Two active-duty warships on the Norfolk waterfront. (Photo by John Griswold)
Things can go swimmingly for so long that they seem to be proof you will make it. Success by sunk cost! Then, smack in the middle of a shouted discussion about politics, alcoholism, and past lovers, you run aground at full speed off some unnamed headland.
Is that not always the way?
Chris and I left the marina in Belhaven, North Carolina, the next morning at dawn. Castaway seemed fine after her soft grounding. The Intracoastal Waterway headed east then north and cut off the need to re-enter the Pamlico Sound, and it was a luminous morning on the canal. The only incident was Castaway’s light prop-strike against something on the bottom of the channel as we passed a cruiser named Retriever, which we would encounter again. Still, there seemed to be no vibration to indicate a bent prop, and the rudders worked.
In the Alligator River we took on fuel at a dock attached to a gas station. The diesel pumps were suspiciously slow, and Castaway’s two tanks each hold 300 gallons. I had time to walk over to the mini-mart and buy a cheeseburger actually cooked to order on a grill, a ham and cheese sandwich made in front of me, and all the yum-yums that marina ship’s stores often do not sell: Pringles, Dot’s pretzels, Bold Chex Mix, Chili Cheese Fritos, Twizzlers, king-sized Snickers, Zero bars, etc. It was a watery road trip, after all, and one had to stay topped-up.
By the time we entered Albemarle Sound, it was obvious something was wrong with the boat. It would not go fast enough to get up on plane, but there seemed to be no reason for it. Or was that a new vibration?
We went along at twelve miles per hour, next stop Norfolk, many hours away, until Chris could not take it any longer and docked at a marina in Coinjock, intent on inspecting the boat’s props, rudders, and trim tabs himself, using scuba gear he had on board. He was fueled by do-it-yourself rage.
Forty years ago ship’s husbandry was some of our business, but when he said he was still using his old army regulator, I did not love that. The buoyancy compensator over his wetsuit was an octopus of gauges, ports, and Velcro flaps that we both struggled with, getting him dressed. He rolled into the water between the swim platform and some barnacled pilings. I tended him with a rope as he dove under the boat in the current. When I looked down at my feet I saw he had left his dive knife on the deck, so he would be unable to free himself from fishing line or a net. I thought about the bowline I had tied, and a story he had told about a body being found in the water after suicide.
He surfaced, said he had been swept off-balance and gotten disoriented, but he believed he had his answer: There was nothing wrong with the props or rudders. The visibility in the river was zero, so he had only been able to feel around and could not be sure.
It was a long but pleasant day at the slower speed. We ran up Coinjock Bay, Currituck Sound, and the North Landing River into Virginia, stopping to let Chris’ friend Brad, who had been on his steering committee for a recent political run, step off a dock onto the fantail. We ran for a while and were lifted by the Corps of Engineers’ Great Bridge Lock into the Elizabeth River.
The southern end of the river marks the start of the fascinating and vital military-industrial complex that is Chesapeake, Norfolk, Hampton, Newport News, and Yorktown Virginia. F-22 Raptors passed overhead, and we passed aircraft carriers, well-armed Navy Police patrol boats, tugs, shipyards, container terminals, wharfs, and drawbridges. A hellish red sunset lit it all from the west, and lights came on everywhere else.
Chris continued to worry about why the boat would not come up on plane. He was willing to have her pulled from the water for inspection, but that could not happen before Monday, and we could not know how long she would need service. He had begun to suspect the fuel—either contaminated fuel at the last slow fill-up, or that the dregs at the bottoms of the tanks were stirred up in the grounding or the prop strike and had clogged the filters. But maybe it was the props. Or electrical.
We tied up for what would be the weekend, at the marina at Norfolk’s Waterside District. What is there to love in boats and ships, all you lubbers? Among other things, they show us our forms of drivenness. Castaway was surrounded by a sailing ship taking tourists on booze cruises, yachts, sailboats, a “Trump boat” owned by Louisiana Republicans, a paddlewheel ferry, two enormous active-duty warships, and a few blocks away, the battleship USS Wisconsin, permanently moored next to a discovery center and a Navy museum. The 40-meter superyacht Driller lay in the next large slip, reflecting the evening light so well we could almost see ourselves in her shining hull.
