A lesson for beginners in houseboats

[harold]

We were out three weeks ago and were moored at little shark point bay. On the Saturday morning I was sitting on the back of the boat reading the paper when I noticed an asian family who were in a 40ft houseboat that was also on one of the moorings. I saw them cast of the mooring line and I could not hear the outboards. I noticed the boat drift in the light wind towards the rocks, all of a sudden it was stuck on the rocks side ways. I jumped into the dinghy and motored over there to see a very worried dad with about 4 or 5 very little children and his wife and friends on board. He explained that he could not get the motors started and was in trouble. He passed me a rope that was only about two meters long and I attached it to the back of our 3.4 meter rubber dinghy and then attempted to pull his nose off the rocks. Given my dinghy only has a 30 HP 4 stroke Mercury on it and the houseboat was made of wood, it was a tough job. After 10 or so attempts I finally dragged the nose off the rocks and inched my way into deeper water. At this point in time his mate got one engine started and commenced to run me and my dinghy over! Finally I managed to untie the rope and told him to either moor again or head back to where he hired it from and get them to fix the engine.

The staggering thing to me was how could someone cast off a fixed line and then try to start the engines? Amazing really and fortunately no one was hurt.

Stay safe and keep tight lines.

[Jewhunter]

They were very lucky you were there Harold.

You're very lucky that they didn't kill you!!

Well done for helping them out at your own peril.

Cheers,

Grant.