The Other Dave Hall wrote:
Well now, my boating experiences on the Ohio River are minimal. I
bought a boat late last August. It was docked at a marina on the
allegheny river and the dock contract came with the boat. So I left it
there for the time being. My first trip out resulted in a dinged prop
(the Allegheny is low along shoregrin). Got that fixed and did one
nice little Saturday outing in Pittsbugh. Then Ivan came along and
washed out the Marina. My boat was found 80 miles or so downstream
after going over 4 or five dams - totaled. So after getting a little
insurance money and watching for a deal I bought my current 19 ft.
cuddy in November. I have not cruised the river with it yet.
Sounds like you had rotten luck, but at least it didnt put you off
boating. I'd guess that less than 1% of us here have written off a boat
due to hurricane damage.
On the other hand, I grew up on the Ohio River (Parkersburh WV -
Marietta, OH area) and boated and skied with my family. Various members
of the family own contiguous lots on the Ohio and they have their own
ramp etc. Mom's house is there, too and that is basically where I will
be keeping and using the boat. Since about 1994 I have owned a couple
jetskis I use there too. I finally decided to break down and get a boat
for the benefit of my two grandsons (5 & 6 years old). They like riding
the jetskis with me, but seem to enjoy boating with other members of
my family and that seems more their speed. The cuddy fits that need too
(naps, a port-a-potty, a little walking room, etc.) or I would have
gotten an open bow boat.
So you are old enough to know better. ;-) (otherwise known as young at
heart)
I will mostly be boating on the Ohio around Parkersburg/Marietta. This
is the pool between the Bellvue and Willow Island Locks - about 45
miles. It includes the Muskingum River and the Little Kanawa River
also. In boating I enjoy just cruising or even "boat floats" and sking
(not sure this cuddy will be real fun for that as the 3.0 L engine
isn't real powerful). I enjoy the Regatta at Marietta every year, the
various historical river attractions including Blennerhasset Island,
etc.
Right now I am a bit of a boat newbie just looking for discussions on
props, maintenence, and general boat talk. I think I know the basics
just from being around it, but just discussion is fun if it is somewhat
pertinent to you (ocean going isn't ever going to be pertinent to me,
but I still read it between the massive rants here).
Try to remember every strange way of doing things your relatives of your
parent's generation had then ask here *why* they were doing things thast
oddball way. To make thias place work the way its ment to *you* must do
what you can to help. Sometimes thats asking the right question,
other times if you are experianced with the problem its posting your
experiance and what you did to fix it, and just once in a while, all it
takes is just posting a link to a website you *allready* know about that
covers that exact issue. (90% of the planet knows how to use Google, the
remaining 10% mostly can't even use a keyboard)
The poster I
responded to indicated that there were other newsgroups that were
boating specific that Krause hadn't yet completely polluted and I was
interested in finding those. (I picked on Harry because when I first
got my jetskis he was crapping all over rec.sport. jetski and along
with a few other assholes drove it into the ground even though it
always seemed to have more pertinent info than rec.boats has). It is a
shame that a few idiots can destroy every newsgroup that they target.
An off target rant now and then is good and fun and I admit that I
participate some in other groups I frequent (Mike G. knows what I
mean), but here it is 99.9%.
95% of your problem is google groups. Are you reasonably comfortable
with PCs? If so, check out
http://www.individual.net/ for a better way
of accessing this and many many other USENET groups. (This is *NOT* a
Google group and long precedes Google, whatever they would like you to
belive). What you choose from the group will be delivered to your PC
just like email for you to read at your leasure and reply to if and when
the mood takes you. Better yet, just about *any* of the different
software packages they have instructions for will allow you to filter
out 95% of the cr@p before it hits your screen. I filter on a long list
of political and 'war on terror' phrases and additionally on a long list
of posters who are a waste of electrons. Result: most of what I see is
boating related. Also the individual.net service is free. N.B. It is
well worth using a totally different program for newsgroups than the one
you use for email. It prevents you accidentally sending an email for
your doctor to the group and other worse things. While I'm on the
subject, its extremely unwise to use a valid email address on usenet
unless you enjoy reading spam. I hope the address you entered into
google is one you can easily throw away. (Its also extremely bad
manners to redirect your spam to someone else. The TLD '.invalid' is
guaranteed to NEVER contain any real addresses).
Wow, that was more than I intended to say - just got on a roll I guess.
The Other Dave Hall
For some of us an 19' cuddy would be a significant step up
Have a look at some of the boats of people here.
http://thebayguide.com/rec.boats/
Lee Yeaton's main site
http://thebayguide.com/ is also worth a look. You
wont find a link to it from the rec.boats pictures pages except on the
entry for Lee's own boat as Lee is very careful not to take any
commercial advantage from his position as custodian of the rec.boats
picture archive.
Stick around and wait for things to get better here. (Your elections
usually bring all the bottom dwelling trash feeders up out of the mud,
now thats over things should start to improve and when the weather gets
half way reasonable for an afternoon on the water or some spring
maintenance outdoors this group can get almost civilised.)
--
Ian Malcolm. London, ENGLAND. (NEWSGROUP REPLY PREFERRED)
ianm[at]the[dash]malcolms[dot]freeserve[dot]co[dot]uk
[at]=@, [dash]=- & [dot]=. *Warning* HTML & 32K emails -- NUL:
'Stingo' Albacore #1554 - 15' Uffa Fox designed,
All varnished hot moulded wooden racing dinghy circa. 1961