First season mistakes (or should I give up before I kill someone?)

[DMF Sailing]

Originally Posted by Lexi22

One of the all-time great parody flicks.

[jeepbluetj]

Originally Posted by DEAN2140

There are two kinds of sailors: those who have run aground and those who lie about it.

Well, here in socal, if I go aground I'm gonna lose the boat - it'll be the beach or rocks. No dragging the keel through mud here (San Diego Bay maybe). So, in all honesty, I have never been aground. (Intentionally beaching a powerboat in Lake Mojave doesn't count)

To the OP, all that's normal. I've been sailing for 30+ years. Owned my C-30 for 10 or so, and had zero worries docking, getting it to the slip, sailing, repairs underway, etc.. Now I've got a C-387 and I'm like an absolute newbie in getting it out of the slip. So I know I just need to practice and build up the muscle memory for how the 'new' boat performs.

Your list is fine. A good landing is when everybody walks away. A great landing is when you can reuse the airplane. Sounds like you were great all season.

[Don C L]

Originally Posted by jeepbluetj

Well, here in socal, if I go aground I'm gonna lose the boat - it'll be the beach or rocks. No dragging the keel through mud here (San Diego Bay maybe). So, in all honesty, I have never been aground.

Tempting fate with that one!

[DMF Sailing]

Originally Posted by Don C L

Tempting fate with that one!

Yeah in my humble experience you never want to say "I never [bad thing]"

[Group9]

Originally Posted by DMF Sailing

Yeah in my humble experience you never want to say "I never [bad thing]"

I remember back when I used to be able to say, "I've never been on a sailboat when it was dismasted while on a close reach."

[DMF Sailing]

Originally Posted by Group9

I remember back when I used to be able to say, "I've never been on a sailboat when it was dismasted while on a close reach."

I both want and don't want to hear that story, if you know what I mean

[Group9]

Originally Posted by DMF Sailing

I both want and don't want to hear that story, if you know what I mean

It was just a 25 foot sloop, that a friend and I were delivering. The standing rigging looked sketchy, and we must have talked about it for an hour or two, but we both finally agreed, "It's not great, but it'll probably make it there." We figured we'd just motor if the rig started looking like it wasn't going to make it.

So, we take off, things are okay for a while. Then the engine dies, and we're about ten miles offshore, and soon, we're beating into 25-30 knots of wind at two am in the morning, in some pretty good seas.

At one point, one of us actually said, "Well, at least it can't get much worse than this". At some point after that, we heard a loud crack as one of the stays let go and the whole rig came down.

But, we got it towed in and we didn't die!

[wolfgal]

excellent post.

keep up the courage
and remember:
it is when the fear of failure keeps you from trying that you are truly making a mistake

(speaking from experience)

[Bullshooter]

Wow, all these responses, and no one is calling him a fool or worse! In fact, most all have been very encouraging! Where's all the rancor and condescension? Am I in the right forum???

[DMF Sailing]

Originally Posted by Group9

It was just a 25 foot sloop, that a friend and I were delivering. The standing rigging looked sketchy, and we must have talked about it for an hour or two, but we both finally agreed, "It's not great, but it'll probably make it there." We figured we'd just motor if the rig started looking like it wasn't going to make it.

So, we take off, things are okay for a while. Then the engine dies, and we're about ten miles offshore, and soon, we're beating into 25-30 knots of wind at two am in the morning, in some pretty good seas.

At one point, one of us actually said, "Well, at least it can't get much worse than this". At some point after that, we heard a loud crack as one of the stays let go and the whole rig came down.

But, we got it towed in and we didn't die!

To Group 9: Thanks for recounting. I'm glad it ended favorably for you. The conversations you had are like every one I've had before disaster struck (in my case, main sheet block on a J-27 snaps beating into a near gale and outboard won't start, rendering us a head-sail only vessel. My buddy that night definitely said at one point "It's not great, but we'll make it." We got the outboard started, doused the jib, and made it. Never again!)

Quote From Bullshooter:

Wow, all these responses, and no one is calling him a fool or worse! In fact, most all have been very encouraging! Where's all the rancor and condescension? Am I in the right forum???

To bullshooter: My thought on this is that the original poster shared all this with humility. This forum will rip you to pieces for a lot of things, but humility and honesty about mistakes reminds everyone that we've all been there.

50 years on the water and I don't know many sailors who haven't done something stupid and screwed up. I know even fewer who haven't fessed up about it!

[AKA-None]

Don’t put off till tomorrow what you can do today. You might screw up and you can spend tomorrow telling us all about it :-)

[phorvati]

My first year I had to get rescued by the coast guard during hurricane floyd, '99. Left the switch in run position, and battery selector on " Both" and drained both batteries on my 27' Ericson. so tried to sail into harbor, but with not much luck. It was getting progressively bad and luckily coast guard Station Pt. Judith was less than a mile away and they brought us in just before the height of the storm. Eye came maybe 20 miles west of us so it was bad. Stayed in a marina where a pissed off owner was hauling boats. Coast guard told him he had to let me stay on the dock because I was disabled. Needless to say staying aboard that night was memorable. Those experiences can only be gained by going through them. Needless to say, I've never screwed up the battery switch again and I know where my Ah are going most times.

[SV__Grace]

My biggest first season mistake was getting caught in a current and ending up on the rocks of Alcatraz Island in SF Bay in my new-to-me Ericson 25 at midnight attempting my first trip out the Golden Gate.

Had to be rescued by USCG, rudder damaged (could have been much worse, I was lucky), trip scuttled, many lessons learned that have stayed with me since.

[argonauta1]

Sounds like a normal learning curve to me. You know you need to refine your coastal waters navigation skills such as memorizing types and meaning of channel markers. A bit of refinement in line management here and there too. But certainly good to go to accumulate experience. Enjoy, we hope, an upcoming COVID free season.

[rmhutch59]

I have been on a boat for over 40 years, and have done all those things most more than once. Not having problems comes with experience, experience comes from having problems.

Best if you can get the experience from someone else's problems.