My Mountain Trail

Recovering the Kayak

Wednesday, November 25th, 2009

Well no surprise, the boat recovery process didn’t go as planned. On Sunday evening I left Todd a message to let him know how I was going to recover his anchor (and my kayak). Monday morning he called to advise against my plan. After giving him more details (thick wet suit, fins, bilge pump, etc.), he said something like:

“Well, that might work. Pulling that anchor is going to be very hard. The swells are 10′ at 11 seconds right now. It will be dangerous. Look, since I’m involved, I’m going to insist that you don’t try that. Meet me down at the beach at 11:30 and I will pick you up in my boat and help you pump the kayak out. If we can’t get it pumped out for some reason, I will tow it as close as possible to the beach and you can swim it in with your fins. If you’re not able to push the boat, the tide will push you in eventually.”

Not exactly a ringing endorsement of my plan. I had to respect his experience though, and obviously having Todd’s help was much appreciated and did make the whole recovery plan safer. I accepted his offer.

I spent the morning running a couple of errands and getting ready for the recovery. I rented a thicker wetsuit, bought a new bilge pump, and ate my Wheaties.

At about 10:00 a.m., just after I had picked up everything I needed, I got a call from Todd with new information. He said the boat was gone and had been picked up by the Coast Guard that morning. Apparently a concerned citizen saw the boat anchored out in the bay and thought that the paddler/owner was lost at sea. The Coast Guard and the National Park Service (Bolinas borders Pt. Reyes National Seashore) responded. The Coast Guard picked up the boat (with difficulty according to the locals’ reports) and began a search. Todd called the Coast Guard and told them we were safe. Then he called me. I later found out the call came in at about 9:00 a.m., so the search had not gone on too long before it was called off. That was good.

I called the Coast Guard and they told me that the kayak was still on their boat, and that they would call me when it arrived back at their docks in Sausalito. At about 11:30 they called and told me I could come pick up the kayak. I also answered some questions for their report.

Monday afternoon I drove on over to the Coast Guard station and met the Officer in charge of the rescue boat. He said the kayak only had about 2″ of freeboard (it was basically full of water), and that it was snagged to the bottom on a short scope of line. He said that each time a swell came in the bow of the kayak was pulled under water into the wave by a couple of feet. They pulled the line until it parted (or maybe they cut it), and then dragged the kayak on their deck and dumped it out. They never saw the anchor…

The Coasties are very well trained and I believe them when they say the anchor should have come free when they pulled on the line. Though, they didn’t know how large the anchor was (it was only a 14lb. Danforth) and they may not have driven over the anchor to pull it up. Anyway, the anchor was gone, the boat was recovered, and I didn’t have to swim in the surf and fight the waves trying to recover the boat. I can live with all of that.

I asked the guys at the Coast Guard if I should have done something different with the boat. They figured what we did was fine, but it would have been helpful if we had called the Marin County Sheriff or other law enforcement to let them know why the boat was there — not because it was wrong that it was there, but because it was an unusual place to leave a boat and someone might call it in. They were glad to see we had flares on board and glad they found the owner of the boat. Apparently it is pretty unusual to find the owner of an abandoned kayak. Of course, ours wasn’t abandoned, but I understood his point.

All that left me with one last task: Returning Todd’s anchor. Kind of hard to do. Fortunately, West Marine had his anchor’s twin brother. I bought that and rigged it w/ a new rode and called Todd. Since we live on his way to East Marin, and he passes by often enough, we agreed that he could just pick it up at his convenience.

So that’s the story.

Just one last comment about Todd. We really don’t know much about him — not even his last name. But his help and commitment to keeping us safe even through the recovery is a strong testament to his character. He couldn’t have done more for us even if he was family. Thanks Todd. You da man!

Safety

Monday, November 23rd, 2009

We are safe.  I have the boat.  More later…