Day 45: Saturday, October 20, 2012
Underway: 6:48 am Motor Off: 3:25 pm Miles Traveled: 54 Stayed At: Marina
First Things First: First time we thought the boat was sinking.
Mile 270 to Mile 216: Since our bodies have become used to solar time, we tend to get up with the sun and go to bed not too long after sunset (or at least Cindy does). So we were up early today and the fog was very light (and beautiful) at least for the first few miles. We came to a section of the river where a large fog bank was hanging just by the edge of the river and the channel seemed to go around a bend – but then we saw a sign saying “Danger – Dam Ahead”. We decided we better take a quick look at the chart and we were supposed to turn directly into that fog bank. Yikes. So we slowed down, used our horn and gradually made it to the dam (using the chart plotter to guide us in the right direction) where the fog cleared and we locked down about 30 more feet.
Travel conditions were amazing – calm water, sunny, warm and no boat traffic – we were cruising. Too good to be true I guess. I heated up some leftover pulled pork for sandwiches and noticed a little water by the Porta-Potty. I just thought it had leaked a little after Cindy used it and thought nothing of it. Well, after eating a great lunch, Cindy looked down the companionway and noticed lots of water in the salon – sloshing over the floor boards. At first, I just thought the water storage tank on the Porta-Potty had drained out and flooded the floor but then it became obvious that there was too much water. We were sinking.
I pulled the cooler out of the way to access the tiny little bilge on Aurora – you can’t really call it a bilge. Its an access hole about 10” square to the bottom of the boat 2” below. A little water can make a big splash. After bailing many gallons of water out as Cindy continued to drive toward the marina 18 miles away, I finally got ahead of the water and felt like I could keep up. I rigged up a small bilge pump I had brought with (I had to find a hose and a plug and cobble something together since Aurora is usually a bone dry boat) and pumped out most of the water and the “leak” seemed to slow considerably. The crisis was over but we still thought this was going to be an expensive problem – just lifting the boat could cost $300 and who knows what we might find.
Luckily, we got all the water out by the time we got to the marina and the water was not coming in anymore. We unloaded some weight – especially the new-found anchor and chain and some other heavy items and I tightened a couple bolts holding the center board pivot on and we held our breath all night and hoped for the best. Well, I reached my hand down in the morning and the floor was dry so that was a good thing. And, surprisingly, the bilge was still bone dry like last night. Now we have a real mystery.
Well, we think we figured out what happened. We have been getting about a gallon or two of water a day that we though might be condensation on the hull and maybe a minor leak. Well, we should have thought about it more. What we think happened was the added weight of the anchor and chain and me sitting up on deck working on the rigging caused a lot of water to be driven up over the inner centerboard trunk and to flow into the bilge. There is an opening for the rope used to pull the centerboard up so the added weight combined with the low water line of our little boat could cause a steady flow of water. We hope. I guess nothing is truly free.
Other than that little excitement, the Demopolis Marina is a very nice place to stay – especially the new section – and we are going to take a “rest” day tomorrow to get ready for a long really remote section of the trip between here and the ocean. Wow. What a great day to be on the water (and not under it).
