Yup...first time out, botched the docking at my marina. I get it, if you have a boat and done it long enough everyone botches a docking but...

New marina, on a river mouth/harbor that gets tidal movement. Went down to the boat (30 Pursuit DC) to start outfitting it for the summer, the guys wanted to move me to a new spot, a better spot, so they came down and said if I can bring it out of the alley they'll move the boat in front of me down and I can have his spot, wasn't really prepared to screw around with it but what the heck. I didn't really get the lay of the new location, had only seen it once but I heard it could be a bit tricky from the guys depending on the wind, tide, river flow etc. It's a parallel docking situation, sort of tight in front and back.

Well I took it out of the alley while they moved the boat in front of me back, I brought it back in thinking I was going to spin it in the alley even though it's tight and go forward to parallel it like any other situation. Not really knowing the dynamics of the location I just went in like I would normally, well the tide must have been roaring in and it pushed my to the opposite side of the alley and now I'm like WTF? It happened so fast I was caught off guard and my hull side scraped along the anchor of the boat opposite of where I wanted to be...total panic set in, all I could hear was a horrible scraping sound that seemed like an eternity. Then I turned total noob fumbling with the controls, didn't know WTF I was doing, meanwhile these two dockhands are staring at me like I'm the new moron in the marina. I finally managed to get it paralleled in after much fumbling.

How friggin embarrassing, after they tied it off I leaned over the side to see what I thought would be 15' of gouge on a perfect hullside...fortunately the other boat's anchor hit my rub rail instead and all was well. Sheesh...gotta give this some thought before I go out next time. The dock hand tried to make me feel better telling me one of the members took 25 minutes to dock in his new Regulator the day before...I guess when they said it could be tricky they weren't kidding.

Does anyone else have some embarrassing docking experiences? I need to hear something so I don't feel like the only one. Geez...what a start to the season lol.

The brain freeze can happen to anyone when others are watching!
i was backing in my old Scarab at a marina when visiting some friends....done it a million times before....for some odd reason when you have more then 1 person watching you the pressure goes exponentially up!
i was slowly backing in and wanted to just flip it into forward and burp the throttles to slow the boat down some.....brain said one thing...the hand did another and i didnt put it into forward but when right to burping the throttle.....boat hit the dock kinda hard (thankfully no damage anywhere) but i almost sent 3 guys into the drink that were standing there watching me
Then you get to have them poke fun and rib ya the rest of the day

I've had a couple terrible follies while docking. My favorite was docking my 26' Sonic somewhere near Kent Island, MD, in a wicked current and a breeze. I was pretty much on my own, as my GF at the time wasn't 'boat trained'. I went up on the bow to tie off on the pilings to finish backing into the slip. I mistook the edge of the boat for what I thought was the edge of the raised bow, (I thought I still had the grip rail to step onto). I literally just teetered and cartwheeled into the water. The problem was the engine was still running, extremely loud as the sound was bouncing off the breakwall. Everyone was looking, my GF couldn't see nor hear where I went. I swam to the back of the boat and had to pull down the ladder, and climb back aboard, absolutely praying that she didn't somehow accidentally put the boat in gear.

Many years later, I was with the owners of a brand new boat, getting them familiar with it as we ran the Miami Boat Show FPC poker run. If you haven't docked at the backside of the Islamorada Tiki Bar, it's REALLY tight. We had the slip literally next to the bar/pool table, so there was always a crowd, and you had to back all the way down the fairway, and bang a backing in turn to port and done. I was charged with docking that weekend due to how sketchy it was; and nailed it perfectly every time. The whole starboard side of the alley heading in/out was lined with flatboat skiffs up on lifts, so the only thing sticking out were props. Well, someone 'higher in the company' came down to drive the boat for the day, I jumped on the bow to fend off of the sharp props if needed. I was instructed back into the cockpit. Immediately afterward the starboard side of the bow hit a prop and dinged the brand new boat and paint with a gouge about 6" long. I didn't say a word. Later, I found a permanent marker to color in the gouge for the rest of the weekend.

We were in a poker run a few years ago on a fairly windy day in our single engine 25' Checkmate. One of the stops was at a restaurant/marina pictured below. The wind was blowing from top to bottom and I figured it would be best to dock with the bow into the wind for easier departure. Idea was to enter this "box" area, make 270 degree turn, come back upwind near the dead end of the skinny dock and tie up on the port side. There were two boats at the top of this box (twin engines) and two boats (singles) at the bottom. Nobody on the sides. I got in, started my turn and made it 180 degrees, which put the SB side perpendicular to the wind, and I figured out later, the tide. With the 10-15 mph wind and the tide, we took off like a rocket toward the bottom of this box with the two boats there. I was already wheel hard to SB, so I goosed the throttle but it just went straight, then quickly ran out of room. Hard to port in reverse, no help. One more time SB/forward with a lot of throttle and again it just went straight. It was like the wind and tide had us locked to only go forward and backwards, with not enough room to complete the turn. It felt like we were doing 15 mph sideways, and by now I was faced with crashing into one of the boats at the bottom. There was, however, a small open space at the bottom right corner. I ordered wife and daughter # 1 to be ready with feet out yelling "don't let us crash into them." At this point I was just aiming with forward/reverse of the shifter. It was like playing Tetris. Our 25' boat came to rest against the dock, which luckily has nice soft cushions, in a 27' space. My prop was practically under the dock behind us, and my bow was over to the guys swim platform in front of me. I was very lucky it all worked out without a scratch to our boat or others.

Twin engine boat owners, don't forget this story when you see a single engine boat docking like an idot....LOL

Every docking is a leaning experience....

I do the gear shifts to control around docks.
but all it takes is that blink
And your hands over react
Add in wind gusts, and weird flows around the docks
wind deciding the last second that shifts 90 or 180 degrees.
instead of gentle touch on your bumpers..you are jammed in or blown off
Practice..
I do a few practices in open water
if i am feeling toted from sun etc
I have been blown off the perfect approach
And been spun by mother nature
And spun when my hand shifted wrong gear
We are human
Best case is zero damage
And nobody gets bounced into the water
and when we get peanut gallery or a crowd and busy docks or ranps
mr. Murphy will appear