p>GREGG DRUDE AND THE FLIGHT OF THE VAN DIEMAN Updates from the log of the Van Dieman
by
Gregg Drude
Jan. 9, 2006 One whole year of planning and preparation, and still a hundred things left undone. Three days out of San Diego and still my mind is full of lists of things that should have been done before setting sail: change-of-address forms, collecting money owed to me, fix the toilet in the aft head. And how about all of the things that would have been nice to have purchased to increase comfort levels on the boat: extra cushions, seat-backs, spice rack, fruit and vegetable storage. All things that I was just too cheap or too lazy to go about acquiring. Now, adrift on this tiny ship, I would pay hundreds of dollars for the $29 go-anywhere seat-back cushion. And how nice it would be to have cooking ingredients ready at your fingertips, rather than having to empty an entire storage locker just to get some salt. Yes, I would do a few things differently if I were to start over again. The value of comfort and ease onboard far outweighs the minor cost of one more shopping spree at the boat store. But then, of course, no matter how much more crap I had brought along, I would still be longing for the few items that didn’t make the cut. How many times can you remind yourself not to reverse the boat while towing the dinghy? Quite frankly I don’t think it makes any difference how many times you do. In the heat of the moment, as the boat is heading directly for a massive rock just below the surface, one’s mind can quickly forget the repeated warning. But who knew just how disastrous the consequences could be? Thanks to quick thinking, and even quicker reactions, the Van Diemanwas saved from a sure puncture through her hull. Her crew got an anchor out over the side of the stern and held her in place mere feet from what could have been her demise. Of course, now that we had been saved from one catastrophe, we are left with another. The line used for towing the dinghy is now wrapped so tightly around the prop shaft we cannot even disconnect it from either end. This of course leads to a dive over the side by the captain, me, to try and wrestle the line free. The water temp is below 60 degrees, so I wasn’t too overjoyed at going in. In the end, it took a diver’s knife and about 15 trips down under the boat to get everything freed up again. All that was really lost was a good piece of rope. Fortunately, no damage to the propeller, and hopefully, a lesson was learned. We were able to finally enjoy our picturesque anchorage and surf some overhead waves all by ourselves. Eighteen years spent helping my old man tinker on Porsches in the garage, and I still don’t have a clue how an alternator works. And now here I am floating precariously between two headlands off the coast of Mexico, and don’t have enough battery power to start the engine. Just before leaving San Diego, I had removed the starter to have it rebuilt only as a precaution. Surely, this could have nothing to do with our voltage troubles. Wrong! Apparently, a wire connects the alternator to a terminal on the starter, without which, the alternator will do NOTHING. Luckily, I spotted the fried remains of said wire hanging in the vicinity of the starter. Turns out that this wire cannot actually lie against the starter or it will simply burn up. With just a bit of jury-rigging necessary, because we didn’t have a proper connector on board, we were up and running again. The boat was almost to be turned around and headed home for the most minor of repairs. I can just imagine the laughs that would have been had by the mechanic down on the dock. “You came all the way home to have one wire reattached?” Another lesson learned, and mockery narrowly avoided. |
