God does “suffer fools”……. Thankfully L

[Frank]

Been quiet here so I thought I’d share a story.
Yesterday while looking for an old family picture I came across this one.
Made my first big passage in 1983.
I had this 21ft “one of”.  Older friends at the marina had a Nash 20
We had a compass but no VHF
They had a VHF but no compass.
Neither of us knew weather forecasting or proper check in procedures for entering another country.
With a long weekend coming up, we thought it a great idea to cross Lake Huron (an inland sea that can really kick up!)
We figured if we prepped Friday after work and left early Saturday from our home marina of Port Franks, it was only about a 10-12 hour sail on our little boats to get to Sanilac Michigan. Sunday would be to Lexington and then Monday cross back to Port Franks.
Heh… they had a VHF, we had a compass…. “what could go wrong” ??
We actually had a hoot and were greeted entering the marina with “welcone sailboats from Canada” over the loud speaker.
We all felt like Slocum as it was our first time out of sight of land for several hours.
Our trip back Monday was in thick fog. We crossed shipping lanes with erie shadows and loud fog horns sounding …..
To our surprise, we had held out coarse and sailed directly to the entrance at Port Franks.
As we tied up our little craft we felt quite proud and the sense of accomplishment was huge.
Both crews took the power squadron coarse that following winter and realized just how &#@% lucky we were!
Ignorance truly was bliss!
But… we were now hooked!
The picture was taken leaving Port Franks by our buddy boat.
Proof that 40yrs ago i actually had  hair colour!

[Norman]

I was thinking more about the hassle you would have today if you repeated that trip, when the Guvmint got a grip on you on our side.

Yep, a friend and I capsized a canoe in the Potomac River a day after the last ice went out (That was before global warming).  We were only about 50 feet from shore, but made it with all the contents of the canoe.  I boosted him up the sea wall, handed everything to him, then inverted the canoe, and he hauled it out.

By this time I was so cold that I could not touch my thumb with my finger, and could not grab the pipe railing to climb out.  He grabbed my wrist, and simply dragged me up the rocks, over the rail, and onto the walkway.

The reflected waves at the end of Hanes Point curves produced a very confused pattern, and simply flipped us right over.  The prevailing 6 to 9 inch waves had been no problem as we went the length of the point, crossed the river, and paddled down to the sailing marina, and returned, more than 4 miles total.

The night before, 3 people had fallen into Washington Channel, behind Haines Point, from power boats, and died, but darkness may have been as large a factor as the water temperature.  Alcohol had been consumed, and both men doubtless had their zippers down when they fell in (separate boats, not near one another in space or time).  The woman who died jumped in to save her husband, who could not swim.

Cold water is a quick killer.