Last week I was in Puerto Penasco (Rocky Point), Mexico, which is located on the Sea Of Cortez about 270 miles south of Tucson. I went to the marina to see what was happening and noticed 2 guys trying to dock their boat under power. When I see a guy and a gal in trouble I'll watch for a bit and then offer assistence (normally what happens is the woman jumps at the offer) but with 2 guys I just watch. After about 5 minutes one of the guys asked me if I knew how to dock a boat. I told him to try to point the bow to the dock so I could come aboard and inside of 10 minutes I showed these guys how to make prop walk work for them. Here's how it works. Lets assume you have clockwise right hand rotation. If you have counter clockwise left hand rotation just reverse what I'm telling you. Also, by increasing acceleration, no matter what rotation you have, you just make things worse because the reaction just spped up so go slow with the accelerator. Port side docking - boat going forward and slightly angled toward the dock, rudder centered and engine in reverse. The stern will swing nice and easy toward the dock. Here's where skippers get into trouble in the above situation. Instead of centering the rudder they turn the rudder to port. So the scenario is the the boat is moving forward and bow is slightly angled toward the dock, the rudder is toward port and the engine is in reverse. They goose the engine and the stern first pulls to starboard. To correct the situation they turn the rudder to starboard and that is where things get all screwed up. What they should do is nothing - just wait a few seconds after you goose it and the stern will rapidily pull to port. Say your backing the boat and you want to turn the stern toward the starbord dock. Center the rudder and put the engine in forward. The stern will swing slowly toward the dock. Say you want to rapidly swing the stern to starboard while backing. Turn the rudder to port, put the engine in forward and goose it. The stern will swing rapidly to starboard. It is hard to visualize this stuff sitting at your computer. The best thing to do is try it the next time your on the water. Spend a few minutes in your turning basin (trying this in the slip way is not a good idea until you get the hang of it)to get the idea of how the forward or backing motion of the boat is influenced by the position of the rudder and whether the engine is in forward or reverse and also what happens when you goose the engine. With a little practice you can get so good that you can park your boat in an empty space between 2 boats!! Last week I met 2 nice guys in Puerto Penasco. They shared a few of their Corona's with me. Sitting on a boat, sipping a few beers in the warm Mexico weather and talking about sailing - picture that. It is sure hard to beat!! Anyone got any docking stories they would like to share - either personal or stuff they have seen?
