Navy Jr.
Senior Chief Petty Officer
- Joined
- Sep 14, 2007
- Messages
- 738
I guess it was just a matter of time. Yep, I'm a newbie. Picked up new boat on May 1st and have launched and retrieved it 9 times since.
Since I joined this wonderful forum last year I've been reading of the experiences of others and taking good mental notes, hoping beyond hope that I don't do something incredibly stupid, or if I do it ends up harmless and without injury to anyone.
Okay, here goes (sorry if it's a little long). My son and I towed our fishing boat to a lake new to us. It's Tuesday, so it's fairly quiet at the access ramp.
I have a routine that I go through regardless of who else is with me to "help." The ramp at this particular lake is the most shallow I've ever launched at, so I tilt the motor up more than usual. We launch the boat and my son uses the fore and aft lines to swing it over to the courtesy side of the dock with the bow facing lake-wards while I park the SUV and trailer.
When I return my son informs me that the 10 knot wind pushed the boat into the shallow sandy shore. We look and determine the outboard is not in the sand, so I get behind, push us off and hustle up over the transom and to the helm.
Here's where the fun starts. I turn the key to "start" and nothin'. No click, no grunt, just an initial short beep. I try this four or five times. Same results.
Meanwhile, the wind is pushing us back to the courtesy side of the dock. On the other side is another fishing boat that just launched. One of the two guys had just returned from parking his truck.
They look at me and I explain I couldn't get the boat started; that I must have drained the battery by leaving the master power switch on from the day before or something stupid; but that didn't make sense because the tilt function seemed to work fine.
They are most helpful. One asks a few questions about our boat, then retrieves a set of booster cables from his truck to jump our main battery from one of our on board trolling motor batteries. No luck; same results. I tell him how much we appreciated their help, but we didn't want to eat up any more of their fishing time, and then I ask for his first name. "Chuck," he says. "Hi Chuck," I replied. "My name is Ken. Thank you so much for your help."
"Are you Ken (and then he says my last name)? I thought I recognized you!!" It turns out I worked with Chuck well over 30 years ago. And his fishing partner was none other than Jerry (last name withheld), also a former co-worker. All three of us were computer programmers at National Car Rental in Minneapolis back in the early '70s. Talk about excited laughter! What a hoot.
We catch up on a few other names from the past, then Chuck looks over my shoulder to the starboard side of the helm, reaches in front of me to the throttle and moves the gear selector out of the forward position and into neutral.
"Try it now," he says with a grin on his face.
Va-rooooom!
All four of us were doubled over in laughter!!! Well, maybe me more than the others. Truth is, I'm still laughing just thinking about it...
Since I joined this wonderful forum last year I've been reading of the experiences of others and taking good mental notes, hoping beyond hope that I don't do something incredibly stupid, or if I do it ends up harmless and without injury to anyone.
Okay, here goes (sorry if it's a little long). My son and I towed our fishing boat to a lake new to us. It's Tuesday, so it's fairly quiet at the access ramp.
I have a routine that I go through regardless of who else is with me to "help." The ramp at this particular lake is the most shallow I've ever launched at, so I tilt the motor up more than usual. We launch the boat and my son uses the fore and aft lines to swing it over to the courtesy side of the dock with the bow facing lake-wards while I park the SUV and trailer.
When I return my son informs me that the 10 knot wind pushed the boat into the shallow sandy shore. We look and determine the outboard is not in the sand, so I get behind, push us off and hustle up over the transom and to the helm.
Here's where the fun starts. I turn the key to "start" and nothin'. No click, no grunt, just an initial short beep. I try this four or five times. Same results.
Meanwhile, the wind is pushing us back to the courtesy side of the dock. On the other side is another fishing boat that just launched. One of the two guys had just returned from parking his truck.
They look at me and I explain I couldn't get the boat started; that I must have drained the battery by leaving the master power switch on from the day before or something stupid; but that didn't make sense because the tilt function seemed to work fine.
They are most helpful. One asks a few questions about our boat, then retrieves a set of booster cables from his truck to jump our main battery from one of our on board trolling motor batteries. No luck; same results. I tell him how much we appreciated their help, but we didn't want to eat up any more of their fishing time, and then I ask for his first name. "Chuck," he says. "Hi Chuck," I replied. "My name is Ken. Thank you so much for your help."
"Are you Ken (and then he says my last name)? I thought I recognized you!!" It turns out I worked with Chuck well over 30 years ago. And his fishing partner was none other than Jerry (last name withheld), also a former co-worker. All three of us were computer programmers at National Car Rental in Minneapolis back in the early '70s. Talk about excited laughter! What a hoot.
We catch up on a few other names from the past, then Chuck looks over my shoulder to the starboard side of the helm, reaches in front of me to the throttle and moves the gear selector out of the forward position and into neutral.
"Try it now," he says with a grin on his face.
Va-rooooom!
All four of us were doubled over in laughter!!! Well, maybe me more than the others. Truth is, I'm still laughing just thinking about it...
