Calamity Averted with Teamwork

The wind had calmed, the sky was blue, and it seemed like the perfect day for a snorkel. My Captain checked the charts, and it looked like there was a reef not far from where we are anchored in Red Shanks. So donning our wet suits, we hopped into the dinghy and took off.

We found the reef, anchored the dinghy and had a nice snorkel – though the fish were sparce and the coral mediocre. Ah well, it was lovely to be in the water (85 degrees today).

When we got back to the boat, we discovered that our little swim ladder wasn’t attached properly, and was low enough that we couldn’t see over the pontoon. So we peeled off our gear – flippers, swim belt, snorkels and masks, and threw them overhead into the dinghy, in order to climb the ladder, without seeing what we were doing. To our shock, several pieces landed outside of the dink into the water, and began to float away. We didn’t know if they would sink – so Jeff dropped the weight belt he was wearing (which sank to the bottom immediately), and dove back into the water to chase our missing gear. He managed to capture one flipper, but couldn’t swim back with more, so he thrashed his way back to the boat, with difficulty, while I threw him lines and a life jacket. He finally got back exhausted, as I started up the engine and we went after the rest of the gear, which fortunately was still floating (except for the belt). I aimed the boat, and Jeff hung over the bow and picked up the missing pieces. Then we dashed back to where Jeff thought he dropped the belt – “there it is”, I said spotting something dark at the bottom, in about 8 feet of water. Immediately Jeff dove overboard and rescued the missing belt – whew, all was recovered!

This was our treasured snorkel gear – we’d spent years collecting just the right equipment. It would have been a calamity to lose it – averted by good teamwork, followed by a very welcome cup of tea!

PS – no pics – my camera has bitten the salt. I’ll figure out how to get the pics on my cell phone onto the computer soon.