Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

[jtexas]

Came in a little hot from fishing on the last night of my camping trip last week. The lake's down about 5 feet so you couldn't pull up to the cut bank like normal - just had to beach it in shallows & wade out to it. The full moon was obscured by clouds & the lantern I had set out on shore cast a shadow that put the actual bank in total darkness. The depthfinder had broke on the way out, so I only had just the lantern to orient myself to the shoreline. Guess I misremembered just how far back on shore I had set it. I shut the motor off & raise it up in time to avoid damage but we ended up with about six inches of the stern in a couple inches of water & the rest of the boat on dry land. Had a real good laugh until we tried to push it back into the water. Four guys, we couldn't budge the stern...we did manage to push the bow around so it was facing out. With a lot of sweating and grunting and a little bit of swearing. I kept reminding 'em how funny it was when it first happened. Three days later my back is still a bit stiff. Next morning I managed to flag down a fisherman & get her towed back out into the lake. A few scratches on the keel...nothing a little Marine-tex won't fix.

 

[Pony]

Re: Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

Did something similar once........pulled the boat up on shore and then left it there a few days as we were busy doing other things like visiting relatives and boating on other lakes.....<br /><br />Beaver Dam broke and the water dropped 4 inches.....just enough to make pushing the boat in impossible

 

[Capt Joe]

Re: Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

Mum flew up to visit a couple of years ago. I took her to one of the local boat clubs for lunch. While eating we watched a bloke digging under a 17 foot half cab with his paddle. He'd obviously let it drift on the tide the night before & it was high & dry, on a fairly flat beach. To top this off he loaded to boat with extra groceries & gas. Mum asked when how long before the tide lifted it off. My reply was: "Today's tide is 18 inches lower than last night. It's about 2 weeks before the tide gets as high as last night!" I was right.

 

[Limited-Time]

Re: Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

Sorry jtexas, couldn't help but laugh at your miss-fortune. But then again if you didn't want people laughing I don't suppose ya would have posted here. Thanks.

 

[studlymandingo]

Re: Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

I beached on Egmont Key last summer while relatives were visiting. We came back and the tide had really gone out; I have beached the boat many times and never have I come back to completely high and dry. I was in a 17' center console, and was able to swing the bow around into the water. I had a guy drive back and forth in front of the beach to create a wake, after a time, I was able to shove her in inch by inch until I got some water under the stern. I had the stiff back for a few days also.

 

[timmathis]

Re: Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

Tides can be tricky.

 

[tomatolord]

Re: Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

Brother took the boat down to the shore one year and he took the inlaws out for some night fishing, they anchored in a spot and threw the lines overboard.<br /><br />After about 1/2 and hour my brother said the ocean is sure calm tonight - they look over the side - yes the tide had gone out and the boat was sitting on a sand bar.<br /><br />Since the boat was within walking distance of shore the FIL walked home!<br /><br />Brother had to wait another 3 hours to wait!<br /><br />Tomatolord

 

[rottenray6402]

Re: Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

We did that in Georgian Bay one time. The wind always blows from the west up there and not thinking to clearly when we beached the boat we were headed east into the shore. After the boat was sitting there all night with the wind blowing it a little bit at a time up on shore by the next morning it was pretty much beached. At that time I had an old Searay that weighed a ton so we all had to wade in the cold water and after a fashion got it floating again. A lesson I never forgot!

 

[Gone]

Re: Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

When I was a yute (1950's), I had an 8' 3-point hydro with a KG7H Merc on it. Typical dead man throttle and manual spark advance.<br />My BIL (Mr. know it all), wanted to take it out for the first time.<br />I explained the sequence for advancing the spark before advancing the throttle and shutting down the throttle before retarding the spark or the linkage would jam against each other at 3/4 speed.<br />He gets it planed out, does a few laps and heads straight towards shore. The shore comes toward him a little quicker than his 14 footer and 15 'Rude. He panics, retards the spark first and jambs the linkage. 35MPH straight onto the shore, luckily no seawall. There was 6' of beach between the transom and shore. No damage except to his ego.<br /><br />I see kids on PWC's today and look back at how I was just as big a meanace with that 3 point as they are today. I've no room to talk....but I do anyway! What do they say about paybacks??? It's true.

 

[roscoe]

Re: Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

<br /><br />This is how Pro Walleye Trail angler Jamie Friebel decided to park his boat last week during the tour event on the Wolf River (WI).<br /><br />They got it back into the river and he drove it back to the launch, but the hull did receive several severe cracks.<br /><br />I beleive that is the same Ranger boat he won in 2002 when he won the Wal-Mart RCL Walleye Circuit Tournament in Oshkosh WI, winning $90,000 in cash, prizes, and the boat.<br /><br />He took 65th in last weeks contest.<br /><br />So does this belong in Stupid human tricks, freshwater fishing, boat topics, Destinations, or Dockside Chat?

 

[rickdb1boat]

Re: Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

I vote "Destinations"....

 

[jtexas]

Re: Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

don't know much about walleye, but he looks a bit shallow to me, wouldn't you say?

 

[Gone]

Re: Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

Hey, if ya gotta go, ya gotta go!!

 

[michael-lagrange]

Re: Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

Was alcohol involved?

 

[rottenray6402]

Re: Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

How about in "Boat Restoration"?

 

[artburr]

Re: Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

It is hard to beat these but my first beaching incident was kind of interesting too. I had just bought a new (to me) boat (16.5' Alumacraft w/40 hp Nissan) and was anxious to try it out. It was spring and high water in the Willamette River, lots of current and the dock had been washed away. Anyway, my friend and I got it in the water, took it for a spin and headed back to the boat ramp. As we approached shore, I noticed a rock just below the surface that I thought I could avoid if I goosed it. I had never had anything bigger than a 15 hp before and the boat ended up out of the water, almost in the parking lot - narrowly missing a marine safety officer who had been watching. He said "Coming a little fast weren't you?". I explained that it was my first time out and was just getting to know the boat. He then asked to see the boat registration. I said that all I had was a bill of sale and it was at home. He just shook his head and walked away. I guess that he didn't think that a 75 year old and and 80 year old looked like boat thieves!

 

[MudIsFun]

Re: Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

Several years ago we were on Lake Mead and my buddy comes charging towards shore on his Seadoo. He pulls the safetly cord instead of just throttling down. The Seadoo just kept skipping along on plane and ended up 15-20 feet up the beach, no way to turn or avoid since he could not restart the boat. Left a real nice green streak where the bottom paint was scrapped off. Ticked his wife but good.

 

[wjeffofl]

Re: Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

While this doesn't exactly fit this post it is humorous and along the same lines. We lived in Myrtle Beach SC in the late 80's. Every time it rained hard and the tides were high the streets flooded on the military base we lived on. One particularly bad flood my brother and I thought it would be fun to take the 14 foot jon boat out in the streets. After the storm water covered the roads and half way up the lawns. People were outside looking around and some people had placed "no wake" signs out. After a while of paddling around the water level had dropped significantly. We were a way off from home so we started to double time it. The crest of the road began to show so we moved to the side and before long the boat was dragging the road under our weight. After we got out the boat was still able to skim the water and we had a block or so still to go. We threw the paddles in the bottom of the boat and I bent over and started pushing from the transom. (I knew if we stranded this boat my dad would have made us carry it the rest of the way home for being stupid enough to let this happen to begin with.) Knowing my time was about to run out I was bent over in a full out sprint (I used to race bicycles so I was pretty fast). All of the sudden there was the awful sound of the bottom of my dads boat being ground off by the asphault below. Followed microseconds later by the sound of my shins plowing into the transom and then my body crashing into the paddles laying in the bottom of the boat. The sound of all the scraping and the crashing of my body into the boat was horrendous. I recieved some applause from the folks who were lucky enough to be outside to catch the entertainment. I played it off as though it didn't hurt, but my shins were racked with pain and blood was streaming down from both legs. Its funny to think back on but I felt the pain of that stupidity for weeks!

 

[CATransplant]

Re: Beached it -- I mean really beached it this time

I used to live near Morro Bay, California, and bowfished for sharks on the flats. There were natural channels in the flats, but the sharks were most visible out on the flats themselves on an ebbing tide.<br /><br />I was used to this, and planned accordingly by taking a good book out with me. I'd get stranded on the mud about every third time, and would have to wait a couple or three hours for the tide to come back in an refloat my little boat.<br /><br />The mud there was so soft and deep that you didn't dare step out of the boat and skid it across the mud to a channel.<br /><br />Well, one time I got stranded, and was quietly sitting there readin, when the harbor patrol from Morrow Bay appeared off in the distance where there was still water.<br /><br />Over the loudhailer, I heard, "Are you OK there in the jon boat?" I hollered back that I was, and they left. Turns out someone had seen me sitting out there on the mud and called the harbor patrol.