Actually, it's a video of us leaving the dock. I thought I'd post it here as an unedited video for both educational and entertainment purposes!
We were on the reciprocal dock at the Hat Island marina just off Everett, WA. Now this is a "tight" marina that just in the last year expanded by a couple of acres. Of course the camera (a GoPro mounted on the flybridge) only shows what's happening forward, toward the newer larger slips portion of the marina. We're side tied on the older docks, which I believe only have 30' slips. It's much tighter there! I wish I had a second camera mounted aft for this one...
Anyway, as you'll see about three and a half minutes in things get "interesting". There was a wee bit of current and wind pushing us to starboard (we have A LOT of freeboard!). While my wife was, um, slightly freaking out, I felt in total control. Sure, it got a little tight there, but we didn't touch anything. One of the bystanders said "Wow, I think he's going to pull it off!" No blood, no foul, right?
My take is that I got into trouble by not backing up far enough into the small fairway. Though in my defense it was VERY tight back there. I thought I'd have a bit more maneuvering room in between the two parts of the marina, even with boats side-tied.
Lastly, we are a twin screw/no thrusters double deck 46-foot 60,000 pound boat. The Cheoy Lee 46 LRC is commonly mistaken for a Grand Banks 50 if that helps you visualize our boat.
Hopefully others can learn from my almost-mistake...
We were on the reciprocal dock at the Hat Island marina just off Everett, WA. Now this is a "tight" marina that just in the last year expanded by a couple of acres. Of course the camera (a GoPro mounted on the flybridge) only shows what's happening forward, toward the newer larger slips portion of the marina. We're side tied on the older docks, which I believe only have 30' slips. It's much tighter there! I wish I had a second camera mounted aft for this one...
Anyway, as you'll see about three and a half minutes in things get "interesting". There was a wee bit of current and wind pushing us to starboard (we have A LOT of freeboard!). While my wife was, um, slightly freaking out, I felt in total control. Sure, it got a little tight there, but we didn't touch anything. One of the bystanders said "Wow, I think he's going to pull it off!" No blood, no foul, right?
My take is that I got into trouble by not backing up far enough into the small fairway. Though in my defense it was VERY tight back there. I thought I'd have a bit more maneuvering room in between the two parts of the marina, even with boats side-tied.
Lastly, we are a twin screw/no thrusters double deck 46-foot 60,000 pound boat. The Cheoy Lee 46 LRC is commonly mistaken for a Grand Banks 50 if that helps you visualize our boat.
Hopefully others can learn from my almost-mistake...
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