There are a number of factors that got me into boating. Everything from that childhood experience which I love to tell to the sound. Here is the story!
As a child, I am sure you know the whole teleportation theory. You fall asleep in a car and wake up somewhere else in a bed in a place you have never been.
When I was a kid, about 5 or 6, my uncle would invite my Mom, Dad and I to his house on Lake St. Clair in Michigan. In his back yard he had this canal that was maybe 40-45 feet wide and a mile or so out to the lake near Clinton Township. We would drive up from Cleveland and somewhere around Toledo, Ohio I would fall asleep. The first time waking up in Michigan was in the Cabin of this 1972 Chris Craft Koho. I remember not being on steady ground. I was immediately hooked to the water. The sound, the smell, the sight. It was immediately something I knew I needed to be around for life.
The first time we took that 32 foot boat out I was enamored at the controls, the wake the boat threw off but nothing stuck with me more than the sound of those twin 350’s getting to speed and then synchronizing. There was family, friends, boating, water, neighbors… all was right with the world when you got on the water.
After he moved on from boating for personal reasons and I was boatless and had moved onto other things.
After refereeing a summer hockey game in Lakewood, Ohio after being off of the water for several years the bug struck! I had cash in my pocket, I was 17, I was in Lakewood. Some guy has a boat sitting in a yard within mere minutes from this ice arena. I went driving! Within 10 minutes I was handing some stranger cash for a boat. Sure, it was 16 feet, baby crap green, dry rotted floor and needed 8 years of junk scraped off of the carpet. But I had a boat!
Not knowing ANYTHING about safety, the law, the regulations, maintenance I drug this thing from this guys house directly to a boat ramp with my brother and 3 of the fattest guys I knew! Sure, there was a storm coming in! I only had to cross a 1,000 yard opening in the lake to get from the ramp to the protected area I wanted to be in. After taking 6 or 8 heavy rolls we cracked a gas line, lost the 80 HP Mercury engine to several air pockets and we were taking water! 2 things needed to happen. I needed to patch the hole before we slammed into the rocks and this boat needed to get on a trailer before the storm REALLY hit. Brian took his gum, pasted it over the crack in the fuel line and after 15 seconds of priming and choking the engine we were OFF to the ramp.
That old Rinker runabout took some serious abuse. It never had an ounce of maintenance in 4 years. It was never winterized, never cared for, never failed to start even once. The time came to sell it when I felt it did not get enough use. 3 times out in a season is no way for an old boat to die. Get it to someone who can use it. The people who took the first ride with me helped me sell it. It was gone 3 weeks after the decision to sell it was made. The story has it that that boat ran until the end of the season in 2018 and the hull was scrapped later that year. The engine went on to power a pontoon boat. Without a doubt that old 80 horse power mercury engine might outlast all of us.
About 5 years pass.
A good friend called me and wanted to go to lunch on his early 2000’s 32 foot Rinker Fiesta Vee at Shooters in Cleveland. I was hooked AGAIN! The sound, the sight, the not so sweet smell of the Cuyahoga River. Even though it was a 7 minute boat ride each way it was enough to get my interest peaked again!
Another 8 boat-less years pass.
Things in my life had been dark and I was down-and-out. A break! I get a BIG contract at work. Then a second. Then the BIGGEST BREAK happens! I decided that it was time to get a big-boy boat.
I purchased my first marina kept boat. I was proud of that ugly hunk of fiberglass. That 1983 SeaRay Sundancer 270 had not been cared for in 15+ years. But I paid a few thousand bucks for it and elbow grease was all that kept me from pulling into Port Side Marina on Kelly’s Island on a shiny boat.
Or so I thought.
Plagued with engine troubles from the beginning I was NOT going to be deterred. If it took re-powering the boat, I was going to have a real boat in a real marina. I needed to get that SeaRay from Ashtabula, Ohio to Sandusky, Ohio. About 90-110 nautical miles. What could possibly go wrong?
Quite a bit actually. After 8 or 9 trips to Ashtabula to bottom paint, change fluids, clean it, correct it and make it mine the day came to launch. The crane operator lifted those boats far up in the air and placed them in the water one after the other. Mine goes in. The previous owner and I hop on board. Effortlessly that engine started RIGHT up. As far as I was concerned the deal was DONE! We took it down the river about 30 minutes to the lake and when it came time to crack the throttle? Sputter, backfire, dead in the water. I pulled the throttle back. Shockingly it started right back up. Attempt 2, same deal but now we are having to turn it over several times to get it to start.
For 3 years I had qualified mechanic after qualified mechanic go and check on this 1983 SeaRay Sundancer. The single 454 engine and TRS outdrive should have pushed that boat to 18-23MPH. All I could get was 14MPH and that was riding another boats wake, with a tail wind and a prayer.
The mechanics all had boat repair theories and when I asked to have their theories exhausted by having the repairs done… I was left with a sometimes running 1983 SeaRay Sundancer 270.
The last straw was when I worked on the engine for 2 weekends straight. I sat at the dock and burned countless gallons of gas running the boat at various RPM. Time with the boat in gear and tied to the dock. For HOURS I pushed my cousins boat behind me around as the propeller thrust was directed at his boat. 6 Hours of running, what could go wrong? I untied from the dock and proceeded to make a port turn. I made it to the end of the fairway. Success? Lets make another port turn and get to the fuel dock. As I tied up the boat, I shut down the boat, took my time getting a bag of ice while fueling commenced. I waited a while to ventilate the bilge. Turned the key AND…..
Dead!
The engine would turn over. It would pop and sputter. It would do the same with starting fluid. But after an hour of waiting, fiddling and tinkering… It was time to call my cousin for the walk of shame and the tow of shame back to my slip.
The Decision
As I walk to the front of the boat to secure my boat to a jetski, I made up my mind that this boat would simply remain at the dock and trying to get it off of the dock was out of the question. I pass the line off to Rick. As I scale the gunwale back to the cockpit I slip twice on what I thought was water. I jumped to the deck wiping out in the process. As I laid there making sure nothing was sticking out of my body I realized that water is not what is causing me to slip. It was my blood. All these years later I can still tell you that I have absolutely NO clue as to what slit my foot open. As I make my way to my feet I decided that this boat and I do not get along. It would be better to get a boat that I could get along with. I hobble to the windshield to talk to my cousin. With one hand on a tow line and the other on the controls of the jet ski I decided to ask Rick if he wanted to buy the boat for what I had into it. He bought it right there and then.
