Couple’s Dream Goes Under
Poised to begin their midlife fantasy of sailing around the world, Dan and Sandy Elkins tried to prepare for every imaginable problem: being lost, getting sick, facing storms.
They never imagined their sailboat would sink in Lake Coeur d’Alene.
“I couldn’t believe it,” Sandy Elkins said. “This boat has been down to Antarctica. It’s been cruising for seven years. We had no idea it would go down so easily.”
The 42-foot Arahina sank Thursday in 14 feet of water at the Arrow Point Resort marina. On Saturday morning, it was lifted with a crane and pumped out.
The suspected culprit: a power surge or other electrical glitch that snuffed the two heaters on board. That apparently resulted in a frozen valve on a fresh water line, one of a dozen “through-holes” in the hull.
As a cold rain fell, the Elkinses and friends began the soggy business of pulling out their belongings. Those included charts for the first leg of their journey, from California to Singapore.
The dock piled up with operating manuals, navigational equipment, charts, seat cushions, baskets of food and a stack of receipts that represented the life savings the couple has invested in the Arahina.
They’re waiting to hear from an insurance adjustor. They don’t know how the sinking will affect their hoped-for departure. At the least, it will mean a lot of work getting things ship-shape again.
“We’d planned to leave the latest in August, the earliest in May,” Sandy Elkins said.
She is 48, and drives a school bus. He’s 51 and has worked 31 years at the Idaho Forest Industries sawmill. Their three daughters are grown, married.
“Everybody always has that little-kid dream in them,” Dan Elkins said, trying to explain their plans to pack up and head out around the world. “For three or four years. Or maybe 20.”
The third-generation North Idahoans were bitten by the adventure bug four years ago when they met a couple who’d completed a seven-year voyage.
They took a class from renowned sailor John Neal of Friday Harbor, Wash. He invited them to go to Fiji on a two-week trip. Despite severe storms and sea sickness, they were hooked.
They sold their house and bought Neal’s 1983 fiberglass, teak-decked yacht with two staterooms. The couple brought the boat to Lake Coeur d’Alene in September 1996 and have lived on it since March. But lately they have been house-sitting for friends and not living aboard.
The Elkinses were heartsick as they went about salvaging the boat Saturday.
Dan Elkins said he and Sandy have a deep faith in God, but the couple may be pondering the name they gave their dream boat. In the Maori language of New Zealanders, Arahina means “Guidance from above.”
, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color photo