Good one CM. I'm still laughing. Do you have
any more of these stories? Tell us more...

It is funny that some people freak out of things
that are actually quite easy. I once sailed down the
river from the bridge under Mystic under full sail,
gybed where the channel turned and blasted right
out through the race by Watch Hill a short while
later. The tide was high and it was perfectly safe
and even would have been safe at low tide as we
never left the channel.

When I told another "Captain" about this, she
seemed to think it was risky. Which immediately
told me she didn't have a clue.

Regarding my lady friend. I put her in charge of
the galley, recommended she delegate some of
the work, and left all that up to her during my last
trip to the islands. She did a great job. She is a
fantansitic cook and we all ate like Kings the whole
trip. Giving responsibility and authority is a good
attribute of a skipper. She didn't delegate much
and everything went perfectly.

I made another fellow dingy Captain, and he did
pretty well. Although some of what he delegated
turned sour on him. He asked his father to check
the fuel--and he didn't--they ran out of gas coming
back from town, and hadn't followed my
recommendation of taking a radio. So it was a learning
experience for him, and those of us back on the
mothership had a good laugh watching them try
to paddle in a straight line. I

I think everyone benefited from the clear lines of
authority. And everyone learned from the few mistakes.
Paddling an inflatable dinghy 1/2 a mile will help them
remember to check the gas and bring a radio next
time.


"Capt.Mooron" wrote

Anyway... we decided to "impress" the newbies, who had wanted some heavy
weather time sailing, during our return to a well populated mooring field.
We approached the mooring field under full press [having done this on many
occasions]. This of course scared the hell out of the newbies. The woman
demanded we slow down. I directed her to quickly break out the fenders as
the vessel was out of control and requested the remaining crew to stand by
along the rails to fend off while my buddy and I handled the sails. They
didn't even see us laughing at them they were so busy. We tacked through
that mooring field at full speed going around, in, out and about all the
vessels for the next 15 minutes without a hitch... then before they
realized
what was happening... the vessel was brought into the wind.... I requested
the newbie at the bow to hook up to the mooring and once secure we dropped
canvas.

We all had a good laugh over drinks in the cockpit.

I spoke to the woman 2 years later and she was still impressed at the ease
with which I not only ignored her objections with fake panic..... but the
surgical ease at which my buddy and I negotiated the mooring field and
vessels until the newbies began to realize we were having it on at their
expense. She has her own vessel now and uses the same tactic. :-)

CM