Day 51
As I stated above, there were no winds in our Shell Mound anchorage when we went to bed on Halloween night, and Steve had been previously insured by multiple, agreeing forecasts that winds all that night and through the next day would be light and variable at the most. Armed with that knowledge, we felt comfortable dropping anchor in a wide, open area with no wind protection. That’s why we were both jolted from our sleep and scared out of our wits when Steve’s GPS-based anchor alarm started blaring loudly about 11:30 pm! Steve bolted out of bed to check the wind anemometer reading to find 12 knots sustained winds blowing! As we watched, the winds increased to 16 knots and we could hear it howling outside. Because we were in such an open area, that wind was literally spinning Legacy around and around on her anchor. When we looked outside at surrounding lights on the shore, we saw them flying by at an alarming rate. Steve felt certain the anchor was set and holding well, so he eventually came back to bed and we went back to sleep. The anchor alarm stayed silent, so I slept up until 4:30 am when I awoke with what felt like severe bed-spins. We have a clock that reflects the time up onto the ceiling over our heads in big, red numerals. When I opened my eyes to “stop” the bed-spins, they did not stop! I squeezed my eyes shut and opened them again only to see those large, red digits continue to spin by in front of me over and over, which really scared me. For some goofy reason, I thought if I put on my glasses it would help. But the vertigo was so bad I couldn’t sit up enough to reach for them on the nightstand. I started to panic then, fearing if this vertigo didn’t stop, I would be worthless, considering I could neither see nor establish any sense of balance! In addition, we were in the middle of BFE Tennessee out in a lake. How would Steve get me to a hospital? He would somehow have to get the dinghy down all by himself, and how could I possible board or stay upright in that dinghy, even if he did manage to get it into the water? If by some miracle we did get to shore in the dinghy, we had no vehicle to get me to the ER! We’d have to call 911 and wait for an ambulance to somehow find us all the way out in the boondocks. I kept thinking maybe I was dreaming, so I slapped myself in the face a couple of times to wake-up, but the relentless spinning continued. I considered waking Steve, but realized there was really nothing he could do, so I tried to go back to sleep. Finally, when the clock on the ceiling read 5:00 am, the vertigo mercifully ceased. By that time, Steve was awake again, too, and when I told him about the vertigo episode, he said he wasn’t a bit surprised, considering the high-speed spinning my poor brain and inner ear had endured all night long.
We had a windy but beautiful travel day from Shell Mound anchorage to Alred Marina, arriving at 2:30 pm, which gave me just enough time to run up to the marina and grab the courtesy car keys before they closed at 3:00 pm. After getting settled in and showered we took the car into Guntersville for dinner at Top O’ The River, which turned out to be underwhelming, even though it had decent reviews online.
Position: N 34° 23.740, W 86° 16.767
Distance traveled: 59.7 NM
Total distance traveled: 871.6 NM
Time underway: 6 HRS 1 MIN
Total time underway: 107 HRS 10 MIN
Total marina nights: 40
Total nights at anchor: 11
Locks today: 1
Locks Total: 12