Scotty wrote:
"Joe" wrote in message
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pWe_Lf71o1U
Do the idiots have shackles and thimbles on the boats
cleats too?
If you dumb yankees learned to use a cleat the proper way,
you would
have no need for such stupity and waste.

Uh, Joe, not all Yankees are dumb. No one uses shackles like
that, ****head set up a few for the video, that's all.

Although I've seen that setup a few times for special situations, I've
never seen it at a marina for all boats, and I've been to a large
number of marinas, especially in the North East. Its true that it
might be a tad more secure, but I've never seen a dock line fail at
the dock cleat, its always been on the boat - usually at the toerail,
etc. When the dock end fails, its because the cleat pulls out.

The worst part of it is that I would much prefer to carry my own
docklines with me, and I have lines made up specially for handling
from the boat. If a marina provided those shackled lines, I would
probably ignore them. Certainly they are useless for approaching the
dock with a larger boat, and they would just get in the way and
perhaps damage other lines.

Perhaps rb's slip get so much wake and chop that they need a special
setup. Or maybe there are so many newbies that its assumed that they
don't know how to hitch a cleat. Or maybe something about the
dockominium regs means that management is responsible for one end of
the line, so they prefer to make it idiot proof.