Still a student, I bought my sailboat
One Sunday evening, at the CVTG sailing club (Club de Voile du Tarn-et-Garonne) in Saint-Nicolas-de-la-Grave, I was getting in my car to go home to Toulouse. The president of the club tells me that a First 18 is for sale. Its owner wants to let it to a club member for a cheap price. This one could not sail anymore for health reasons. I myself had been a member of the club for only 2 months.
To find out more, I met the owner who lent me the keys to the boat so that I could judge for myself the condition of the hull and its fittings and thus make a decision on the purchase. I was a student at the time and I was afraid that the boat would need expensive repairs.
Discovery of my sailboat in a magical atmosphere
On Friday morning, November 17, 2017, I boarded "Titanic" (that was its name) for the first time. That day, the Garonne was covered with a veil of mist. I borrowed a dinghy from the CVTG club and rowed around looking for the boat. It finally appeared in the middle of the fog. It was a magical atmosphere! I boarded the boat, I looked at its fittings (mast, shrouds, cap shrouds, forestay, backstay, winchseuros). All the cables seem to be in good condition. The mast is holding well and the 2 winches are running smoothly. I open the companionway, I go inside, the smell of moisture and mould is hardly bearable, but it doesn't matter. I immediately see the mainsheet hoist and the 3 sails that will turn out to be in good condition (mainsail, genoa and jib). I immediately have the irrepressible urge to hoist the sails. I slip the mainsail foot in the boom track, the luff in the mast track, and I hoist the mainsail! I was amazed, like a child.
I didn't cast off that day, the boat wasn't mine yet, but I immediately fell in love with this boat which seemed very easy to handle. I quickly called the owner to confirm that I was buying his boat.
On Sunday, December 3, 2017 (the day before my birthday, I was turning 26 at the time), I met with him a second time and completed the purchase with him. Everything happened like a dream. It was an unforgettable birthday!
Given its name "Titanic", I found it urgent to rename it. At the time of registering it at the Maritime Affairs, I preferred to rename it "Enbarr". In Irish, this means "mane of foam", the name of a mythological horse that had the power to gallop over water.
Four years of unforgettable sailing
originally, I joined the CVTG looking to sail from Toulouse where I live. The club is dynamic with dinghies and keelboats. We race there, but the club also organizes events like the Nautical Festival or the Night Raid. In this case, we cast off in the evening to sail on the water while enjoying the sunset and the beginning of the night. We return to the port around 11 pm with the navigation lights and the headlamp. The night is spent on board the houseboats.
This night raid is followed the next day by a day of navigation towards the Natura 2000 ornithological zone, 1.5 km upstream from the port. We had to avoid the muddy shoals of the Garonne, but we managed to do so thanks to our depth sounder and our knowledge of the location of the river bed. A picnic follows on the bank of the Garonne. On the water level of Saint-Nicolas, the navigation is easy provided that we take into account the current. This one can be quite strong sometimes.
The keelboats remain at anchor
During the winter, keelboats without trailers can stay at anchor. Indeed, the club only offers the service of a slipway, but no crane. So you have to be able to immerse your trailer completely in order to put your boat on it. In my case, I don't have a trailer, so the question doesn't arise. Moreover, the "old-timers" tell me that winter at anchor is not a problem. To reassure me, I see that other owners also make this choice and leave their sailboat moored at the buoy. To be safe, I put three moorings in the ring.
The SMS with the bad news
One evening in February 2021, I received a text message from the club's president accompanied by shocking images: they showed my sailboat blocked at the Malause dam, just near one of the valves. The latter had been closed to prevent the boat from tipping downstream. How could this happen?
Apparently, the 9 mm chain of the mooring body broke just during the receding of the Garonne in February 2021 (probably because of a drifting tree trunk that got in the way) and my boat drifted away dragging the buoy (the ballast of the mooring body probably remained at the bottom). Without being braked, it ended up one or two hours later at the Malause dam which closes the water. I was warned when the boat was already blocked at the dam.
I understood that it was time to say goodbye to my boat
Early the next day, after a sleepless night, I went to the site to see what kind of shape my sailboat was in. I was able to call the person in charge of the dam. He told me that there was nothing more to be done, that he would have to open the dam and let the boat fall into the void. He did not allow me to secure the boat, nor to go down with a harness to try to recover the sails and the fittings which were inside (the First was blocked near a ladder on the structure which would have allowed me to descend easily).
I looked at my boat one last time, understanding that it was time to say goodbye, that I would never see it again.
It was during the night that the dam gate was opened. The sailboat tipped downstream of the dam, broke up and the pieces sank immediately. Downstream of the dam, not a single trace of the boat will remain, all the pieces of the boat have been swallowed by the river.
No need for insurance
I bought this First 18 very cheap: only 450 euros. This 40 years old sailboat was insured with a third party insurance (because of the obsolescence allowance, it was not interesting to insure it all risks). As no damage to a third party was declared following the drift of the boat (it obviously did not hit any other boat) and as the person in charge of the dam confirmed to me that the boat had not caused any damage to the structure, I did not ask anything to the insurance. I sadly declared it destroyed and did the same with the Maritime Affairs.
The lessons of the shipwreck
I spent a painful weekend. I asked myself a lot of questions: why did this happen to my boat and not to the other boats moored like mine to their mooring? Why didn't any witness call the fire department during its drift?
And then finally, I came to simply learn this lesson: always have a way to get your boat out of the water so you can get it to safety in case of a severe weather event. My mistake was not investing in a trailer for this keelboat, and relying too much on the mooring to which my boat was tied.
Even before I bought it in 2017, it had been sitting in the morgue for several years, like many other boats in the area. I mistakenly thought it was safe there.
Club policy changes now
The sailing club also learned a lesson. Since this mishap, the rules of procedure have been modified: from now on, as the flood season approaches (winter and spring), the owners of keelboats moored on the Saint-Nicolas-de-la-Grave waterway are obliged to take their boats out of the water, or to put them in a sheltered place on the Canal Latéral à Moissac (by going up the Tarn and passing the locks that connect it to the Garonne).
The loss of my boat will have served a purpose. Rather than remain sad, I preferred to focus on all the good memories I had sailing on this boat. But I know what it's like to lose your boat and I wish a lot of courage to all those who are going through such a misfortune.
