When my parents lived in Bellevue, Washington, in the 1980s, they owned a small cabin cruiser. I don’t recall much about the boat, and I never went out in it. They mostly sailed on Lake Washington, but occasionally, then took it into Puget Sound and up into the San Juan Islands.
To get from Lake Washington to Puget Sound requires passing through the Hirem M. Chittenden Locks in the Ballard area of Seattle.
I first remember seeing the Ballard Locks when my grandmother lived in Ballard, and my husband and I took our small children to see the locks to have something to do other than sit in my grandmother’s apartment. My husband and our kids enjoyed watching the boats go through the locks and the fish climb the fish ladder to return from the ocean to their spawning grounds past Lake Washington.
Most recently, when I was in Seattle for my daughter’s wedding, we visited the locks again. We watched my son-in-law’s sailboat go through the locks and then went to see the fish ladder.
But this story took place back in the early 1980s, when my parents took their boat through the locks.
It was their first time through the locks. Dad steered the boat, and Mother was in charge of the ropes. She wasn’t very experienced, but Dad told her, “All you have to do is throw the rope to the dockhand when he asks for it.” The dockhand would be responsible for tying the boat to the lock, so it wouldn’t hit other boats as the water level lowered from Lake Washington to Puget Sound.
They entered the lock, and the time came. “Toss me the rope,” the man called to Mother.
And Mother threw him the whole thing. No one had told her to first be sure the rope was affixed to their boat.
The dockhand shook his head and threw her back the end with a loop. “Put it over the cleat, lady.”
My dad always chuckled when he told that story.
Though that might have been the same trip when Dad hit a rock and destroyed the propeller. Or maybe it was the trip when the battery in the boat went bad. There were plenty of stories to go around, with plenty of foolish happenings.
What boating mishaps have happened in your family?
No boating mishaps here. Although we lived high above the San Francisco Bay, we were not “boaters.” That said, I was invited to join friends on their boats both on the bay and up into the Sierras. A friend of mine, her name was also Pam, used to invite me to water ski with her family. I LOVED WATERSKIING! My heart leapt as I skied back and forth across the waves made by the boat. Pure joy.
We were a waterskiing family. I loved it, too. https://www.theresahuppauthor.com/blog/2022/06/01/the-family-that-waterskis-together/
I fell into the water near the dock trying to get off a small speedboat in Boynton Beach, Florida. This was in 2005 when I was younger and nimble, or so I thought. Pretty embarrassing.
We all have those moments.