Beach landing - American Style

Four Americans were booked in to visit the island last Wednesday, but little did we know how difficult a day it was going to be. We prepared the island as usual for a Wednesday and ensured that all paths were raked and tidy. It was a mammoth task with just 4 of us and it literally took us all 2 hours of raking each. Just time for breakfast before our visitors were to arrive we sat up on the beach crest for a rather large bowl of rice pudding and bananas. This has currently become our favourite breakfast, which had kinda developed on from porridge, but now oats are ‘all finished’. But we found it was a good way to start the day, cheap and reasonably healthy. This morning Melv was rather generous with the portions and looking back I'm glad he was. As we sat and ate, the self sail yacht was sailing its way towards us, taking advantage of the wind the mono hull was rolling in the choppy sea. Half way across it turned tail and dropped it's sail and for a moment we thought it had decided to alter it's course. Now looking back I kinda wished it had, but no, it proceeded to power towards us under engine.

We sat and watched it approach the mooring, towards to which it proceeded rather fast, however there were people up front with the hook and they managed to hook the leader rope, but the boat continued to move forwards. At this Melv shouted
‘He's going to drive over the mooring rope’,
‘Don't be alarmist he'll be ok.’ I replied – famous last words...

They seemed to moor up, however the boat lay at a peculiar angle and looked awkward in the water. But we just accepted this and continued with our usual routine, the visitors were brought ashore and I took them to the shop where we stood and chatted for a while, Regis then took them off on a tour and we all dispersed to do our thing.

Melv and I came back home to get changed out, I disappeared out the back to put dry clothes on and Melv put the kettle on. As I dried myself I heard a distant call from Melv, and thought hang on I'm not decent yet, he called again and seemed a little more anxious, I thought it must be some wildlife spectacle out to sea, I quickened at getting dressed. Melv often shouted to me 'quick, look' and my reply nowadays is usually 'I don't do quick'. But then from the top of his voice Melv hollered for me, this was urgent and I thought there had been an accident, as fast as I could I pulled my vest over my head and grab my phone, I ran out of the kitchen to see him running up the path out of breath, shouting:
‘The boat's off its mooring',
‘What! Never,’ I replied and ran to the beach crest. Sure enough the yacht had come loose and was now on the reef about 10ms off the shore, I felt sick, my god I thought, what the hell do we do.

Fortunately the guests were back and running down the beach with Regis, I ran to them and we stood and looked in complete horror, unable to believe what was happening. Then there was this awful sound as the waves pushed the boat further onto the reef, a grating noise and a banging, followed by the clacking of the ropes on the mast. There was a bit of headless chicken running going on from most of us - me included. Then Melv shouted call the boat hire company, the skipper said it is Moorings Mahe, I dashed to the office and found the number, completely out of breath I got through and explained the situation. We have been trying to develop our relayionshop with this company and as I spoke I thought thid really isn’t going to help, telling them that one of their £150K yachts was currently being washed up onto Aride’s beach right across the reef. Still they had to know and hopefully come out and recover it. I returned to the beach and the conclusion of the call was that they would send a representative out from Praslin to assist in the recovery and to deal with the situation, were his words.

So that was step one, but knowing how quickly the Seychellois don't respond the boat could be in ruins by then. Still currently very much in one piece, Regis, 1 of our rangers, proposed we used our anchors to hold it off the beach. It was high tide at 4.50pm and if we could hold it where it is we should gain enough water to free it. At first I resisted the idea and thought of insurance claims and negligence, but he convinced me that this was the right thing to do. I spoke to the skipper and explained our plans and he hold heartedly supported them. So we took to the water and managed to secure the two anchors in place, it was easier said than done, this large vessel crashing around in the water, with no guarantee which way it was to lie next and the footing was terrible, the rocks where it was washed up were extremely uneven and then of course the Aride waves were crashing in one after the other. But Regis and Melv persevered and did an excellent job.

Fortunately Regis persuaded 3 of the visitors to carry on with the tour and the skipper stayed with us and we gave him tea and chatted. Sitting up on the beach crest we could still see any progress and yet sat out what was now the burning sun. By midday there was still no sign of help on the horizon and the skipper phoned Moorings again. The voice on the other end of the phone reassured him a vessel was on its way and it was large enough to pull the yacht out, but of course this meant it was a little slower. By this time the yacht had started to swing round a little on the anchor ropes as it gained more water every so often. Before too long it was moving with the waves, facing into them, but swaying from side to side, indicating the tide was coming in, but was putting huge pressure on the keel of the boat. As it moved onto its right hand side the damaged side was there to be seen and much to my surprise there were no visible holes or gashes, apart from a few scratches it visually looked unscathed. With the keel stuck in the sand there was huge amount of pressure on it, but all we could do was wait and hope that the anchor ropes held. The securing the anchors was a very good move as they were now starting to take the tension and if it wasn't for them the boat would have been pretty much up on the beach by now and fully grounded, creating a lot more damage and a logistical nightmare to try and remove. Not to mention the high probability of fuel leakage and contamination.

Finally by 2pm, on the horizon we could see a large mono hull boat heading our way, once we could see it, it soon arrived and was on our mooring in no time, we launched the tornado and collected the rep, who was a very large Seychellois bloke with a neck like the size of my thigh and a handshake that was painful, he wasn't to be argued with. He took charge and there was soon an attempt to pull the yacht out was being executed. However for the first two attempts the rope broke and the yacht wasn't going anywhere. They the tried to pull the mast down to release the keel, but this was using our small rib and we had visions of the rib being catapulted into the air as the yacht swung upright again and of course there was risk of damaging our boat. The next plan was to attached a shorter rope and pull from a slightly different angle to take the yacht over the sandy channel that we daily bring our boat through. Also in our favour by then the tide was coming in and providing the yacht with more water. This time the large Seychellois man was in the driving seat and it was slowly does it. Taking the tension on the rope the large passenger boat tried to ease the yacht with it, then the rope released suddenly putting all the weight back on the anchor, then to our horror one of the anchor ropes snapped. It was going to be now or never for this to get moved or it really was going to end up on Aride's beach and possibility stay there for some time. Tension went back on the toe rope once more and slowly does it the passenger boat crept forward we all apprehensively watched the yacht trying to judge just the slightest movement. Then it did, it made it forward a few feet, the next big wave was going to be key, giving the boat more water. Thank goodness the driver got it right and she moved forward again, then again and then she was out on the open sea and floating. Gosh that was a nice sight - amazing, she looked good and it was difficult to see the evidence of her ordeal.

The relief was tremendous and we all cheered as it left the bottom, thank goodness, it was a float. There was a bit of tidying up to do, but before long the visitors were back on the board the passenger boat and them were all heading towards Praslin towing the damaged yacht. Once up the beach and in the shade we gathered round the boatshed and heaved a huge sigh of relief. We were all exhausted, both mentally and physically and scorched from the hot sun. The skipper and I had exchanged addresses, much like you do after a car accident, so now I expect it will be the battle of the insurance companies. We recovered the mooring rope and were all of the opinion it had been cut, but was it his propeller, we will never know for sure, but thank goodness we had had 3 divers to check the moorings just 2 weeks previous.