We have met boaters of many years who feel as they are of advancing years its
OK to leave gates open and paddles up as they only work locks in front of the
boat and leave fit youngsters to clean up after them. Others ram the gates to
just see if they will open as the lock looks empty.
On a number of occasions the wife has been lectured for not doing the lock
right. Normally right seems to equal quick, to get out of other boaters way as
they are in a hurry. The wife is past the 11,000 mark in locks and does know
what she is doing.She prides herself on being totally efficient in distance
walked and paddles wound/gates opened and shut but experts still tell her how
she should do the locks.
To be quite honest in our world where many boats sit in marinas for 50 weeks
of the year and crews only do a few locks and miles when they are out it is
often difficult to tell if some crews have been boat owners for ten years or
ten hours.
Having said that I totally agree that potential owners should hire first -
if only because that way they get some instruction. Mind you even there I
notice a definite deterioration in effort. One instructor told me they have so
many boats now that they simply send the video or 'how to' book and, on
arrival, get people to sign that they have read it rather than take them out as
they used to. The taking out only happens if you pay extra and it reduces
holiday time...
Going on from this if hire boats do cause complaints to come back to the yard
modern practice seems to be for the yard to deny, be facetious, be rude and
then to refuse to take action. It's happened to us in the last year but the
case of a friend illustrates attitude very well...
In this instance he was moored a Rugeley in a line of boats with a
hire from a local firm moored a few yards in front. His wife was sitting in the
front well area of the boat making rag rugs and heard the hire, facing them,
start his engine. He then moved off at speed straight into my friends boat
ramming it in the side and throwing the lady onto a metal edge before hitting
the floor. My friend, asleep below until the bang, dived out of the cabin and
yelled at the boat to stop. He received in return a string of obscenities from
the (old) driver of the still going boat in which he indicated that the
friends boat was too close to miss! My friend took the yard phone number from
the boat and after checking wife for damage, phoned the hire firm who seemed
friendly until damage to wife and paint plus large dent were mentioned - at
which point the hire operator's mood changed to one of unfriendliness shortly
before the phone was slammed down. My friend was so angry
with the attitude that he had to go for a walk - and found us mooring round
the corner so we got the full story live - as it were.
So that's privates and hires. You will note I have not mentioned share boats
in this reply. They deserve a book to themselves!
rry Waldron <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Although there has been much discussion in the past about new private
boaters and hirers and the lack of knowledge and experience in both boat
handling and lock operation I would like to pass on my experience in the
last week whilst moving a boat from Middlewich to Barnoldswick.
On one particular day and in the Wigan area we met 5 boats of which 3 were
new boaters.
Boat 1 - We had seen this boat at Lymm and chatted and they said 'Were new
to this game, if you see us later will you look after us'.
Little was thought of this comment until we went through Poolstock Locks
with them.
When both boats were in the lock I was on the lockside and brought both
boats up. The new boat steerer then asked if I could show his wife how to
operate a lock (now I knew what he meant by 'looking after them') - as I was
closing paddles, closing gates and locking the handcuff locks I talked the
lady through what I was doing and why. On the walk to the next lock I talked
her through how a lock operated and the sequence of events for going up and
then the sequence for going down. Whilst at the second lock I watched her
carefully and again talked her through what she was doing - all seemed to go
reasonably well other than her being unable to get the handcuff unlocked -
it operated but was stuck and just needed a little push with a finger to
open fully and allow the paddle to be operated. The steerer went into this
lock first and had bow in one corner and stern in diagonally opposite corner
and said 'what do I do now'. I gave him instruction how to get his boat
straight - which he did very easily -and then allowed the other boat into
the lock. As we were going up the Wigan 21 and they were going towards
Rufford we left them in hopes that they would remember the instructions and
would have no problems in getting to their Marina destination.
Boat 2 - We met this boat just under half way up the Wigan 21, they were
coming down. They roped on round two bollards with rope back to steerer.
They had to be prompted to close the top paddles prior to opening the bottom
paddles (we thought they must have known this as they had bought the boat
some miles away and had done quite a few locks since buying the boat). When
the lock was empty the steerer had to be prompted twice to pull the boat
back to allow the gate to be opened. The boat crew and the steerer had to be
prompted to remove the rope from the bollards to allow the boat to come out
of the lock.
Boat 3 - This boat had gone up the 21 at some time earlier in the day and
had obviously passed Boat 2 at some point. About 4 locks up from where we
saw Boat 2 we started encountering open top gates and sometimes 1 and
sometime 2 paddles open, and we experienced a combination of open gates and
open paddles all the rest of the way up. They were moored at the top but we
did not really get a chance to have a word.
It is apparent there are many new boaters of the private boat type that go
out and buy a boat without even attempting to get any experience or even
reading what you should or should not do.
If this is going to be the norm then I feel that the day will come when all
purchasers of boats will be obliged to have some form of competency
certification prior to taking the boat away from the boatyard.
My views are that all these potential owners should hire a boat for a week
(where at least they will get some instruction - level dependant on the
individual hire company), or to do the RYA Helmsmans Course, if they have
done neither then the Boatyard should give instruction until he feels they
are competent to take the boat away (and to charge them for that privilege).
This obviously would not apply to any person who can give assurance they
have a reasonable level of experience on the inland waterways.
Terry Waldron
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