Fog, and the luck of the Irish

May 15, 1976, Saturday. I know the date exactly because it was the weekend before my wedding, Christine, my wife of now (do the math) years, was in tears most of the day because she knew we were all going to die and all her plans for the coming festivities would come to nothing. I was never really worried about dying, but the day had a sense of the strange about it that I can still feel these many years later. This story is a testament to the power of her prayers or some kind of uncanny luck which really happened to me but really belongs in Ripley's.

The plan was to bring the Andrea, a 39 foot long racing sloop, down to Chicago from her winter storage at the Palmer Johnson yard in Racine, Wisconsin. We drove up early, very early in the morning. Bob the Owner was aboard with Andy his wife and I think Duncan was the other seasoned crew member along with my father, who had been sailing with Bob for years. Chris came because they wanted a strong back, (mine), and in those days I didn’t go anywhere without her. (I admit that its still pretty rare to find us apart if we can help it). We quickly got down to rigging the boat for the trip and not wanting to waste travel time we shoved off and started south without completing a check of all navigational instuments. There was no Loran on board and satellite nav had not yet been invented. Racine to Chicago is some 70 miles which would take all day under the best of conditions. The day was cool but with a light breeze from the SW and fog on the lake.

We didn’t even take the time to swing (or calibrate) the compass, but the depth finder was operational and no one was terribly concerned about a little early morning fog in our home water so we set off. We were initially in company with Condor, a 41 footer and friendly competitor, but we quickly lost them in the mist as it closed over us. We proceeded Easterly into the lake until the depth finder showed 39 feet which we arbitrarily picked as a familiar number (same as the boat's length)and then turned South, unpacking the gear from winter storage and setting up the running rigging as we went. There was a nice breeze so we set the main and no.1 Genoa. The boat leaned into her work and we were off, doing 7 knots in eerie silence, in a Lake Michigan no more than 60 feet across, to look at it.

Hours went by without change. The offshore wind raised no waves to speak of. No sensory input of any kind but the rushing water past the bows. No sky but the misty blanket that surrounded and covered us. We called Condor a couple of times on the radio and they were in the same soup. So we continued south. As mid afternoon approached we were all getting a little skittish with no good idea how far we had come. The dead reckoning of elapsed time, times the speed along the suspect compass course gave us a clue, but we wanted to know. Poor Chris was on the foredeck peering into the mist sure that we would hit something or something would hit us and that would be it. No wedding. I tried to comfort her but she wasn’t buying it, with everyone on board hiding some concern. Someone made the suggestion that perhaps if we took a peek inshore the fog would lift and we might get a glimpse of something we could recognize. This is a pretty odd thought in retrospect but maybe you had to be there as all agreed it was about time for some kind of change of scene. Condor was not answering the radio.

We dropped the sails and very cautiously headed West under engine power. I was steering and Duncan was posted at the depth gauge reading out the numbers as the bottom came up to meet us. Tension was high and things were real quiet. Still no waves to speak of, no danger of pounding surf. A gentle offshore breeze to take us out of trouble. Still could see more with my eyes shut than open. Then something was wrong. I called out to the skipper that something had changed but I didn’t know what but I knew I didn’t like it. Bob told me to put the wheel over and I did. We spun around on a dime and headed back out into the lake the way we had come. Suddenly a dark shadowed mass appeared very, very close, about 2 o’clock high and off the starboard bow.

An instant of sharp fear was followed by relief when the object did not move, and we were still afloat and steering. The steel skeleton of a breakwater light resolved out of the white gloom. Consulting the Great Lakes Pilot and crew memory confirmed that we were looking at the terminus of the South breakwater at the entrance to Great Lakes Naval Training Station. We never saw the North end or its light. All unknowing we had motored into, turned around inside of and were on our way back out of the Training Station harbor. I know that this is not really possible but it did happen, and to me, I was steering at the time. Condor was not so lucky. Who could be? Obeying the same instinct we had, she also turned West to look for land and piled herself onto a seawall. No one was hurt but they spent that whole of that next season in repairs back up at Palmer Johnson.

Our adventure was not quite over though. Much chastened, we continued to feel our way South until we reached a point in the lake opposite the city where the depth demarcations are far less clear. The Lake bottom kind of flattens out. Once again we slowly turned to the West. The wind had dropped and we were moving though a glassy calm still wrapped in cotton. Again I was steering, now in the dark and fog when the hair stood up on my neck and a glow materialized again about 2 o’clock high off the starboard bow. Same place but this time a light! It resolved into a streetlight, what was a streetlight doing out in the middle of the lake? Then more clearly it was a Chicago streetlight on the end of one of the municipal piers. We heard voices and called out to them asking where they were. They laughingly let us know they were on a pier. We asked which pier and they replied “This pier”. By then we had smelled the pungent odor of burning herbs and knew we were not going to get much more out of these particular sirens. We thanked them and moved on, feeling our way along the seawall like a blind man holding a railing and eventually into a secure berth near the Columbia Yacht Club downtown late, very late that night.
Chris and I got married the next weekend and for the most part have lived happily ever after. Do draw your own conclusions, but Chris admits she was praying very hard most of the day. I think she has some pull with someone up there.