Boating with knuckleheads

Funny things you experience along the journey -

We’ve been sitting at the end of a dock for a day or so in a very nice place to wait out some windy weather to blow itself out before we travel further down the Chesapeake (15-18 knots, gust higher). We see a brand shiny new, minty fresh 48 ft powerboat pull up near the dock, sizing it up for docking. Good idea, as ts blowing pretty good. Plan the work, work the plan. Must be a smart boat owner.

Gerry and I go out to assist, and there is women on the bow, standing there holding a dock line. One….dock….line. Gerry ask for it and she hands him the dock line, the whole dock line, not connected to anything. Gerry asks her to put on one of the bow cleats and return the other end to him to secure.

Seeing that the fairly substantial boat is going to quickly drift down on us, Gerry asks expediently for a “spring line” to keep it off our boat. She has no other dock lines. She has to walk to the stern of the boat to find another line. During this, they are telling us and another person on the dock that they just purchased the boat and just picked it up. They commented “oh it only came with two dock lines”.

Eventually, she goes to a back locker and takes a line off of a fender to use as a stern line, that I tie to the dock and she ties to the boat. The husband is just standing there with his hands in his pockets, reveling being the “Captain” of his new yacht, posing for the cover shot of Patrick O’Briens book, Master and Commander. They never find any other dock lines, but pull a small line from one of the fenders to use to secure the stern.

He grabs the power cord to plug in so the boat has electricity. Maybe that can double as a dock line?

We will need to ask them where their going next…..