Crazy lack of basics

[dralex]

I was down at the marina last night about to go out for an evening sail when a bloke in the all white french make fishing boat next to me asked-"Excuse me, do you know what direction the wind is coming form" to which I duly replied with a direction. He then asked " is it rough out there?" He was just preparing to go out for an overnight fishing trip on his own.

The anwers to both his questions were both there for observation- ie look over the wall of the marina and also see where the wind is coming from and look at a compass. Alterntively, listen to the inshore waters forecast.

I tend to assume most people prepare to some extent and have a bit of knowledge- then I get hit with this sort of thing.

Any other stories of blinding lack of nonce?

<hr width=100% size=1>Life's too short- do it now./forums/images/icons/wink.gif

 

[snowleopard]

yes indeed. the family who drove down to the coast every weekend. if the boat was afloat they would go out, if not, they would do something ashore. they had no idea the tides were predictable.

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[Benbow]

How many times have you been alongside a wall or on a mooring and have someone motor up and ask 'does it dry here ?'. I always wonder if its that they are too lazy to work it out for themselves or don't know how. Either way, they are trusting the safety of their boat to me, a random stranger.


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[Windfall]

I remember being at the Hayling Island Yacht Company ( a drying 'marina' in Chichester Harbour) which is very tidal and being completely amazed when a young chap and his girlfiend untied their sportsboat, threw in their picnic gear and sat in the front seats waiting to go. He assured her that the water would be there any minute and they'd be ready to go.

Unfortunately the tide still had a few hours to fall /forums/images/icons/smile.gif



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[robp]

Maybe he was a Fastrack YM Examiner? You passed.

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[NK_man]

Isn't this what the Darwin Awards are for?

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[dralex]

?? Darwin Awards

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[Talbot]

The <A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.darwinawards.com/darwin/>Darwin Awards </A> honor those who improve our gene pool... by removing themselves from it. Of necessity, this honor is bestowed posthumously

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[dralex]

Nothing like a bit of natural selection. Humans don't actually do evolution anymore, - they just do perpetuation.

<hr width=100% size=1>Life's too short- do it now./forums/images/icons/wink.gif

 

[Evadne]

Re: Mobo @ HYC

I wonder if they were the same boat that I remember so vividly from two or four years ago? I was rowing up the channel at about 0.5 knot over the ground, agin the outgoing tide, having got in late, about HW+4.5 hours as it happens. As you know, at that state, just before the Big Bend there is a channel about 2m deep and, I don't know, 4m wide and the rest of the 50-60m width of the channel is about 1cm deep. We were about in the middle of the channel. This speedboat, with Dad, Mum and littlun on board, came planing up the creek. No problem there, it's the last of the tide and a planing speedboat leaves virtually no wake. He, courteously, swings wide (to the north); no problem for us but we wave frantically, he waves back and then ploughs to a halt in the goo. Last I saw was him peering querulously over the bows of the speedboat as I rowed around the corner, and he was obscured by the banks of drying mud: a sight worthy of a Peyton cartoon.
We did ask one of the houseboats to put out a call to the HM, but by that time I was walking, painter over my shoulder, up the middle of the channel. I never did find out how and when he got off, but him peering over the bows in a few inches of water, 5m from the channel and 20m from the sea wall is a sight I shall recall forever.


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[steve_cronin]

Year before last...

We were moored up in Sami on Kephalonia when an obviously brand new Bavaria 36 came in crewed by two couples of twenty-somethings. We helped them moor up. Well if you'd seen Barbie and her friend ( yes absolutely perfect bodies most of which was on show) so would you have offered help.

Anyway, we got talking with the "Ken and his buddy" as the girls went off to explore the location of the street scenes in the film Capt Correlli's Mandolin wearing only the slightest additional clothing.

"Tell me" said skipper Ken " you appear to have done this before. What are all the little numbers printed all over the charts for? We thought that they were distances to land as they get bigger the further away from it you get but it doesn't seem to be the same everywhere"

True as I sit here! Ask Duncan Kent of S.T. He was on the other side of them and also lent a hand getting them tied up.

We enquired as to wether or not the charter company had asked for "Skipper Licences" when they took over the boat.

"Oh yes" was the reply "but in Germany you can buy one at a post office"

Then the REAL reason (I suspect) for their being given this brand new boat returned, so the conversation ceased.

Steve Cronin



<hr width=100% size=1>The above is, like any other post here, only a personal opinion

 

[dralex]

Re: Year before last...

I thought the numbers were dot to dot- no wonder I never get a proper picture.

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[Sans Bateau]

Re: Year before last...

Only just recently down at Emsworth marina (Sill, access 2 hrs either side of HW) a chap with a small Hardy asked me if he would be able to get over the sill "I only need about 18'' of water", he said. He only had to look out into the harbour as he left his car to see, that even if he did manage to get his boat over the sill the water was about half a mile away, receeding!

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[dralex]

Re: Year before last...

Also reminds me of a French sailor in Guernsey inner harbour earlier this year. There's a lovely great calibtrated scale over the sill., It's even in SI units and hence Euro Friendly. now surely we all know the draught of our boats and therefore it's a relatively simple task to decide if there's enough water. not this chap. Hammers it hard and must have hit the sill at about 4kn- the boat slewed right over and the thud was heard by all inthe marina judging by the number of people who appeared from their boats. He turned around, hovered for 30 minutes, then left. I wonder if he made it home.

<hr width=100% size=1>Life's too short- do it now./forums/images/icons/wink.gif

 

[oldharry]

The story reputedly from the Cox of the Yarmouth IOW Lifeboat goes that they were called out to a mobo in the Needles Channel.

The casualty - a large Gin palace type mobo had run out of fuel. The owner had taken delivery of it that morning in Lymington, and said it couldnt have run out already as he had filled up with 5 gallons before he left Lymington that morning. "Its a diesel so it cant have used that much!"

A line was passed for a tow. It was thrown back - "that's no good, it hasn't got a loop in it"

The Coxwains next words were, sadly, not reported....

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[Gunfleet]

oh go on I can't resist. A motor boater in Brighton (nice chap) got talking to us. We'd just sailed from St Peter Port (30 hrs - don't ask). He told us he'd been all over the Channel Islands and the associated bits of France... 'after all St Malo is the bit of France nearest to here.' When he said he was going to Le Havre and asked for the best route I said 'follow 180 on the compass'. Was I cruel or did I do the right thing?

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[Twister_Ken]

A rib full of anglers...

...lines dangling over the side waved us closer as we were passing them, about 3 miles south of the Needles.

"Where's the nearest place to get petrol?, they shouted.

"Yarmouth" I replied.

"Where's that?"

Just maybe it was a quiet day's fishing and they thought it would be fun to wind me up.

<hr width=100% size=1><A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.writeforweb.com/twister1>Let's Twist Again</A>

 

[pugwash]

Here's a chill factor. Was talking to a senior Channel pilot who helps the Asian big boys rocket up the Channel in container ships and tankers. Many of their wach officers have the required papers but little experience. One night his ship was proceeding east at 25 knots in a following wind of exactly the same speed. Young second officer comes on watch and starts to fill in the log. The anenometer is reading zero and the direction is all over the place. After some thought he fills in the wind speed as zero and the direction as Var. The pilot says: "Have a look out of the window. What do you think is making those big waves with white curly tops?"
"It's strange," the mate says. "There's no wind here but it seems to be blowing hard over there."

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[Benbow]

That reminds me.

At the nav table talking through the situation with a trainee watch leader. Hmm says I the GPS shows 8kn but our speed through the water is only 6kn, what do you think is going on ? After the briefest pause she replied 'The GPS is going faster than we are'.

I am afraid that I laughed - for some reason the image of the GPS hurtling past us struck me as hysterically funny at the time.


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[MASH]

Re: Year before last...

SC's reply reminds me of the difference between British and German charterers as related by an industry professional in a big charter resort in Turkey. The Brits call up and ask if their experience is enough to handle a boat that size, whereas the Germans just book the biggest boat they can afford.
<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1>Edited by MASH on 09/08/2004 14:35 (server time).</FONT></P>