved difficult. Even dragging the line through the water against the waves was hard once it went from slack to taut. And then there it was—their line, only a metre away—but our 18-metre mooring line pulled tight, the yachts drifted at different speeds, and I was dragged backwards. Lady Mary had to circle around for another approach.
Out of breath after a dozen attempts, I shouted:
“I can’t! You’re pulling me away!”
We tried a couple more times.
“Hold on!” the captain shouted, opening the throttle and approaching the drifting boat from seaward.
From this side, the wind and ebb tide brought the yacht towards us rather than away, and the manoeuvre worked on the first attempt. Without noticing the skin scraped off my hand and leg, I swam for our stern with all my might, towing the victorious line. The junior crew member caught it and made it fast; the captain threw me a rope. Hooray!
The shore was already two miles away. We towed our trailer behind us while I tried to catch my breath.
Operation Interception
Meanwhile, our manoeuvres had been spotted from shore. Just as we reached the entrance to the anchorage, a motorboat materialised out of nowhere. “We want to attach this monstrosity to a buoy,” we said. “Right,” they replied, “then you’d better let us attach it.” Well, that was one less problem: their boat sat low in the water, so no one had to go swimming a second time. With a clear conscience, we handed over the line, which turned out to be a remnant of the mooring, very conveniently encrusted with shells and twisted.
...
“Why have they only come out now?”
“Well, perhaps the mooring’s owners realised what they could be facing if the yacht disappeared—or perhaps they want a reward.”
“Ah, right. Well, good luck to them.”
Epilogue
We dropped anchor, rigged the awnings and finished our buns. We treated the cuts from the shells with our miracle remedy. It worked. Our neighbours waved and gave us the thumbs-up, and for the rest of our stay everyone in the anchorage looked at us with respect.
After all that strenuous swimming, the first mate could feel that she had muscles for two days. And that was a good thing. Our yacht gone with the wind rested peacefully on her mooring.
If everyone knew how much selfless good deeds lift your spirits, that is all they would ever do. 🙂
The very same yacht gone with the wind
Do good and cast it into the sea! And do not be afraid of being misunderstood.
More Photos
Store Bay in southern Tobago
The Coco Reef Hotel in the south of the island
Rainy weather in Tobago. Our yacht is the second from the right in the Store Bay anchorage
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