I grounded hard once in my old Clipper Marine 21. A buddy and I were out fishing and went across a shallow mud flat and stuck the keel good. We tried all kinds of rocking with the motor running but only got it stuck worse. Incidentally, I had sailed and motored over that area many times in the past with no issues, but it was late in the season and the lake was a bit low. The Clipper had a swing keel but it's lock down was a long bolt with a nylock nut that went through the keel trunk. As luck would have it, I had absolutely no tools onboard.
We tried everything we could think of to improvise a tool by wedging things together that were on board, like buckles on life vests, spare hardware, the handles of a pair of scissors, things that were in our tackle boxes, car keys, etc. Some of the things we tried may have even worked had it not been a lock nut. It was looking like the inevitable solution was gonna be to strip down and get in the water to shove it free. The problem with that was it was late October and the water temp was in the 60's. All the towels, bedding and extra clothes had already been taken home for the season so there would be no way to get dry or warm. Nevermind it was already evening and we were 3 miles from the dock. Neither of us was willing to go neck deep in that cold water, nor would it have been smart.
We finally freed it by turning the motor 90 degrees to the stern and locking it at full throttle. We then bounced up and down on the bow until we got it spinning 360 on the keel. This caused it to carve out a crater that got a little wider with every spin. After a while we had enough of a crater that we could start to make forward progress (still bouncing on the bow) and built just enough momentum to plow through the silt for several yards until we were deeper.
We were stuck for two hours and it sucked and it was embarrassing, but I did learn some valuable lessons. First was how to free a fixed keel from a soft bottom. Next was always keep enough tools aboard to perform any conceivable repair or maintenance. And finally, never take any provisions home for the season until the boat has been hauled and laid up for the winter.
Tough day last week. Decided to take the family sailing on the hottest day of the year.
