Daft thing you've done ---- while sailing / on boat !

[Refueler]

We've all had those moments when its as if brain is just not engaged ... and you just cannot figure out how you were daft enough to have done it ...

Let me start by the departure from Ventspils Port for 2011 baltic Cruise (I've already covered the mast damage on town wall) ....

There's Steve and myself slipping out through the breakwaters into the Baltic ... we know the Ferry is on its way out as well and we look back to see it appearing ... no worries she will pass well clear ...

Steve and I ... both looking aft ... tillerpilot keeping her steady .. BANG ..... WHAT THE ******* as we see the main fairway buoy bumping down the port side ...

Up on deck to survey the damage ... all looks ok ... slight dent in pulpit ... but all seems well.

Evening falls and I switch on nav lights ... I have small pinholes in my sidelights so I can see when they are actually working ... nothing from port ... I go up and look .. no light !! Only the back plate. Buoy must have smashed it.
On arrival at Farosund - I buy a pair of lights (cannot get one !) and fit them.

 

[rich]

On passage to st quay in France, I was on autopilot, when I spotted what I thought was the grand Jardin lighthouse, it was a bit early, that’s when the autohelm started playing up, it wasn’t holding the course I kept adjusting it. Something strange was going on!
eventually as I get closer,
I was looking at a bloody great Trimaran with a huge black sail moving slowly across the bay.

 

[capnsensible]

Having had the pleasure of being a Sailing Instructor for the past 22 years, I could probably fill a book with strange things Ive seen attempted with boats!

With a long forward of me learning my trade........

 

[Refueler]

back to my Solent days .... I had a love - hate relationship with Ryde Harbour.

Despite it being next to a Fun Fair and amusements ... public beach with noisy kids etcx. - Wife and I really liked it.

But the number of times I cut too close to turn into the approach channel and hit sand !! I can remember times like Tim on board ... first time ever to Ryde ...
Ok - Tim ... take note, Ryde channel is a long run in - don't be tempted to get too close before turning in ... BUMP !! Oh Sh** ! See what I mean ...

 

[V1701]

We've all had those moments when its as if brain is just not engaged ... and you just cannot figure out how you were daft enough to have done it ...

Let me start by the departure from Ventspils Port for 2011 baltic Cruise (I've already covered the mast damage on town wall) ....

There's Steve and myself slipping out through the breakwaters into the Baltic ... we know the Ferry is on its way out as well and we look back to see it appearing ... no worries she will pass well clear ...

Steve and I ... both looking aft ... tillerpilot keeping her steady .. BANG ..... WHAT THE ******* as we see the main fairway buoy bumping down the port side ...

Up on deck to survey the damage ... all looks ok ... slight dent in pulpit ... but all seems well.

Evening falls and I switch on nav lights ... I have small pinholes in my sidelights so I can see when they are actually working ... nothing from port ... I go up and look .. no light !! Only the back plate. Buoy must have smashed it.
On arrival at Farosund - I buy a pair of lights (cannot get one !) and fit them.

Very similar to yours, I'll put my hand up to having clattered one of the big fairway buoys leaving Portsmouth Harbour about 10 years ago. As an inexperienced single hander I'd raised the mainsail just as I was leaving Gosport Premier Marina, it wouldn'y go all the way up so once I got into the main channel put the AP on & went up to the mast to sort the sail out, I didn't allow for the current running at 3 knots or whatever...

 

[peteK]

Stepping out of the inflatable on to the boat having forgot to tie it on and seeing it drift away,luckily retrieved by a nearby boat.

 

[Stemar]

Completely forgot about Shrape Sand, off East Cowes.

One of the many times I've been glad to have 28hp under the bonnet of a 24 footer...

 

[Skylark]

I quite enjoy single handed overnight passages. A couple of hours earlier my wife had said “I’m just going below for 5 minutes” which I translated to mean “see you in the morning” ?

Looking forward I could see a really bright reflection of the moon on the water. I watched it for ages, in awe of the spectacle. Then it occurred to me that it was cloudy and that there was no visible moon. I had 12v in the standing rigging and one of the shrouds was touching the guard rail and shorting.

The shroud and the guard wire had to be replaced under warranty. The stray 12v was from a faulty nav light. Oh the joys of being the Quality Inspector for a new boat.

 

[Refueler]

Stepping out of the inflatable on to the boat having forgot to tie it on and seeing it drift away,luckily retrieved by a nearby boat.

Bembridge Hbr ...... plenty boats on the pontoons ... and I'm looking for best for me to lay alongside ... Only one suitable ... as others were modern high freeboard jobs that would damage my stanchions etc.
As I approach .. I call out to guy in cockpit ... to which he tells me - You are NOT coming alongside me ! Honest - this guy was RUDE !!
I do a turn and look again ... but no - he's only one .. so I make a beeline for him ... he's adamant he's not going to take any line ... his pal gets up and says - I'll help ....
We tie up and I quietly ask second guy whats matter ..... reply is that he's been grumpy all day !! They do expect to leave early as soon as tide .. No problem says I - just give me a shout when and we'll help.
I'm getting things sorted to use dinghy for wife and I to go ashore - when first guy says I don't have enough fenders out ... (I'm 25ft - he's similar and I have 4 good size out ) ... he DEMANDS I put more ... so I ask if he has any to put as well. His reply is not one for the ladies.
I put a couple more and then go back to readying the dinghy. This guy has really annoyed me and Wife asks me if I'm OK ...
YES ... and I step off into the dinghy ......... wife notes I have no oars ... So I go to climb back on to get the oars ... SPLASH ! I'm in the water ...
Boy is that water cold .... I'm hanging onto the boats side and making way round to boarding steps on transom. I have a couple of those bronze sprung steps on the transom ...
By time I get to them I am cold and I cannot get foot up onto rudder ... cannot haul myself up ....
Wife is calling for help and a guy in a dinghy comes to help ... and the FIRST rude guy gets into our cockpit with another guy ... they help me back on board.
While I'm shivering and looking to sort out ... FIRST guy notices the empty bottles in the cockpit and shouts out to the world to hear : No Wonder look at the empty beer bottles here .... DRUNK !

There was 6 of those French little 300ml Blonde low alcohol bottles laying in the corner ... maybe people remember them ? literally every UK Supermarket had them ... Yacht Beer I called it because it was so low alc ... and small bottles.

End of story .. Mobile phone ruined .... never went ashore - guy made it very plain that we could not cross his deck to pontoon .... they never left before we did next day ....

 

[john_morris_uk]

Early morning start from a marina in the US intercostal waterway. 0500 and the duty watch, mate and myself leave the rest of the crew in their scratchers. We get the lines ready to let go and sails ready to hoist whilst creeping round the deck. At the very last moment I start the engine to get the boat out into the channel and hoist sails. Crew let go the lines and the boat drifts off the berth and I discover that the gearbox has fallen off the engine. We're drifting about with no power and no wind and nearly 30 tonnes of boat that you can't paddle back to the dock.

Mat manages to lasso a pole and we wait for our sister boat we were sailing in company with to give us a tow out to the main waterway. The wind filled in and later it was up kite and a glorious sail. (Always with the 'What are we going to do when we get there?' question going through my mind. But that's another story.

(I had words later with the RAF engineer who was doing engine checks....)

The incident also reinforced in me the habit of checking steering full lock to full lock and that we have f'wd and astern propulsion before letting go lines. Sails bent on and ready to go is a given and it makes me very nervous to be at sea in a sailing boat with the mainsail cover all on and triced up.

 

[Refueler]

Folly Inn ..... tied up to the river pontoons .....

Tim is crew ... I'm on pontoon chatting to guys from the other boat we are in company with ..... Tim asks what we are going to do .... I reply that he will be letting go the lines and I will be at helm ...
I carry on chatting with Jim and his mate .... Jim shouts - NIGE >?>>

I turn round to see Tim letting go the LAST line from our boat with BOTH of us on the pontoon ...

I run up and grab the guardline ... and get a line back on cleat ..... before boat gets away !

Tim - what are you doing ?

Nige - you said let go the lines !!

But we saved the day by doing one of the best ferry glides of the pontoon ever when we actually departed .......

 

[Refueler]

I'm surprised by lack of posts ... honest - I cannot believe so many have not had some mishap or done something daft !

 

[Rappey]

Some 30 yrs ago had a very heavy twin skinned rowing boat and use to put a very old tiller steered Johnson 25 on the back.
So I'm stood in dingy between boatyard pontoons on a busy day.
Gave the throttle it's usual half measure else engine would not start.
Pulled the cord, engine fired up and as a bonus it was in forward gear.
Boat shot forward taking my feet out from under me and summersaulted me over the back.
I surfaced to a large audience cheering ?
Luckily the engine revved up but then died before the boat could do a 360 and run me over.

 

[James_Calvert]

The

I'm surprised by lack of posts ... honest - I cannot believe so many have not had some mishap or done something daft !

The problem is deciding which one to confess to ... from among the ones involving:

dinghy painters...

collisions with navigational marks...

going aground...

flooding the boat...

running out of fuel...

mid-passage promises of divorce...

getting caught by pot lines...

ditto own mooring lines...

navigation...

I'll start with one of these. In the days before Decca or GPS assistance I duly planned a passage from Boulogne to Dieppe making allowance for tidal offsets in the prescribed RYA manner. There wasn't much cross tide but just enough to create a banana shaped expected track. I was a little surprised en route not to come across a navigation buoy that was marked on the chart, but there was a boat a mile or so ahead of us that I knew was going to Dieppe so I wasn't too worried.

Then this boat made a major alteration of course to port...

Why's that I thought?

Then I spotted a dark patch in the white cliffs well off to port which was getting bigger and bigger...

The Dieppe-Newhaven ferry of course.

Later I realised I had taken the time of Low Water Dover from the Almanac to work out my tidal calcs.

 

[pvb]

Many years ago, and I'd just bought my first sailboat. I decided to fit a bracket in the bottom of the aft cockpit locker to hold something or other. Just as the drill bit started to bite into the fibreglass, I had a sudden thought! Fortunately, it wasn't the hull...

 

[AntarcticPilot]

Too many to recount!

But one lesson learnt was when we took delivery of my dad's brand, spanking new Halcyon 27. For various reasons, it was delivered by road to Berwick, where the shipyard had a crane and could launch her. First mistake (not our fault!) was that the shipyard was used to steel fishing boats, not yachts. They didn't have canvas strops, so they tried to launch her by lifting the trailer and all into the water. They ended up having to use a gas torch to cut the lifting wires! This left permanent scorch marks on the port side of the deck...

Anyway, we got her rigged and set off for Dunbar. My Dad and I had checked the chart and knew there was a dog-leg in the channel. Unfortunately, we didn't tell my brother - and he was steering! We realized too late that he was cutting the corner when we went aground on a falling tide. The boat spent her first 12 hours aground on the sandbank at the mouth of the River Tweed! Moral - make sure the helmsman knows where the channel is when in confined waters...

 

[C08]

I had a Macwester 26 called Marcus which had a bowsprit about 8ft long, made I am told from wood retrieved from the last of the slate carrying barques to trade from Porthmadog. Anyway despite all the boats shortcomings we loved the boat and adapted accordingly most of the time but it was a pig to park and astern was alway exciting as it had an enormous totally unbalanced rudder that other than dead slow astern "caught" and swung hard over with no stopping it. So we enter into Port St Mary harbour in the Isle of Man and the wall is stuffed with fishing boats except fot the very end berth behind a small sailing boat. Despite the tide being slightly behind me I still preferred to go nose in and all went well until I put her into astern when the engine stalled, I managed to restart before hitting the boat in front but by that time my bowsprit was well above the cockpit in front without hitting anything . Then I went astern and out of the berth. My next approach went just the same but then reversed alongside into the berth. The old boy in front was apoplectic but soon calmed down and saw the funny side of it.
I think having rickety old boats make you quickly aware of all the "what if" possibilities.

 

[Sandro]

Many many years ago, the family 12 ft open (wooden of course) sailing dinghy, arriving to where we wanted to anchor. Me, 17 y o ,standing in the bows I pick up the anchor and with an athletic launch throw it rather far from the boat, to the accurate anchoring position.
I still have in my eyes the picture of my anchor merrily flying high in the sun, completely free of any restraints.

For some reason it was disconnected from its rode.
Later we could fish and salvaging the anchor with a grapnel.

Sandro

 

[Kelpie]

About three years ago I was helping deliver a Sadler 26 from Troon back northwards, via the Crinan. I was the more experienced out of the two of us so passage planning was on my head.
Having checked the tide times that morning as we left Ardrishaig, I announced that we would be spending the night in the Crinan basin, as by the time we expected to complete the transit we would have missed the tide through the Dorus Mor.
We buddied up with another boat, belonging to a friendly but fairly inexperienced singlehander. Together we worked our way through the locks and made good time, reaching Crinan well ahead of schedule. We mused that it would be a shame to have to sit around for the rest of the day.
The owner of the other boat said there was nothing to worry about, the tide was in our favour, and that he was cracking on to Croabh Haven. Perplexed, I grabbed the tide timetable and re-ran my calculations. We only had a few minutes to decide whether to lock out or not, so I didn't take as much care as usual. Lo and behold, the he was right! We would have good tide with us all the way to Croabh.
So out we went, Dorus Mor in our sights. Our speed didn't quite seem as high as we had expected. Then we saw the first of the boats coming the other way. What a bunch of dafties, we said to each other. Even that Centaur that, according to AIS, was doing 7kts straight towards us. Oh hang on. I re-ran my tide calcs. And, yes, I had read off the LW time instead of the HW. Couldn't have got it more wrong if I'd tried.

The upshot is that after several tense moment where eddies alternately held us back and then propelled us forwards, we eventually made it to Croabh. I apologised profusely to my mate, and felt awful that he had placed his trust in me. He laughed it off. For him, it was a huge confidence boost- you can run through a notorious tide gate in the wrong direction and live to tell the tale. And after all, we were now a whole day ahead of schedule.

 

[James_Calvert]

LW for HW again!

So easy to do. I make myself write it down, including its height.

Can still catch myself out if I try to do stuff in my head. Here in S Devon the flood tide carries on making up the channel after it's turned to ebbing out of the estuaries here. So the tidal gates are offset by some hours from local highs and lows. Managed to get these 180 degrees out last year during a phonecall with a friend about his passage plan to join us from Poole last year.

Good job he wasn't really listening to me as it turned out.