Sunday, May 13, 2007

Worst Sailing Mistakes

Thanks to everyone who participated in this week's group writing project on your worst sailing mistakes or most embarrassing moments. You rose to the challenge and were not afraid to share your awful mishaps with the world.

Thirteen brave boating bloggers sent in stories. Here is the full list...

Protest Shoe by M Squared

The Vicar and the Hog by Tim Coleman on All Day I Dream About Sailing

Broken Arm by Pat Byrnes of Desert Sea

Gybe Ho
by Carol Anne of Five O'Clock Somewhere

Taking the Inside Route by Manfred of Sailracing.

Light Airs Suck by Walter Mondale

The Midnight Shredder on Captain JP's log

A Bag of Pretzels by Edward of EVK4 Bloglet

Naked Sailing at US Naval Academy by JSW225

A bird's eye view by Zen of Zensakai II - By Sea

Playing Ahab by Heather from The Picaroon Blog

RFU W/ RDF, SO BAD WE MISSED CAPE COD from Panbo: The Marine Electronics Weblog

Bugger's Muddle by Adam Turinas of Messing About in Sailboats

And my own Top Ten Worst Sailing Mistakes

So browse the list and tell us in the comments which story you liked best. Which is the funniest? The most awfully incompetent? Feel free to post links to some or all of the tales on your own blog. Share the link love. Retell the stories to beginners as terrible warnings of what not to do; and to remind them that sailing is so much worth doing it really is worth doing badly.

6 comments:

JP said...

Very good group exercise tillerman!

Zen said...

group hug teammates...

WeSailFurther said...

I wish I had seen this earlier! Still, I can't wait to read all of the entries.

Two summers ago I had a few friends out for a sail. Naturally, it was blowing stink so we made it a short day. We were wet, salty, and tired after just a short little sprint.

I had a 23' boat with an 9hp long shaft outboard that fit into a well in the transom (a SouthCoast 23). It was so awkward to take in and out that I tried to leave it out most of the time (to leave it in compromised the manueverability as the long shaft interfered with the rudder).

Here's where the genius takes over: I decided to leave the motor out and sail into the slip. It would have gone fine if I had sailed in under jib alone instead of main alone, and if I had known what I was doing.

As we got far enough into the slip to be committed a big puff came from the side, giving the boat a push of speed. I eased the main all the way out, trying to kill the speed, tried to grab a piling, and communicate to the guy on the bow to put a foot out to prevent us from crashing into the dock.

As soon as the main ran all the way out, to a "run" position, the wind veered back to behind us, strong as ever, driving us headfirst into the bulkhead. Nice!

I learned a new word that day: "stemhead fitting." Of course, the 40 year old boat had original bronze parts and I had to have a new one manufactured. I constantly wonder how the hell the thing didn't snap in two instead of just fracturing. Had it broken the suddenly unsupported mast would have come down. Beauty.

Getting that part cost me all of July.

Robert Jack Wild said...

Here's the correct link to The Midnight Shredder: http://captainjpslog.blogspot.com/2007/05/midnight-shredder.html

Robert Jack Wild said...

And a corrected link to Playing Ahab

Tillerman said...

Thanks Jack. I have corrected the links in the post.

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