Beeped

After radiotherapy (a fair old whack, judging by the noises and wheezes coming from the machine), I spent a pleasant afternoon working on the Caribe, trying to reconstruct the anchor winch. Then, as sometimes happens in Antibes, somebody stopped by and offered a pointu, with motor, for nothing. We told the guy to bring it to the lifeboat station.

Lulu and I went there to help moor the boat. As we were tying up, the lifeboat pagers went off. So we abandoned the boat and went into 'shout' routine. Off into the increasing gloom, some ten nautical miles off Nice, to tow back a large motor yacht which had lost all power, both engines and generator. Took some finding, as there are a lot of radar echoes, what with the port traffic, the aircraft flying low, and the ferries.

Still, we found her, finally, dead in the water and rolling quite violently beam on to the swell. This was the first time I had to cast a heaving line for real. Ticklish, given the movement of the two boats in three dimensions. A matter of timing as well as aim. I was very relieved that it was spot on, first pass. Lolo1's patient instruction paid off, evidently.

The trip back was long and boring, as usual, as we were much reduced in speed (7kts instead of 25kts). The deck crew, apart from the deputy cox, steering, was effectively two grandfathers: the third grandpops was keeping radar/radio watch. We managed OK, despite a combined age well in excess of the limits set down in the SNSM regulations.

Took some photos the next morning: they had run out of fuel, but not of Spanish beer (click on the photo of the stern, and look at the ladder).

Makes you forget the hum and whine of the X-ray machines...