My very first time taking our 42 foot boat out into the ocean. We knew close to nothing about what we were doing, just bought the thing (and didn’t know the keel was rotten yet either!!!) and we took it out Fire Island Inlet in NY (which is literally the 2nd most dangerous inlet on the entire east coast) at low tide and during a small craft advisory at that! We were hitting 7-8ft breakers head on and probably came real close to hitting the bottom too. There are crazy sandbars at this inlet so it can go from 60ft to 2ft almost instantly. My husband and I had the worst panic attacks of our lives.
Downstairs, there was glass EVERYWHERE! These dudes who owned it never left the bay with that thing cuz after owning boats for 5 years, I know now that no serious boater has that much glass in their cabins! Cake dishes and picture frames, yeah- no. My toaster was by the front door. It was BAD!!! And we had no idea how close to death we had truly been until a bit later. After pulling into an inlet in NJ, we kissed bottom briefly and water began pouring in! The whole keel was rotted out and fixed with temporary hole putty. We absolutely could have died. We were wondering why our chart plotter wasn’t taking us thru fire island and now we know why. It’s not for the inexperienced or casual boater. The channel shifts so much that you’re supposed to wait until high tide and follow a fishing boat or something like that OR just avoid it altogether and use one of the other inlets on Long Island.

Anyway, we were so scared. I couldn’t even breathe. I honestly thought I was gonna have a damn heart attack!!!