most common boat ettiquette violations at the ramp

[sandcraft]

Another one my brother told me about: Man and wife recovering the boat. Wife can't back a trailer so they swap. Man gets trailer into position and is coaching his wife which is piloting the boat. (19' blown jet boat) After several approach attempts and failures and amid much yelling and gesturing between the two, the final words from the man are "just give it some #*&% gas!!! A picture was taken with the couple posed next to thier rig with a boat sitting in the bed of the truck with one of the sponsons jammed through the back window. I havent seen the picture, but I dont have a hard time believing this story either.

[Westcoast]

I hate it when fisherman wait til they are in the basin to start feeding their bait to the fu ck in seagulls....not to mention getting bird sh it on your boat

[Dude! Sweet!]

Two months ago, I watched a guy run an little old o/b powered fiberglass boat up onto the ramp at full throttle like he was taking the beach at Normandy. Concurrent with that, another guy hit the dock with his trailer and high centered his mini-van on the dock while trying to get the trailer off. There was a young guy standing on the dock (affiliated with General MacAurther in the glastron) who just watched as the guy hit the dock with the trialer and didn't say a word.

Of course I was sitting there watching because I flooded my engine... Dang Quadrajet!

Two weeks ago, I watched a guy back off his trailer under power, cut the boat 90 degrees and back into the dock. Then, he gunned it forward to get the drive out from under the dock and hit the breakwall (concrete) on the other side. Awesome!

[rangerrick63]

I find myself laughing at all the posts on this thread, I live & boat on the Mississippis Gulf Coast, they are still trying to rebuild some of our ramps. Unfortunately, some folks forget this. My wife has learned very well on backing the trailer for me to load the boat. What really "chaps" my butt is...she is clearly backing an "empty" trailer down the ramp, I am "clearly" idling toward that empty trailer, but I can't count the times some happy boater deems it necessary to pull in to the dock & tie up right in front of me....I just wonder, what are they trying to accomplish here???...Another thing, our boat ramps has parking clearly marked, vehicle & trailer, or just a vehicle, but on a crowed weekend, I always see a single vehicle (mostly a car, import) parked in a trailer parking area...wow, I could just go on & on about "ramp ettiquette", there should be a book or something...

[PIGPEN160]

Rangerrick

Here Is A Solution To Your Parking Problem. Get A Couple Of Buddies To Lift And Slide The Trailers, On The Sides Of The Import Car, Towards Each Other, Thus Blocking The Car In.

[rangerrick63]

Originally Posted by PIGPEN160

Rangerrick

Here Is A Solution To Your Parking Problem. Get A Couple Of Buddies To Lift And Slide The Trailers, On The Sides Of The Import Car, Towards Each Other, Thus Blocking The Car In.

I do like that idea, I'll have to recruit a few folks next trip to the ramp...That would be good for a laugh when they return for their car....

My favorite ramp at Lake Minnetonka has three lanes. But if boats park on the inside portion of the docks, they block the two outer lanes leaving only the middle lane usable! It's so obvious, but people do it all the time.

I've had good luck with fisherman because they launch all the time and are in-and-out!

I can launch or recover my Scarab, alone, faster than nearly anyone at the ramp it seems. I've even had some guy's wife comment on how can you do that alone? They had like four people trying to get a 16' foot Alumacraft on to the trailer!

My girlfirend and I though are a great team. She can back a trailer better than most men!

All and all, I do enjoy the ramp experience.

[handfulz28]

Well since we've hijacked the ramp eitquette thread into a ramp humor thread...
Looks like I was ramp geek today. I only had one guidepost on and the wind blew the boat away from it. As I pulled it out of the water, the boat was sideways enough to fold over a front centering bunk; I was hoping it was still on good enough that it would slide back on center.
so I had to back it back in, unload and re-tie the boat to the dock and then fix the bunk...and put the other guidepost back on. At least there weren't a lot of people there today

[US1 Fountain]

Originally Posted by rangerrick63

.Another thing, our boat ramps has parking clearly marked, vehicle & trailer, or just a vehicle, but on a crowed weekend, I always see a single vehicle (mostly a car, import) parked in a trailer parking area...

I think that is one of my biggest pet pieves. I don't mind as much when there are 2 cars taking up 1 truck/trailer spot, given the choice over a single vehicle taking both spots. We have approached the DNR guy at our ramp many times about this. They don't enforce the parking lot rules. I don't know if they can legally though, dictate who/what parks where??

Then there's the trailer guy will pull in and cut it short so he taking 4 spots!

[Croozin2]

Originally Posted by sandcraft

My brother told me he goes down to the local lake some weekends and sits at the marina bar that overlooks the ramp and usually leaves when his sides are aching too much from laughing.

That's a common past-time around here too. We've got a couple public launches that have bar/restaurants right alongside. Although all of the items previously listed here are aggravating as hell when you are trying to launch or trailer your rig, sometimes when you're just having a couple cool ones at the watering hole, the entertainment dollar can't be topped! Some people simply should not own a boat....