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Fate sealed
A little known fact is how the pastime of sailing is enjoyed. 85% of the time being bored silly. 10% actually doing what you have spent your childrens' inheritance hell bent on pursuing (having fun). The remaining 5% in sheer terror. The latter often further aggravated by suffering in front of a sadistic audience. An audience of 'Grockles' that to man, woman and child are not just delighted to watch foundering of your vessel, possibly accompanied by your early demise as a bonus, but who know how through their vastly superior expertise, mainly gained whilst sat in an armchair, they would have avoided similar such catastrophes. Then, assuming you do survive and make it back ashore, to the local bar to celebrate still being alive, who will then take delight in reminding you and the rest of the spectators, who armed with binoculars and cameras had gathered earlier on the quay, exactly what it was you had done wrong.
So it was last summer when in a ‘bit of a chop’ I decided to replenish Fille d’Armor’s diesel and water tanks. Despite near gale force winds it was a bright, warm and sunny day. I negotiated a couple of score or more of 'Grockles' who seemed amused to be almost run down by a little boat moving on wheels and trundled my tender down the quay and plopped it over the side into the harbour. Inevitably someone amongst the crowd knows how to tie knots better than me and so volunteered to help with the painter. After overcoming the delay of untying a ‘granny’ and replacing it with a Bowline I then proceed to lower the diesel Jerry cans over the side of the quay into the tender. Too much wind and swell in the harbour to take the whole load in one trip so I decided to risk leaving the water carriers on the side of the quay. All I then needed was a Grockle to bribe to look after them whilst briefly away. I asked a tame looking one to explain to the rest of the trippers, should one amongst them decide “Look, someone has abandoned these nice water containers. Let’s take them home.”, that they did actually belong to someone and that the same someone would be back shortly to collect them.
That accomplished I climbed down the ladder, boarded the tender, started the
reluctant (as usual) outboard and set off. It was rough. Very rough and very wet.
My little 8 foot tender doesn’t have much freeboard at the best of times. With my not
inconsiderable bulk plus seventy five litres of diesel it had even less. A lot of
spray and wash thus came over the side but nonetheless and much to the obvious
disappointment of the crowd gathered ashore, all undoubtedly 'tut-tutting' whilst exchanging views on
how I should really have gone about doing the job, I came alongside Fille d’Armor. I
tied up and transferred everything on board.
“I’ll start the engine to recharge the batteries.” I thought to myself. Planning to leave the engine running for half an hour or so whilst I returned to shore for the rest of the load. Except Fille d’Armor’s engine wouldn’t turn over and I quickly discovered why. I had stupidly forgotten to isolate the electrics when I had last left the boat around three weeks previously. As a result the refrigerator had completely drained both main and standby batteries.
Lifting one of these heavy 12 volt marine batteries out to get it recharged wasn’t an option.
It would involve perhaps an hours work, delving down with spanner in one hand, holding on
with the other whilst hanging upside down in the bilges and with fading torch clenched between
teeth. Not a prospect I relished. The alternative was to return to shore, nip home
quickly and remove and bring a battery from my ‘third wife’* for a 'jump start'.
*
My 1957 Ferguson FE35 tractor. The local maire (mayor) had though told me that despite being a farmer
and therefore fully understanding my relationship with my Fergie, there was nothing mentioned in his vast
collection of books of Commune legislature about marrying a tractor. Civil wedding ceremony or not!
I returned to the quay and was amazed to find that on this occasion at least no one had decided to walk off with my collection of ‘abandoned’ accoutrements to boating that I had left at the end of the quay.
The tide was ebbing fast so I had to work quickly. I negotiated the impromptu assault course the trippers had so thoughtfully arranged for me by each of them wandering around aimlessly between me and the end of the quay whilst I lugged a 25 kilo heavy duty tractor battery around each one. Thoughts ringing in my ears of how my ever critical relatives jibe “You’re so overweight because you never get any exercise do you? Just swanning around on your boat occasionally with a Gin & Tonic in your hand.”
Sweat now blown off my brow into the slipstream from the rising gale I made it to the end, climbed down the ladder over the side of the quay wall with first one, then two, then three 25 kilo water carriers then finally came back for the battery. Heavy duty tractor batteries are fitted with carrying handles. Farmers are not expected to use these carrying handles for carrying the jolly things up and down quayside ladders in a gale. Least of all with fifty pink Grockle faces peering over the edge all reminding you how you’re doing it all wrong!
Finally I’m in the tender and with outboard starting first pull for once I set off. I set off too with a certain amount of satisfaction from a job so far well done in front of the army of critics now assembled on the quay. So I open the throttle to raise the little bow and motor quickly to Fille d’Armor swinging wildly in the gale out in the middle of the harbour. Except the bow didn’t rise. It dipped instead. It dipped and a couple of cubic metres of ‘green stuff’ immediately seized the opportunity to join the other ten centimetres or so of spray and wash that had already accumulated and was now slopping around in the bilge from the first trip.
Down like a stone she went. Straight to the bottom. Fortunately, or perhaps unfortunately because at that exact moment I might actually have preferred the alternative of drowning, the bottom though wasn't too far away. Enjoying the spectacle of my unceremonious drowning was anyway the undoubted aspiation shared amongst the more optimistic of the Grockles. All my enforced delays of having to dash back home for a spare battery and the extra dinghy trip back and forth across the harbour, to say nothing about having to negotiate the human assault course of trippers on the quay, meant that the tide had well and truly gone out in the meantime.
I was thus now sat with only my head visible above water, in an obviously stationary yacht tender (outboards don’t run right well after sucking loads of seawater in through their carburettors) with a heavy duty tractor battery now fizzing away and theatening to eject concentrated sulphuric acid between my thighs.
I had learned through many similar such maritime misfortunes as are studiously observed by experts on shore that the secret to avoiding total derision from them is to pretend that either:-
A) What you have just done is normal.
...and even better if you can get away with it...
B) You did it on purpose.
Neither option though seemed too appropriate on this occasion however. For one thing even if I had tried any sort of protest as to my innocence I doubt I would have made myself heard above the laughter.
I therefore decided that a casual wave was in order. Made as casually and nonchalantly as one can wave whilst sitting in a small boat on the sea bed in a full gale and with icy cold sea water washing over one’s head.
None of this was improved when Josephine, our friendly local seal and mascot decided to dive in off the quay to investigate. She had up until that time enjoyed trying to snap off the fingers and even the hands and ankles of 'Grockles' either so illiterate or more likely, too stupid, to note the contents of a sign erected at the end of the quay and which reads ‘Do not touch the seal. It bites.'
Josephine and me know each other quite well however. So far she has never shown any sign of trying to bite me, especially if I encounter her in her own element, whilst I’m swimming or just paddling around the boat at low water for example. Though others disagree I am convinced our harbour’s solitary seal and, as I say, now quite famous mascot, is an escaped circus animal. She shows no tendency to rejoin her couple of hundred mates in a seal colony just up the coast. I also swear I’ve seen her clap her arms or paws or flippers or whatever it is that seals sprout from each side amidships. What she did on this occasion though and I suspect she was just playing to the crowd, was to try and push me ashore with her whiskery dog like nose in the manner of bouncing a circus ball. An action that did not improve my ‘local competent yachtsman’ persona one jot.
I’ve finished ‘messing around in boats’ now.
For the day anyway.
