Salty enough?

Because you readers are typically far more intelligent than me, you might ask, “Who is going to captain this big adventure? Are any of you experienced boaters?” And I would answer with great hubris, “No, but there are going to be four pilots on board, so we’ll be fine.” My brother and his lovely girlfriend are both flight instructors, my mother is taking flying lessons, and I have plenty of piloting experience. Surely a little boat could not be too much of a challenge for us. Aren’t they kind of the same? Boat captain/airplane captain?

On the morning of our boat day, I checked, not the marine forecast, mind you, but the terminal aerodrome forecast, which showed showers in the area and moderate wind. The radar also indicated storms, but it looked like they were staying several miles offshore. In an airplane, you stay 20 miles from any severe storm, but in a boat, what are the rules? If the water or the boat gets struck by lightning, what happens? These were the questions we discussed over coffee that morning.

When I expressed my concerns to Captain Dave, who was renting us the boat, he replied, “I’ve been boating these waters for 40 years and never once been struck by lightning. You’ll be fine.” I accepted those keys without another question. In airplanes, I shy away from giving weather advice because my comfort level with gusty winds or low ceilings is going to be different than a 100-hour pilot’s. So, then why would I accept this explanation from the hardened sea captain? Because he was telling me the words I wanted to hear, of course, and I didn’t want our day of fun to be canceled.

When I expressed my concerns to Captain Dave, who was renting us the boat, he replied, “I’ve been boating these waters for 40 years and never once been struck by lightning. You’ll be fine.”So, we loaded up the kids and coolers and struck out 10 miles across the bay for St. Vincent. We couldn’t travel at top speed because the water was choppy, so we bounced along slowly as my husband, who struggles with motion sickness, white-knuckled the side railing and the rest of us tried to ignore the ominous gray clouds in the distance. After a long, and I mean long, bumpy ride out to the island, we finally made it. My son immediately jumped out and caught a 17-inch redfish. We found shells as big as our hands and marveled at the beauty of the unspoiled beach for about 15 minutes before those dark clouds moved too close to ignore.

We decided to walk inland for a few minutes to get off the beach and let the storm pass. But a marshy Florida island in the middle of summer meant attack of the killer mosquitoes as soon as we stepped into those trees. So, we got back in the boat to make a straight line across the bay for the marina. As those pesky showers followed us across the barrier island, we kept shifting our course closer and closer to the inner coastline. Around the point that we were soaking wet from both light rain and the spray of the chop around us, a cell moved in front of our path, narrowing our options further. Couldn’t go back or forward, so we made a 90-degree left turn toward the shoreline and looked for a place to beach the boat. Not ideal, but neither was sitting out in the water as the storm rolled over us. By some small miracle, an actual boat dock appeared in front of us. We had no idea who it belonged to, but we parked there anyway and dragged our soaking wet bodies up the steps to sit under the refuge of their porch.

When I look back on that day, I wonder why it is that someone who is such a cautious decision maker in the airplane could end up doing something so silly in a boat with her family on board. I exhibited every single one of the hazardous attitudes that day, except for maybe resignation. Maybe I’m just so well-versed in the aviation world that I know specifically what to avoid. That day, I gained a new respect for the boating world as well. Just because I’m an airplane pilot does not make me an expert on anything else.

Later, when Captain Dave asked how our day went, I told him about the disaster, how none of us had fun, but that my husband and children were actually scared for their lives when they saw my hair standing up from the static electricity. He answered with a lazy smile, “Naw, they’re just not quite salty enough yet.”

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