Re: What boating mistakes have you made?
Buying one.
Ha, well, as they say, the 2 happiest days in a boat owners life is the day he buys it, and the day he sells it....
I've chronicled a couple of things in the SHTWB section, but long story short, being new to boating, and starting with a houseboat, I didn't set the anchor well, and it got interesting...
I was upwind on a windy day from my friends 28' Silverton. Set anchor maybe 75 yards from him, changed my shorts to pants since it was chilly, and stepped out the back door. I could have underhand tossed a ball to him I was so close.
By the time I got back to the controls and started the boat again, I was along side him. I figured... correctly... that my outdrive was probably going to catch his mooring line, so I didn't put it in drive. With all the lines in the water, it was going to be difficult to power away from him, but we eventually, pushed the boats past each other, I quickly pulled my anchor in, and powered off before I drifted into the next boat in line behind him. That was probably week two with the boat.
Also accidentally dropped my phone in the water. Caught up to it about 15ft down. I was in 70ft of water, much deeper and it would have been a writeoff.
Another time, I missed a step from the inflatable to the boat, was in about 4ft of water. Kept my $5 transistor radio dry, forgot that same phone was in my pants pocket...
Another time, was taking a nice slow cruise around the shoreline. Skirting some very shallow water with a rocky bottom. Noticed a dog was trying to chase its owner down the shore while she kayaked along. The dog decided to swim out across a deeper spot, got tired, and almost drowned. Was caught up in thinking I was gonna watch the poor thing die as I saw less and less snout above water, drove into the shallows, blew out my hydraulic lines on the outdrive when it caught a rock. I realized what was happening before the drive hit, and put it in neutral, so a dinged prop and a blown line was all I suffered.