Most people look forward to Friday afternoon...not this one.

After the on and off deluges of rain, I was finally able to hoist a couple of sails and tack back and forth inside the ICW. As I made my way along and the day dragged on I dodged traffic while zig-zagging down the ditch trying to make up some time by sailing faster than just driving straight with no sails. As I started passing the bombing range (Camp Lejuene I think?) a guy in a powerboat was approaching me from the other direction. Once again, I was being polite... and we saw how that worked out with the generator the night before. As I waited for him to pass and not tack across the creek i front of him I inadvertently bumped into some shallow water. Not a big problem, just put it in reverse and back off gently. This boat allows the engine mount to rise up as it is in reverse. Unfortunately his wake was rocking my boat as the engine was in reverse and somehow the engine mounts slipped and the engine started to slip down into te water as I was adjusting the sails to maneuver off of the sand. I jumped to the back of the boat, shut off the engine, and grabbed a line and with on hand held on to the engine and slid the line around the lift handle with the other as is started to sink. I grabbed the other end of the line frantically and hoisted the engine back up. Once the engine was above water I moved forward and adjusted the sails and sailed off of the sandbar. Holy Yikes at this point but lucky for me I deal with pressure well. I sailed downstream and put all of the sails away and pulled out the jib (the front sail) so I would have some steerage. I made it down to a channel that went out to the ocean and tried to set the anchor so I would be holed up near that entrance in case I had to sail into the ocean the next day. The anchor didn't hold so I moved further down the creek and did a soft landing on the mudflat. I threw out the anchor and went to work immediately on getting the engine and mount back in place (and secured them from future movement). I then removed the spark plugs and turned the engine over by hand to get the water out of the pistons. I sprayed the engine and carb with carb cleaner and got the engine to start. WHEW! Next I put the dinghy in the water and went about setting the anchors. Remember it is getting dark by this time. To add to the fiasco, after setting the anchor with the dinghy I pulled up to the side of the boat and revved the dinghy motor to push on the side of the boat. The motor started to rip the transom off the dinghy. It turned out that the wood had rotted inside during storage but wasn't visible. That was enough excitement for the night so I opened the hatches for a breeze and went to sleep.