The confessional...........

First time on this boat going alongside with a full audience, SWMBO makes the leap of faith as we call it onto the dock with a bow line, one turn and we are still going forward, I shout pull, she says "I feking well am", she hangs on for dear life until she is in the drink......................Yes I left it in forward all the time
 
Just to add to the night spent at 30 degree angle, the Boss was furiously checking yachting magazines for the next few months in case we were in the "oh dear" section - lots of people did take photos!!

Funny confessional; getting a water taxi back to the boat in Tobago Keys as rest of crew were happy drinking ashore and skipper was anal about supper on the table at precisely 7pm. Climb up the steps and realise it's not my boat as this identical one had yellow curtains.

Can't believe I almost forgot this one, cringe! Ok on 65ft cat anchored somewhere lovely. Crew of 14, most go swimming while I make lunch. Crew back, owner in agony as stepped on a sea urchin or 3. Through gritted teeth he announced that the best remedy to remove spikes is fresh urine so "does anyone need to go?". Everyone says no, I think about it and say ok, guess I can but can you lot go inside please so I get a bit of privacy. Most of them fall on the floor laughing as I didn't realise I could just have asked for an empty bottle.... No hope really :)
 
It was a delivery trip from Corsica to Jersey in 1989. I forget exactly which small Spanish town it was, but we arrived early evening to find the harbour full. So, we headed up the small river estuary to see whether we could find a river mooring. All the fore-and-aft trots were in use, so the skipper decided that we could moor against a large, fairly derelict-looking wooden motor vessel which was on one of the moorings. As we came alongside, two of us jumped aboard - I was ok but my crewmate landed on the deck and his foot went straight through the planking.

Some would see this as a sign to move on…

For some reason we didn't.

So, we tied up and prepared to head ashore. Just as the last of us was stepping into the dinghy, someone exclaimed 'aren't we a bit closer to the next boat downstream than we were before?'. It didn't take us long to get back on board, get our lines off (avoiding making more holes in our now accelerating mooring platform), get the engine on and scarper.

Strangely, not one of us looked back as we headed out to the bay to find a quiet spot to drop the anchor…
 
Fitting a nice new watercooled exhaust system and then setting off forgetting to turn on the water inlet.. No warning lights in them days.. Just a pshh as the hoses popped and steam arose.. Fortunately a roll of spare hosing 'just there' but the expensive watertrap needed early replacement..
...It gets better . While examining the 'oops' mess, we clanged a buoy with the boom.
The green paint stayed on the varnish and galvanised, solid boom end as an embarassing momento. Made a fair old clang too..
 
SamanthaTabs said:
Just to add to the night spent at 30 degree angle, the Boss was furiously checking yachting magazines for the next few months in case we were in the "oh dear" section - lots of people did take photos!!

Funny confessional; getting a water taxi back to the boat in Tobago Keys as rest of crew were happy drinking ashore and skipper was anal about supper on the table at precisely 7pm. Climb up the steps and realise it's not my boat as this identical one had yellow curtains.

Can't believe I almost forgot this one, cringe! Ok on 65ft cat anchored somewhere lovely. Crew of 14, most go swimming while I make lunch. Crew back, owner in agony as stepped on a sea urchin or 3. Through gritted teeth he announced that the best remedy to remove spikes is fresh urine so "does anyone need to go?". Everyone says no, I think about it and say ok, guess I can but can you lot go inside please so I get a bit of privacy. Most of them fall on the floor laughing as I didn't realise I could just have asked for an empty bottle.... No hope really :)
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Sam,

If you tire of your bloke, give me a look. Love your humour! :-)
 
If you ever see a girl left dangling at the top o' mast for over half an hour 'cos he's gone to make phone calls and have a cup of tea come alongside, chuck me a line and I'll practise my abseiling .. :)
 
On the hoist for launch after a winter refit, one of the yard boys asked if I could get to the berth under my own power.
Nervously I said yes. After all, the battery was charged and the engine had been serviced.
So... into the water, opened the sea-cock and the engine fired first turn of the key.
The boys lowered the hoist strops.
Moments before putting the boat in gear I turned round and realised something was missing.
The tiller.
It was still in the dining room at home after a re-varnishing.
I made it to the pontoon using a pair of mole-grips on top of the rudder stock.
 
Getting into dinghy at Le Palais, Belle Ile.

It was on the side of a slipway as the normal boarding height area was occupied. As my knees were giving trouble I decided to drop the couple of feet into the tender.

Result: my daughter on the bow rebounded high in the air and into the water, followed by myself, similarly rebounding. Swmbo in the middle, who is also an equestrienne rode the wave successfully.

All this under the eyes of the passengers of the ferry alongside!
 
Done the shoreline still on, done the spring on the offside that I don't normally use, done the reversing up to a quay and dropping anchor too soon so stop 20 feet too short, done the anchoring up in zero wind with the main still up, done leaving crew ashore. Have also wondered why the boat suddenly turned 90 degrees across a VERY narrow channel when someone pressed the auto pilot 'by mistake'!!! I do sometimes wonder how I manage to get anywhere...
 
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clyst said:
Also hurts riding off with the kick stand down........... Not until you take a corner tho'
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Motorbike stories:

Constantly starting the bike, putting it in gear and it shutting off several times until you notice the stand is down... Pulling away looking cool only to find your disc lock is still on...
 
Today's.....

So, Diesel bug stopped the engine so we had to anchor without it. Spent a very hot day draining the system, cleaning it, bleeding it. Restarted and then went to check for leaks. It was some time later that I worked out I had left the engine in gear!
 
While anchored once, I started the engine to try and find out why the alternator was not charging the battery. I found the dodgy connection and replaced it.

But in the mean time I had been in forward gear and had motored forward to be turned by the anchor and had motored in circle round a big nagivation buouy four times.

I had to motor in a circle the other way round to unwarp my anchor chain from the navigation buouy's riser.

The guy in the boat anchored next to me must have been cracking up laughing........
 
Feeling extremely smug as we're tucked in nicely and other boats are dragging literally all around us, then I go to up anchor. I've managed to drop the hook inside the eye of a sunken mooring rope, I'm clever like that... After lots of jiggling it came out!

Oh did you know there are seals in the Med? Yep, anchored off an old prison island in Sardinia. Wake to the sound of braying, tell the Boss there are seals here. He says no seals in the Med and this sound is that of donkeys. Indignantly I respond with yes there are seals here, we've heard them near Portals.. Bugger, that'd be the marine land place (so "technically" I'm right!)
 
in Kythnos 3 weeks back , a charter cat moored next to us had filled his bilge with 70 litres of diesel before realising he had PUT IT IN THE EMERGENCY STEERING ACCESS CAP !
innocent mistake , it looked as if the caps were not individually marked .
I lent him 2 fuel containers to help pump it out , funny thing later , sailing into Ydra we were flagged down by a Froggie
who had run out of diesel , so was able to help with some of that diesel .
what goes around comes around ........
 
SamanthaTabs said:
Just to add to the night spent at 30 degree angle, the Boss was furiously checking yachting magazines for the next few months in case we were in the "oh dear" section - lots of people did take photos!!

Funny confessional; getting a water taxi back to the boat in Tobago Keys as rest of crew were happy drinking ashore and skipper was anal about supper on the table at precisely 7pm. Climb up the steps and realise it's not my boat as this identical one had yellow curtains.

Can't believe I almost forgot this one, cringe! Ok on 65ft cat anchored somewhere lovely. Crew of 14, most go swimming while I make lunch. Crew back, owner in agony as stepped on a sea urchin or 3. Through gritted teeth he announced that the best remedy to remove spikes is fresh urine so "does anyone need to go?". Everyone says no, I think about it and say ok, guess I can but can you lot go inside please so I get a bit of privacy. Most of them fall on the floor laughing as I didn't realise I could just have asked for an empty bottle.... No hope really :)
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Precious absolutely precious. I would go to sea with you anytime
 
Leaving a small Greek harbour with a really horrible glutinous grey clay bottom after 3 days of a bad blow. Wind settles and we cast off. Chain starts coming up bringing great lumps of stinking clay with it. I had around 70 metres out so the pile of gunk on the foredeck was getting bigger and bigger. Then the windlass starts to struggle. I back up and then run forward to free the anchor. Do it three of four times before the chain starts to move again. Sigh of relief. Then a panic stricken look on wife's face as a grey grunge encrusted shopping trolley emerges from the muddy water. By the time she's got over the shock and slides her foot off the switch her shoes slips in the mud and she tips over backward into the mire. Plonking down backside first into the heap. Meanwhile the anchor slides into its roller with the shopping trolley firmly attached.
Now a dilemma. As the captain of a small ship, where does my duty lay. Hauling my wife out of the mud which has now created enough suction against her bum to render her helpless or prising a very prominent shopping trolley off the front of my boat.
In the event I chose to get out of the harbour into open water and away from all of the people pointing and killing themselves laughing in the cafe's around the port. Got the boat pointing up wind on low revs, engaged autopilot, and went forward to fix the problems. By this stage wife is hysterical and shopping trolley is swinging on the anchor and knocking lumps out of the gel coat.
There is still the after slop from the storm so the foredeck was like a roller coaster. Nevertheless I get forward and decide the wife has priority. I reach down to give her a pull just as the boat pitches down and I slide on the stinking slime, toppling backwards as my foot slides on the mud to lodge itself firmly in the metal work of the shopping trolley. I sit with my back against a stanchion watching my blood trickling across the pile of clay. Wife has stopped yelling at me and is now helpless with laughter. I don't know whether to whimper, cry or laugh. Anyway the partly executed pull has freed the wife's bum from the mud pile so she was able to manipulate my foot from the metal work. We were free.
Never in all my days have I been so pleased to see a significant lump of marine litter disappear into the dark blue briny
I certainly had no intention of returning it to port and pushing it up the Main Street to get a €1 back.
 
Borrowing a tender only to find it leaked, badly. so I paddled, standing on the gunnels. Saw a floating rope, thought it'd glide over the top but didn't know about the large screw protruding from the bottom which brought the dinghy to an abrupt halt. I continued through a full summersault into the harbour. never realised so many people were watching!
 
Many years ago when I was a kid, I was with my dad, popping over to his fishing boat on the mooring, about 100 meters from the slipway in Porthmadog harbour. About 9 in the morning, no body about..Ghost Town.
In them days, he just 'borrowed' whatever dinghy was lying on the grass on top of the slipway, and whatever bit of wood he could find as a paddle.
Being ex navy and a fisherman of old' he used the technique of standing in the middle of the dinghy (I think it was a Mini-Moorhen') fag in gob, gently sculling on one side, making painfully slow progress, out to the boat.
Naturally, I thought, if my Dad can do this, then so can I...So I jumped up and stood behind him...I startled him, he dropped his fag, I grabbed him to steady myself.......and the pair of us 'Plonked' down on the rear seat, him on my lap.
The dinghy flipped over, bow over stern...dropping the pair of us into a bitterly cold harbour (it was January..ish).
Up we popped, panting like a couple of dogs...bitterly cold....Dad swearing his head off....and behold...a Bus full of visitors, on top of the Slipway looking at us in shock....'Look at them mad welsh muggers, swimming in January...'

I can remember a few others, involving the usual pair of clowns, me and my dad.....
 
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