Runaway Sailboat Gets Tow from Paddleboarding Rescue Swimmers
We’ve heard of boats towing paddleboards and other floating toys, but paddleboards towing a boat? That’s a new, but true, story. When Latitude 38 reader John Canfield heard “a BIG chopper” fly over his house a little after 8 a.m. last Thursday, he saw it was the Coast Guard heading toward the township of Mendocino. “[I]t circled Mendocino Bay numerous times before heading home passing over our house,” John recounts. But the most interesting part of the story occurred in the afternoon …
Later that day, as he was heading to town, John spotted a mast out in the bay and several State Park vehicles at the waterfront end of Main Street. “So I did a bit of inquiring and got the scoop,” he continues. “One aboard and OK, but ended up on the beach overnight (one of the very few soft landing spots in the area) and floated off with the afternoon tide.”
The most unusual part of John’s day came next, when he observed four State Park rescue swimmers, on boards, “all in a line,” towing the sailboat toward Portuguese Beach “so it wouldn’t run up onto Big River beach beyond.”
John adds, “A different State Park fellow told me that the Coasties at Noyo Harbor were going to come tow him to safety out of the kindness in their hearts. But many questions remain — sailing the North Coast without a backup anchor; or a running engine; or an outboard to go with the upside-down dinghy on the bow? Inquiring minds want to know …”
John also attached a link to a story about the boat in the local online publication Redheaded Blackbelt. “Locals and tourists alike were surprised to find a sailboat named the ‘Not Sure’ washed ashore on one of the Mendocino Coast’s most iconic beaches this morning,” the article began. “The vessel was discovered on the sands of Portuguese Beach, part of Mendocino Headlands State Park.”
According to Redheaded Blackbelt, park rangers believe the boat “washed ashore after it slipped off its anchor and drifted onto the sands of southern Portuguese Beach.”
Three of us were sailing an Albin Vega 27 around SF Bay one evening in December when the wind died and the engine crapped out. One of the owners got the idea to drop the dinghy in the water and tow the boat to the dock at Angel Island. It would have looked pretty weird to someone on another boat, except there was no one else near us.