Real-life boating - what now skipper?

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You arrive in the car to marina in nice afternoon. You crew has gone to buy provisons whilst you prepare the boat to go out and anchor in a nearby bay. However, you notice that the electric seems to have tripped befoe yopur arrival so the plan to keep a few essentials cold in your absence has been thwarted. You now have no cold drinks whatsoevr, and the ice maker will take at least 3 hours to get going. It'll be pretty awful with lukewarm drinks, and the shops are shut. What now skipper?
 
whilst the obligatory call to the CG putting them on notice about your prediciment won't actually help you should still make it.
Seastart of course should also be informed - it's what you pay your money for.

Then, in more practical mode do a quick run down the pontoons looking for either people sipping drinks with ice on large boats from which you could barter for some ice for your trip or people sipping iced drinks on small boats who you can ask where they got their ice!

Either way you are right to be conncerned and should not under any circumstances leave your berth without a supply on board
 
being october, and a sharp chill blowing across your favourite anchorage, you find a few nuts and raisins in the cupboard, heat and the dodgy vin rouge,add a a splash of gin/vodka you found under the helm seat, a quick warm in the microwave and serve them all glogg, while waving at the poor folks in gloves drinking their tinnies
 
Easy peasy. It's back in the car to the 24 hour Tesco up the road. Not the Tesco Express at the Esso station mind, but the proper one. Buy up all the bags of ice in the freezer section and then it's back to the marina again, feeling smug that you sold the DB9 and bought the E class estate. It might have seemed a bad idea when the sun came out but how on earth would you have gotten all that ice in the Aston?

You screech to a halt in the marina car park just as the guests arrive back at the boat. Obviously you don't want to keep them waiting by wasting time checking things and everything was ok last time you used it, apart from that slight grinding noise from the starboard engine, oh and the smoke. But you're only going out for the afternoon so it's not going to be a problem is it?

It's now time to turn the keys and get the party on the road. The kids are all out of sight and mysteriously quiet. It's only later when the waves start to build that you realise that they've opened all the portholes to try to get the aromatic smoke out of the guest cabin.

Suddenly the nav displays go blank. But much more importantly the aircon in the saloon fails. Still, as you cheerfully remark, everyone's got ice in their drinks and the sun's shining. What could possibly spoil this of all days?

However, within minutes your 18 year old daughter appears. There's no power to run her hair dryer and it's the last time she's ever going to set foot on this boat. Don't you realise she's got a party to go to this evening. Don't you care? Well punk, don't you?

Your 16 year old son and his friends Chas and Smelly now emerge. There's no power to run their X Box and there's, like, nothing to do, they complain bitterly and, as they correctly observe, since the wind got up and the thunderstorm began, there aren't even any topless sunbathers on other boats to stare at through the binoculars.

So, reluctantly, you decide to turn for home. The wind really has built and the spray coming over the flybridge forces you downstairs. But which way is home? Anyway turning is out of the question because the wheel just spins freely in your hands and, although the automatic fire extinguisher system seems to have coped well with the fire in the starboard engine, the port engine is now spluttering to a halt. Surely you remembered to fill the tanks?

Your wife emerges from the saloon clutching a slightly damp copy of MBY, open at the real life boating problem page and, with more than a touch of irony in her voice says, "What now, skipper?"
 
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