Let me start with the good. We spent the last 4 days in Alma taking a mini vacation like many do on a holiday weekend. The weather was gorgeous, hotel accommodations excellent (Thanks Les!), and the fishing was above average. Of course boat and vehicle traffic was heavy but when people use their heads things will go surprisingly smooth. It’s when people don’t use the six inches between their ears that stuff goes afoul. This brings me to the point of this post.
Boat Ramp Etiquette: Certainly there should be a guide for those new to boating to use as they’d learn and as a result have a much better time on the water. But the people that really need to read it never would, likely out of ignorance or arrogance. I found out what irritates me even more than people hollering, while not offering to help, at someone having loading/unloading troubles at the ramps. That is BLOCKING the ramps with their boats. I lost track how many times I was victim to this over the weekend. Ok, I lied. It was once Thursday, twice Friday, and twice again Saturday. I’ll not count the one time today because I’m in a good mood. As I mentioned the boat traffic was HEAVY right? So what makes people think it is ok to tie off at the damn ramps and sit there waiting for their buddies to go on a beer run?
The first time it happened a young fellow was sitting in his larger than average ski boat that was tied off on the river side of the Alma landing. He had no intentions of moving to the sandy beach just off to the side of the dock even though there were two boats waiting to come off the water and three to go in. I was in the three. Everyone made do while muttering under their breath at the kid in the boat. We got in and went fishing. Two hours later we come back as we had company coming. Guess what? Here sat the SAME BOAT and the SAME KID! Did he ever leave? No idea! And again there was a line waiting. When we finally got on the trailer my blood was boiling. (I had a newer red F150 and black/tan Lund. If you are reading this and I talked to you, understand how close you were to a quick bath!) I turned and, as calmly as I possibly could, pointed to the sandy area and told the kid if all he was going to do was sit in his boat that he needed to move it over so everyone else could get loaded. His smart reply? “I am waiting on my friends, should only be a minute.” Sure enough, here they came as we pulled out carrying another load of beer.
This same scenario played out time after time all weekend. Strangely enough only one time was it a boat registered in Wisconsin. Regardless of where people are from or go common sense and courtesy seems to be lost. Saturday we came to the launch and found a boat on both side of the ramp tied off and NO ONE AROUND!! WTF?? This morning we get there and find a group of people on each side loading up. No big deal. But after they got loaded up they decided it was hot and they needed some soda. So there they stand jack jawing and drinking pop with both boats in the water! I swear I damn near went into orbit. If it wasn’t for the delay today however we may have damaged a prop, we noticed the replacement was loose and thought we may have gotten the incorrect replacement Saturday. (Another story about rock piles, lol. Another thanks to the friendly gentleman at Alma Marine!)
Bottom line is simple. If you are using a boat ramp please consider those around you. Hollering and honking at people having trouble loading/unloading while offering no help is asinine. Taking the extra step and acting like you are at your own private landing and leaving your stuff in the way is completely inexcusable. The two that left their boats tied and unattended were very close to having to get help retrieve their mysteriously floated away boats.
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