Impatients At The Ramp

[fishyfrost]

Now As A Reasonably Newish Person To The Boating World... Well At Least The Decent Size Boating World I Find It Interesting How People Are Soo Impatient At The Ramp And If It Is Taking Me A Couple Of Goes To Drive The Boat Onto The Trailor They Start Getting They Shits. Now I Find This Quite Off Putting. Just Wondering If Anyone Else Has A View On This Cause I Find More Tolerance Is Needed You Got To Start Somewhere

[SnapHead101]

My friends used to laugh when I got my first boat as I would head to the local ramp when the weather was quite bad. Firstly to practice driving the boat in rough conditions and secondly to get four or five launch and retrieves in a day. This way when the ramp is full of boaties and aggro I know that I'll have no trouble in recovering my boat. I can now back my quad axle trailer down the ramp and retrieve my 30 ft cat in under four minutes single handed (wife is preggers). Now if only I could convince the wife to back the trailer .........

I think a non stressed environment is the easiest way to learn. THen if anyone gives you a hard time when you are practicing on a bad weather day you can really get up them as you are trying to do the right thing, and there is nothing as good as ripping up someone when you are on the moral high ground.

[Eagle]

I always thought the moral high ground was to ignore the unwelcome comments, accept the foul mouthed quietly with grace and offer a hand to those who are really struggling with their rig.
Eagle

[fishing111]

Its a bit like yelling abuse at the umpy, have you ever seen them change there mind?? Same/similar thing happens if you carry on like a twit at someone who you think is'nt doing it fast enough, they'll proably get there back up and say f&&& you or try and rush to appease and make a bigger balls up of it. I think people should calm the f*** down at the ramps and realise its the goverment's fault for not keeping up with demand.The ramps are overcrowded because of the lack of infrastructure, yet most boaties put up with it instead of mobilising a concerted effort for better facilities.I started a thread on this a while back and most people completely missed the point.

[bluefin59]

Dont let it bother you mate speed comes in time just concentrate on what your doing i drop my misses of and she gets the car reverses down too easy and i just drive on she attaches the winch pulls it up the last inch or two and we drive away to the rigging area bugger the impatient fools just do your own thing mate. i must say though i love the look on there faces when my wife jumps out after reversing down the ramp straight as a die it all comes with time no1 rule dont panic its too easy after a while just my opinion .......matt

[PinHead]

only ever had one impatient sole say something to me...when I had my first boat..you just would not believe how long everything took then...I just took as long as i wanted and did ntotgive him a glance.

[finga]

It seems it's either the blokes launching/retrieving are the wally's or the looker-onners are the wally's.
Sounds like if you turn up to a boat ramp your a wally.
Is that why you got TMD Greg??

see this for the stories about wally's from the other perspective

[NAGG]

Now As A Reasonably Newish Person To The Boating World... Well At Least The Decent Size Boating World I Find It Interesting How People Are Soo Impatient At The Ramp And If It Is Taking Me A Couple Of Goes To Drive The Boat Onto The Trailor They Start Getting They Shits. Now I Find This Quite Off Putting. Just Wondering If Anyone Else Has A View On This Cause I Find More Tolerance Is Needed You Got To Start Somewhere

Fishyfrost ..... dont worry ..... 2 , 3 ,4 attempts at a drive on ... will still be faster than most winching ....... Stick with it ... Nagg

[NAGG]

My friends used to laugh when I got my first boat as I would head to the local ramp when the weather was quite bad. Firstly to practice driving the boat in rough conditions and secondly to get four or five launch and retrieves in a day. This way when the ramp is full of boaties and aggro I know that I'll have no trouble in recovering my boat. I can now back my quad axle trailer down the ramp and retrieve my 30 ft cat in under four minutes single handed (wife is preggers). Now if only I could convince the wife to back the trailer .........

I think a non stressed environment is the easiest way to learn. THen if anyone gives you a hard time when you are practicing on a bad weather day you can really get up them as you are trying to do the right thing, and there is nothing as good as ripping up someone when you are on the moral high ground.

Mate ... well done ! .... unfortunately too many dont take the time to learn as you did ..... Nagg

[jeffbqld]

Speed will come with experience. But don't make the mistake of taking shortcuts. ie Like taking the safety chain off the boat at the derigging and not on the ramp.

[Blueroo]

I agree with Jeffbqld.
Be accurate and careful. It's not a race.
There's no point knocking your crew or boat around just to please someone else who probably wont appreciate it anyway.
You will find things will become routine and launching and retrieving will get easier.
Cheers
Stue

[Ryan.S]

Just take your time mate. Every prick out there had to learn at some point. Some ppl are just to far up themselves to remember those days.

[BM]

Fishyfrost,

I find it quite interesting how you capitalise every word in a sentence! Any reason for that??

Anyway, practice makes perfect and it is difficult when you have to deal with err, "people of seriously limited brain capacity" who want to carry on like prize pricks at the boatramp.

Cheers

[Lovey80]

Don't feel like you have anything to feel sorry for, The "wally" as finga puts it was once in your position. I too get impatient sometimes but as long as someone has done the right thing and been considerate by having everything ready before they back down the ramp i'm more likely to lend a hand than gobb off.

Cheers Chris

[jman2016]

My wife is learning to back the boat trailer down the ramp. One week day quiet afternoon after cruising we were back at boat ramp. young guys with big PWC laughing at missus taking many attempts to back trailer down ramp. Wife gets it right and nails it! Young guys back car down and hook up big PWC to trailer. Small car is unable to find traction on wet, muddy, slimey ramp. They are stuck between rock and hard place. Who has last laugh now!

Choice 1. Leave foolish young with incoming tide and setting sun. No-one else there to help. Getting dark? Teach lesson?

Choice 2. Build bridge and help.

Parked boat and trailer - hitched tow cable and backed 4wd down - pulled errant youngsters from situation. After all they are someones son!