Re: Tip: keep your safety chain on . . .
It will "shoot" off a roller trailer! Especially if ramp is inclined, which of course most are, so don't have anyone walk behind a boat holding a line while you are backing down. This is also another reason you may not want to use those plastic slides or the spray stuff to make a bunk type trailer slipperier.
No question about with boating (especially launching) being that therte is just so many things to remember. It's not like your car where you open door, turn key and drive away. Some use a checklist on launching and retrieving. Others use a walk around like a pilot does before he boards plane.
I still always seem to forget to do something
Like the last time I was out . . . I keep a 3 foot folding ladder in my cars back seat. Makes it easier to jump in and out of boat when de-rigging after I pull the boat back out like when getting the trailerable cover back on and positioning the support poles. So I used it in the staging area at a local marina that I launched at on Lake George and when I came back 7 hours later the ladder was still sitting right where I drove off from and I didn't even know I forgot it. When I came back as I drove up with the boat to this little parking area to start de-rigging I said to myself . . . hey, someone left that nice little ladder and just drove off . . . as I got closer it started to look very familiar . . . oops.
Boating tends to get very expensive when I only have half a brain left
