Erik Eisele: Untethered

I landed on Wednesday. I met Dave, a 58-year-old accountant, at a marina in Charleston, S.C. Dave had a 33-foot sailboat he was looking to sail to Jacksonville, Fla. The boat’s name was Untethered. The distance was roughly 200 miles. He’d mostly sailed in bays and protected waterways; this trip was to be his first in offshore waters.

Dave found his volunteer crew — me and a 70-year-old retired Navy officer named Rob — online. After a flurry of emails I bought a plane ticket. We had a four-day window, and the forecast called for headwinds that after 12 or so hours would shift to tailwinds. It was promising, just what we wanted. We prepped and stocked the boat on Thursday, and early Friday we unhooked from the dock. We left Charleston Harbor under diesel power hemmed in by container ships. Rock jetties protect the channel from ocean swell, but a stiff wind was blowing. Dave and I were excited, but Rob, the most experienced of us, had a word of caution.