Trucking isn’t easy, but docking is worse
Issue 31 : Jul/Aug 2003
Jerry named it Yeti, another name for Big Foot. It is the largest truck we can imagine driving. We’d been driving small sedans and sports cars before we decided it was time to travel the country with a trailerable boat . . . a big trailerable requiring a three-quarter-ton diesel pickup. It’s a big truck. Some days, when this used truck was new in our lives, we’d open the garage door and be shocked to see that huge vehicle there. Sometimes the surprise led to hysterical fits of laughter. We had trouble adjusting.
It can just fit in the garage. Side mirrors barely clear the openings on each side, and there’s not an inch to spare front to back. We have to remove the trailer hitch to close the garage door.
After driving small and smaller cars all my life, I was intimidated by the idea of actually driving the truck, getting it into and out of the garage, and even more intimidated once we added a 6,000-pound boat and trailer behind it. Our total rig is nearly as long as a semi.
But I have volunteered to drive Yeti. I can manage the garage maneuver, and I expect I’ll eventually drive the full rig on the road from time to time, although I’ll never be the primary driver.
What’s more intimidating, even though I’ve been exposed to it much longer? Docking our nontrailerable boat.
Flash of insight
I realized in a flash of insight that it’s easier to park Yeti in the garage than to get Mystic (a 30-foot C&C) into her slip. I’ve done it a few times but only when conditions were perfect. With a four-wheeled vehicle, you can maneuver slowly, stop when you’re confused or beset with an unanticipated problem, and move in the other direction at will.
With a boat, you’ve got to take into consideration the vagaries of wind direction, sudden loss of wind, large gusts of wind, currents, tides, propwalk, random maneuverings of other boats in the vicinity, and so on. All of these contingencies can lead to an unanticipated problem from which you may or may not be able to recover gracefully. When you’re underway, you’d better do it smartly (not at dead slow); there’s no stopping, reversing direction is not fast, and backing may be a random act. The bow may swing in the wind, or it may not. Life gets stressful in a hurry when things go wrong. When they do, you’re committed. Think fast!
I didn’t grow up with a tiller in my hand. When things go wrong, instincts don’t kick in, but my adrenaline does. Sure, I have to drive that huge truck around at highway speeds and get it into and out of tight spaces, even pull a large heavy load with it. I’ll take that over docking the boat any day.
Thank you to Sailrite Enterprises, Inc., for providing free access to back issues of Good Old Boat through intellectual property rights. Sailrite.com
