Cockpit Confessions: For Lack of a Serpentine Belt

Last summer, on a beautiful Saturday afternoon, my husband, David, and I headed out on our 30-foot Monterey across Chesapeake Bay. Our destination was Tolchester Marina in Chestertown, Maryland, to meet up with our daughter, son-in-law, and some of their friends for an afternoon at the Shanty Beach Bar for some relaxation and good music.

The Tolchester Marina entrance has a rock-lined jetty. About 400 feet into the jetty, I was on the bow readying lines for docking when I heard David struggling at the helm using a few choice words.

“What’s going on?” I shouted.

“We just lost our steering!” he ­shouted back.

In a split-second decision, he turned the boat around in the narrow rock-lined passage by laying his body weight into the steering wheel. I had a few moments of panic as I viewed rocks on both sides of us. We’d be on them in no time. Using the throttle, we got out into the shipping channel.

“Take the wheel!” David shouted. “I’m going to go down below to see what’s wrong!”

“Absolutely, not!” I shouted back. “We should go over to that beach area, anchor, and then see what the problem is!”

“No,” he said, “we’re not taking any chances of being near anyone else’s boat! We’re going back home!”

I opened the engine hatch. The serpentine belt that had been on the starboard engine was lying on the bilge floor, the starboard engine was silent, and our steering was almost gone. It was a long way back across the Chesapeake to get to our marina with only the port engine and manual steering. An intimidating thought.

This was only our second year of boating. We had taken boating safety courses and proudly display a Vessel Safety Examination sticker. We discuss right of way and how to use our equipment; we monitor tides, make docking decisions, search channel markers. But you can’t prepare for everything.

We managed to get the boat back across the bay. As we approached the narrow railroad bridge at the Gunpowder River that separated us from our marina, panic returned. I grabbed the boat hook planning to push us off the concrete pillars if we got too close, nervously looked at my husband, and he said calmly, “I got this.”

As we passed under the bridge, the sound of our relief was interrupted by a loud snap. We looked at each other, crying out, “The antenna!” It’s my job to put that antenna down, but in the chaos it escaped my mind. My husband’s only remark: “It just adds to the expense of the day.”

We docked the boat uneventfully. Nothing feels as good as being back in your slip when something’s wrong with your boat. The tensioner on the engine had gone bad and allowed the belt to slip off – a quick fix when you’re tied to a dock.

A few weeks later, while monitoring Channel 16, we heard a sécurité call. A captain advised that he was about to navigate under the Kent Narrows Bridge with only one engine and no steering. We looked at each other and said at the same time, “It’s probably the serpentine belt!”

“Don’t forget your antenna!”