The holiday is going a little different than planned. We thought we could go for about three weeks together with the Indian Summer and the No Doubt. But now we are already two days in Dunkirk on the shore for a makeshift repair of a large hole in the hull and all we have to do is break off the holiday and go back to Bruinisse as soon as possible for a good repair. What happened?

We will sail from Cadzand to Guernsey in the first night at sea on a very poorly lit weather buoy along the French coast which is not on the map and is in the middle of the channel. Visible on the radar but not on in normal circumstances. We sailed an entire Atlantic Ocean... A head-on collision was the result. This causes a large hole in the hull, partly below the waterline and the first compartment is completely submerged. Luckily the No Doubt is close by and a little later the Indian Summer as well. Because of this we soon know that there is no danger for our own lives, but what about the boat? Do we keep it afloat and do we get the SeaQuest a bit damage free on land?

First we stuff the holes at the top of the waterproof shot by Eline's bed full of towels. Because that's where the water runs through. That helps a bit. Sailing ahead is not an option at all. The water would then run over the first shot, which would probably lead to the loss of the boat. Sailing backwards at a slow pace seems to work. Then the water would regularly run from the first shot into the bilge and we could eliminate that with the hand pump every time. But as soon as the boat is going back and forth or we are sailing a little faster, the water fills up over the waterproof bulkhead in Eline's bedroom, and we don't get that cleared away properly.

We call the Coast Guard for emergency assistance for the first time in our sailing lives. They accompany us to Dunkirk and come with two men on board to help pumping. This is really heavy and after an hour Mira and the girls are really tired. Toine steers the boat backwards to the harbour and that is not really easy at sea. Three hours later we are finally in the marina. It is then 5 o'clock in the morning.

The boat leans forward too much to get the water out of the front part. With the combined forces of the Indian Summer and the No Doubt we move the weight (like the anchor and the chain) backwards and then the hole fortunately rises above the waterline. Now the rescue service can pump all the water out of the boat with a large electric pump. We are now on the shore and the hole will be repaired provisionally in three days. The shipyard here is helping us well and they are working very hard!

So the 'holiday' consists mainly of arranging for the boat to be made good. Luckily everything is insured and our insurer Interpolis helps us super!

In addition, it is therapeutically very good to spend three days in Dunkirk on and around the boat to deal with this rather traumatic experience with our family. We talk a lot, analyse what happened and what we can learn from it. We also think about possible construction improvements, such as placing the automatic emergency bilge pump lower in the bilge so that it can be used earlier instead of the hand pump, and closing holes in the advance for electricity pipes so that no water can enter through here. In addition, there are plenty of cleaning jobs and washing with dirty towels to turn. That keeps us busy these days.

Looking back on everything, the main thought remains... tremendously frightened to experience such a collision. And also had a lot of luck with such a decent boat and calm weather. Things could have turned out very differently with the boat and we were close to that. But it is also an experience from which we learn a lot, which we as a family have endured well, with clear thinking without panicking, and we are really proud of that! All in all we learned a lot ....