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Fleet Admiral
- Joined
- May 26, 2009
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- 9,715
Yesterday I came in from fishing into my cove--this is tidal water, fairly shallow, off the channel. All of the rivers around here are actually estuaries; tidal and get shallow until dead end.
A guy in his 70's, alone, in an old 32-34' cruiser is steaming along and he heads right into the cove, going across the bars at the mouth (there are a couple of PVC poles marking a slight channel. Very odd to see a boat that big come in and I know all the boats in the cove. So he ends up by my pier, and starts askig questions about what's up the river, looking for marina's and such. Well I told him there isn't much and he seemd disapppointed, sayinh ghe just bought the baot in maryland and there were lots of marinas up there.
So I told him how to get back to the big river and the intercoastal, where he can find lots of marinas; he said he was going to make his way to Florida. Well, the intercoastal is the highway for that so I tried to describe what he would find and how to get there. I asked him didn't he have charts? nd he said there were a few that came with the boat but they were old so he didn't like them. From the way he steamed into the cove it was obvious he didn't have a depth finder either, nor did he care. Not a very smart way to go exploring, especially in a large boat in skiny water. Luckliy for him we have soft bottoms here.
So he's just a retired guy who bought a boat and took off wandering. Good for him; I admire that. He will learn a lot of hard lessons about boating. Sometimes that's just part of the adventure. But I worry how he'll do when he meets adverse conditions, even just a squall, or engine problems (the boat was pretty beat). Without some planning he is bound to run out of gas sometime, too. Such things can be particularly hard on an old guy alone in a large boat.
Not calling the old guy "stupid" by posting here but perhaps his naivete is approaching that level....
A guy in his 70's, alone, in an old 32-34' cruiser is steaming along and he heads right into the cove, going across the bars at the mouth (there are a couple of PVC poles marking a slight channel. Very odd to see a boat that big come in and I know all the boats in the cove. So he ends up by my pier, and starts askig questions about what's up the river, looking for marina's and such. Well I told him there isn't much and he seemd disapppointed, sayinh ghe just bought the baot in maryland and there were lots of marinas up there.
So I told him how to get back to the big river and the intercoastal, where he can find lots of marinas; he said he was going to make his way to Florida. Well, the intercoastal is the highway for that so I tried to describe what he would find and how to get there. I asked him didn't he have charts? nd he said there were a few that came with the boat but they were old so he didn't like them. From the way he steamed into the cove it was obvious he didn't have a depth finder either, nor did he care. Not a very smart way to go exploring, especially in a large boat in skiny water. Luckliy for him we have soft bottoms here.
So he's just a retired guy who bought a boat and took off wandering. Good for him; I admire that. He will learn a lot of hard lessons about boating. Sometimes that's just part of the adventure. But I worry how he'll do when he meets adverse conditions, even just a squall, or engine problems (the boat was pretty beat). Without some planning he is bound to run out of gas sometime, too. Such things can be particularly hard on an old guy alone in a large boat.
Not calling the old guy "stupid" by posting here but perhaps his naivete is approaching that level....
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