... now... unto this point, I had "assumed" I was with a group of "competent" seamen... but some of the "situations" that had already arisen had me starting to wonder...
... Having already assessed the boat, I knew(worst case scenario mind you) "I" could defenitely make it back to shore if push came to shove lol...(strange how survival instinct makes one think...
)....
The "captain" already had me on edge... coming out of the harbor, he had almost taken out a dock on the way out... and just seemed a tad "nervous" behind the helm to say the least... but... being "his" ship(and me being a complete stranger to him and guest), I sat back, kept my mouth shut, and just watched... saying nothing... as he(along with his friends) was quite cocky... and keen to "appear" as though he knew what he was doing... so I allowed them to pretend for a while... lol
.... back to 4pm/wind starting to blow...
Now, here was my one big mistake on this trip... I pride myself on being ever aware of the situations that I get myself into... I do not care to trust anyone with my wellbeing if you know what I mean... This time, however, I had neglected to look at the 3-day weather forecast... assuming....(never assume kids)... that the "captain" would have thought to do so, before green lighting the trip...
.... I assumed wrong....
.... Had I looked at the 3-day, I would have seen that an early, STRONG, back-door front was carreening towards us from EAST TEXAS LOL.... carrying with it, gale force winds before, and after it.... along with high seas potentially capable of putting our vessel in a bad way...
The sun was starting to get low in the sky that afternoon... Having come up to dump fish, I noticed the increase in seas as I climbed aboard... one look at the sky, and I knew it was about to get ugly... At this point, the seas had built to probably 2-3' in the matter of a half hour... and the wind was cranking out of the east at about 20knts.... so I knew it was only gonna get worse... Got our last diver in the boat and came to a decision it was time to batton down the hatches and haul ass back to shore... into the ever increasing white caps now throwing spray over the bow... This was not gonna be a pretty ride home at 10 knts for 6 hours...
.... about an hour into it, it had finally become pitch dark... driving rain, we slowly pounded into the now 6-9 footers, occasionally taking one over the bow and cockpit... with that un-nerving sound of heavy water crashing onto the rear deck... the wind had now increased to 30knts +.... it was getting real, real quick...
