I knew that i was starting north from Panama a month before the end of the hurricane season. It was a gamble. And i felt like i paid for it, beating (or being beaten) on my last multi-night solo legs to Providencia and Roatan. But worse was coming. Early the morning before Sean was to arrive, i e-mailed him about the weather system that would become hurricane Richard. While i welcomed his help, i offered my understanding if he wanted to delay his arrival and stay out of harm’s way. He got that e-mail when he was waiting for his connection at the Miami airport and decided to come ahead. I am very glad that was his decision.
When last i blogged, i tried to allay anyone’s worries about the fact that we were about to weather a hurricane. Without local knowledge, we decided a nearby marina was our best option for shelter. An aerial photo gave you some idea of where we went. What i didn’t tell you was that the day after we got there…most of the other boats in the marina left for better shelter. This was not comforting. Some ran 80 miles south to Big Creek and Placencia. Others knew what mangroves they could get into and out of. One of them vacated a better slip that we moved into. Then Sean and i…arranged for a ride to nearby Mayan ruins (Altun Ha) with a gringo (Don, a retired ship’s captain from British Columbia) who owned a tiny food concession in the marina. On the way to the ruins and back, our conversations with Don taught us much about life in Belize – which is much more third world than we had expected. Lawless? Mexico was going to feel like a relief.
We had the ruins to ourselves. The place felt powerful and magical to us. I thought of those old National Geographic TV specials in which the camera pans across empty ruins while playing the soundtrack of what they must have sounded like a thousand years ago when they were filled with a bustling population. The sun broke thru, no cruise ship crowds were due, the vendors sold us a few souvenirs or gifts and we counted ourselves lucky witnesses. After our 5 hour outing we got back to an even more empty marina. Hmmm. Then the Belizean Coast Guard boat came to the ramp, went on a trailer and was towed...to safety?
The next morning another better slip opened up. It would be in the lee of a big building during the worst winds (east) and the wind would hold the boat off the dock. We tried to move into it but ran aground at its entrance. So we backed up and decided to tie up at the space that had opened up on the other side of the marina at the highest docks in the place – this on the theory that there could be a considerable storm surge and unusually high water, and in spite of the fact that the east winds would push Akimbo against the dock. The storm was due that evening. We had prepared Akimbo as much as we could. At two o’clock we walked around the marina to anticipate what might happen, re-tie a few boats…things that were in our interest to take care of.
At about 5, we thought to do this walk around again while we still had some daylight. The wind was starting to howl. Before we got past checking our own lines and those of our neighbor the water level in the marina began to drop. So we kept retying our fenders and trying to help Akimbo. Soon it was dark. The winds made their dreaded shift to the east and increased dramatically – our battle began in earnest. In the last few days we had reduced Akimbo’s windage as much as we could, still she healed hard over at the dock. With a lot of pushing and fendering we were able to keep her from bending her stanchions and lifelines. We were too busy to help the unattended boat ahead of us much. Still, once in a while, one of us would crouch against the wind, go check her fenders and lines – i added a spring line to her tie up – and run back. The two catamarans ahead of that had a few people each to take care of them. A section of roof on the nearby restaurant ahead of us, blew off and away to our right.
We were struggling to keep fenders between Akimbo and the dock. As the water went down, with Akimbo pinned against the dock, the fenders squeezed up and out. We kept putting them back. I had the idea to take a fender and float a line across the marina to Akimbo. Then we could lead that line to a big cockpit winch and take a strain on it to hold her off the dock. The danger would be if anyone came in or out of the marina, the line might get in their way or have to be cut. Finally i ran around the shore of the marina to its other side and attempted this idea. It didn’t work. The line was too heavy for the fender to carry it. Then i realized…i was ankle deep in water. The water was on the rise. I took the now 50 pounds of soaked line and fender and started huffing and puffing my way back around the marina to Akimbo.
By the time i got there the water had risen another foot at least. Now Sean and i were in a struggle to keep the fenders from squeezing under the dock instead of up and over the dock. The boat ahead of us had healed over hard while the water was down and its edge appeared to have gotten pinned under the edge of the dock as the water came up. There was nothing we could do for her. If one of her port holes burst she would fill and sink.
The noise was considerable, each had to shout into the other's ear to be heard. It was pitch black. The rain stung exposed skin. We couldn’t look into it. Sudenly 50 gallon steel drums started floating in and wedging between Akimbo’s bow and the dock. Everything that had been on shore on the other side of the marina was floating and heading directly for us. What had been the north side of the marina and between us and the waves was now under a couple feet of water that was getting deeper. The shlelter north of us was gone, and in fact the stuff that had been on it became our next threat. Now we added to our tasks fending these steel drums off of Akimbo. Some we could pick up out of the water, toss into the wind and watch blow away. Others had enuf in them we could pull them out and put them on the dock. A few were too heavy. I tried tying a line to them and cleating them away from Akimbo – one kept getting loose and coming back to beat up her water line. As i pushed what appeared to be an empty fuel tank back out into the channel to blow past Akimbo, something very heavy pushed it back at me. I peaked out from below the hood of my foul weather jacket to see a section of dock floating by.
Now the water surface was covered with diesel from the drums and debris that had been swept into it, and from a power boat that was sinking nearby. The wind would whip spray from the water. That spray was now laden with diesel. Sean’s and my eyes began to sting, our skin feel oily. The diesel was added to the salty taste on our faces.
We had managed to retrieve the fenders from where they had squeezed uselessly down, but Akimbo was pinned against the dock and we could only wedge them between her and the dock forward and aft of her beam. At here widest, Akimbo was grinding against the dock and the scratches thru her gelcoat were growing. In desperation i started poking strands of a thick docking line between her and the edge of the dock each time the wave action allowed and inch gap to open up – careful to keep my fingers out of the gap. Soon i had a six foot section of the dock covered with pieces of rope and the rope proved less scratchy than the dock.
The water was higher still, now only six inches below the top of the dock. Every other dock in the marina was under about three feet of water. Each wave now splashed thru up between the boards that we stood on. If the water kept coming up the fenders would become useless and Akimbo would start to be lifted up onto the dock. There would be nothing we could effectively do to help her except check on her once in a while. And the longer we were exposed out here the more chance there was of one of us getting hurt. Anything unexpected might lift in the wind and be hurled at us – and this was only a category 1 hurricane. I told Sean to go look for plan B. Find where we would shelter our bodies from the storm and simply hope Akimbo would recover. If it got ankle deep on us, it would be time to leave. He came back and said he found a good spot.
The wind shifted a bit more south, off Akimbo’s side and to her bow, and the pitch of its roar dropped a little, the water level started to drop, we were able to place a couple fenders at her beam. We went below, ate a few energy bars, drank some water…i looked over and Sean was asleep. It was 10:30. We had been hard at it for 5 and a half hours. Not trusting our environment entirely, i told Sean that we were starting our watch schedule now, here at the dock. He could sleep for three hours while i watched outside and then we would trade places. On his watch he saw the nearly full moon peaking thru clouds. The boat ahead of us was damaged but floating on her lines again. The worst was over. Rumor has it that this was the first direct hurricane hit on Belize in 50 years, and that gusts reached 90 and 100 mph - we were too busy to watch the wind meter. The photos will show the scenes we woke up to.
At the head of the dock we were on there was a 40ish foot catamaran. I hadn't seen anyone on board or attending to it, but it appeared to have ridden the storm out with only minor damage. That morning when we were talking to the marina managers they knocked on it and called out. A woman's tired face appeared. Apparently she lives aboard there. She had stayed below and hoped for the best. Her description was perfect. "It was like living inside a wild animal tied to the dock, struggling to break free. Crazy." We were SO sore, but we were grateful. Akimbo now wore battle scars but was otherwise okay. It felt like time to get the hell out of Belize.
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