My maiden voyage

[peterjaw]

Good day, captains,
I had my maiden voyage yesterday afternoon. Honestly, I did not have fun at all. I was so nervous from the very beginning
through the whole voyage.

Here, I would like to share you some photos that were taken by my daughter.

This is "Turtle Island".


Close look at the "tail" of "Turtle Island". Doesn't it look like a "sleeping dragon"?


The underwater volcano/fumarole, live, cause the "Tiffany" blue.


This is me.


Thanks for watching.

When I was about to park my boat, the wind blew my stern away from the pontoon while a worker helped me
to tie my bow line. My boat was almost "vertical" to the pontoon and hit a big sail boat beside me. Did not cause
any damage, but that was scary. I held to my helm and did not know what to do. In fact, that was not "wind", I would
say "breeze" if I were on land.

Well, that's quite about it. I will share more pictures when I can.

 

[Bouba]

We’ve all been been there, Peter. But you’ll get confident very quickly, but you need some techniques. Turn the wheel all the way in the direction of the pontoon and put the engine in reverse, that’s will suck the back of your boat towards the pontoon . But don’t let the person with the bow line pull too tight, better still give him your mid ship line (a mid ship cleat is your best friend). Because you have a bow thruster, he could also take your stern line first.
But you learned the first lesson we all live by, it doesn’t matter how much you mess up the manœuvre, if you don’t cause any damage then it’s all good
Lastly, to a motorboat wind is everything. I plan all our trips according to how the wind will be when we return to the marina.
Good luck with Lucky Peter, it’s great that your family is involved in your boating and thanks for the photos.

 

[Montemar]

Our boating life is very dependent on wind and its effect on sea state and mooring up.
When mooring preparation in advance and doing everything slowly are very important. As Bouba says "if you don’t cause any damage then it’s all good" and he is right. Work out what went wrong and how you can correct it next time but every now and then you will balls it up!
The breeze may be gentle but it is blowing on quite a large area so it has a bigger effect than one realises.

 

[tico]

Don't worry... as previous posters said. as long as there is no damage all is good.
As you learn , things will become easier.

a sign of good seamanship is to ensure that fenders are in the right places to ensure that, even if things go wrong, there is no damage.
Hope to perhaps meet up on my next visit to Taiwan (The beautiful island)

 

[Richard10002]

I got some own boat marina handling tuition in Lagos in 2007. Taught me loads about mooring techniques, and some peculiarities of my own boat. Well worth investing in a half or full day, whatever the cost.

The biggest thing was, when coming alongside your pontoon, get a midships line on a midships cleat first, (a loop of preset length to drop over the cleat is ideal. Then motor slowly forwards against the line with the wheel away from the pontoon, (how much away is something to be learned by quick trial and error. This will hold the boat alongside, even with noone at the wheel, and you can sort out your other lines at leisure.

If the wind is blowing you off your pontoon, and there is a boat moored beside you, you can let yourself be blown alongside the other boat, then sort your lines out and pull yourself sideways onto your berth.

If you have a permanent mooring, it can help to have fenders fitted to the pontoon, including where your bow might hit if you come in a bit fast.

 

[Firefly625]

with our old boats if anyone was on hand to take a line I always asked for them to take the stern line... now with both bow and stern thrusters it doesn't matter. Even the irritating sods who take a bow line then attach to the middle cleat on the pontoon as fast as they are physically able, then even more enthusiastically haul the line in as tight as possible are no longer a threat to my sanity...

 

[petem]

Good advice above. Some for me to add...

1) Try not to feel pressurized to take the boat out if it's breezy.
2) Have a Plan B, somewhere very easy to park the boat for a few hours if the wind picks up.
3) Don't be tempted to apply lots of power to get you out of a difficult situation. If you're going slowly and hit something the damage will be minimal.
4) Boats are made of GRP for a reason, it's cheap and easy to fix!

 

[peterjaw]

Thank you very much for each advice. They are so helpful to me.

When I attend the tuition last year, I was not so nervous, I guess that because the boat was not mine and the whole marina section
was cleared for us. But now I have to deal with the real world.

I will go to the marina this weekend and pratice more. Hope in the near future I can share more pictures of Taiwan coast with you.

 

[PCUK]

I used to practice coming in and out of the mooring when there were not too many people about to laugh. I still tend to do it when taking up a new mooring anywhere.

 

[simonfraser]

if the bow was tied on well and you have and out drive, you could have engaged reverse and pulled yourself at least away from the sail boat and likely back to the pontoon.

 

[AllanG]

if the bow was tied on well and you have and out drive, you could have engaged reverse and pulled yourself at least away from the sail boat and likely back to the pontoon.

I think the OPs boat has an outboard engine which, provided he has a bow line secured ashore, he could turn the outboard fully towards the pontoon and select reverse to pull the stern into the pontoon.