Generally holiday weekends on the lake have a higher idiot factor than regular weekends. Usually this is because EVERYONE that has
ever boated even once heads to the lake on holiday weekends. This includes new boaters, holiday weekend only boaters, borrowed my buddies boat boaters, bring every friend and/or family member boater and so on and so forth. This weekend did not disappoint.
Highlights -
1. Wildlife and Parks official backed into a boat he was hassling...er....checking for life jackets. Yep, Barney Fife -can't wait to use his authority - forgot his boat was in reverse and just kept coming back until he bumped into the other boat. Thankfully no one was hurt and damage was minimal. This guy is not a very good boater at all. He has come close on several other occasions to doing damage. He likes to hassle....er pull people over in the marina for various stupid checks.....in the very busy, sometimes windy, blind spots around each corner marine. Never mind all the jackass things happening at the boat ramp, or out on the water, or over in party cover where 100+ boats are rafted up, he likes to make stops in the marina.
2. Numerous boats were towed in with failed engines. My favorite was the large, engine-less houseboat that was being pulled in by a small ski boat. Instead of tying off the tow line, three houseboat guys were laying/sitting on the front of the houseboat trying to hold the tow lines with their hands. They would shout at the ski boat to gun it to get them straightened out again only to have it slingshot them in the opposite direction. Soon their friends following behind in a bass boat threw them a line from behind. The thinking here was that they could help keep them straight. Now the ski boat is towing two boats. As always it's funny until they make the turn at our dock and we are scrambling like mad down each finger to be sure they don't wipe out the stern of several of our B-Dock sailboats.
**Soon after a small Morgan 22 sailboat with a very small outboard gracefully towed in another small sailboat (whose outboard had pooped out) to the farthest, most difficult corner of the marina and totally stuck the docking for a perfect 10 score from the judges.
3. Powerboat from #1 was manned by approx 6 twenty somethings out for a good weekend. They popped up again looking for tools as they had a belt issue with their engine and not one tool on board. Yes, you heard correctly NOT ONE TOOL ON BOARD ANYWHERE. However, the ring leader - we'll call him Shaggy - had a new white captains hat.
It's not a stay at a Holiday Inn but I guess it's close enough for his crew!
4. Every single pontoon boat was transformed into a clown boat - more people than a clown car at the circus.
5. A 25 ft cruiser smacked into C-Dock with a loud crash, hitting not only the dock but another powerboat.
6. More twenty somethings guys, piled into a go fast ski boat decided gunning it to create large wakes inside the marina would be a fun activity on the way to the dock bar. This got our entire dock group riled up in fighting mode. Much shouting ensued. We plotted revenge while they reloaded at the bar. In the end we were too wise (actually it was too lazy) to exact the revenge and both parties waved and laughed as they went by a few hours later. The twenty somethings yelling NO WAKE at the top of their lungs and our group remembering what it was like to be young and stupid.
7. Pontoon boat - unfamiliar to us, tied up on our dock with......wait for it......twine. Yes, twine. It can only be described as twine. You can't even call it line. I spotted this mishap mid-action and thought I would hyperventilate holding in my laughter before I got back to our group to let them know. The pontoon or "Tooner" as we call them, started with a rats nest of this twine and eventually got some of it untangled and then used it to tie up their Tooner. Never mind that the wind blew 25-30 all day and never mind it was still blowing through the marina at a good clip. Nope, twine for this Tooner. When they finally stumbled up the dock to leave - 3 of the 50 passengers (not really but the number of actual passengers they had did fit clown boat standards) fell getting off or walking down the dock - we all wandered up the dock to check out the final tie up and giggle our heads off. Although a couple of our captains were less than pleased with the thought of this Tooner busting loose from it's twine and bumping down the sterns of their boats in the middle of the night. Honestly, my little finger is bigger around than this twine. And it wasn't Dymeena.. Nope, somewhere there is a Wal-Mart missing a ball of twine and some idiot shoppers to match.
8. Night fall came and with it all the various light combinations on boats. Some had a light out, one or two didn't have lights at all including a small sailboat - NOT on our dock. Then there was the guy with the fancy ski boat with a very expensive aftermarket swim platform off the back. He decided to show off his grand appendage....er... swim platform by lighting it all up. And what color did he pick to show off his boat accessory? Why green of course! YES HE DID. So looking at his port side he had a red light on his bow, white light up above towards the stern and then a green stern. It wasn't until he cruised by the dock that we finally figured the whole thing out. I can't imagine seeing this thing out on the water at night.
9. 2 AM Sunday morning someone fired off a gun but much laughter followed so it must have been for fun vs a drunken marital lake spat. I laid on the port berth of s/v Ta Keel La wondering where that bullet might come back down and hoping it wouldn't be on us.
10. C-Dock had a what seems like a gross of those horns people blow at soccer matches. And they weren't afraid to use them....all evening long. The only thing that seemed to have a calming affect on that dock was the 1973 Sesame Street song "Sing a Song" sung by The Carpenters which they blared at least 3 times.
11. The Jefferson County sheriff and a couple of other officials were in the parking lot Sunday evening (pretty standard for them to be called at least once on a holiday weekend) but we never did hear what happened.
12. A fare number of boaters sunburned themselves into a painful reminder of the weekend. The best was Shaggy from #1 and #3 above. He sunburned his back bright red but not 100%. No, he had some interesting white spots where he either got a small bit of sunscreen applied or more likely was leaning up against a rail or something that kept those two areas lily white.
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| Cap10 Tom, Denny and Terry solve the world's issues all from B-Dock |
Yes, it was a typical holiday weekend at Lake Perry. We had a blast getting caught up with all our lake friends as well as being entertained and somewhat frightened by the idiot brigade.
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| Typical B-Dock Potluck |
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