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Hume and Gerda Fink
already knew the basics—lines, Rules of the Road, basic safety, etc.
Both had spent significant time on the water and say they enthusiastically
helped out when needed. But with Hume’s desire to retire onboard
and with Fink and her husband about to cruise the Great Loop on their
own 42-foot Grand Banks, both women needed and wanted to be able to do
more.
Connie Macaluso had
less powerboat experience. Although she and her husband owned a sailboat
many years ago, she mostly watched the kids while he ran the boat. He
is now looking into buying a powerboat and gave Macaluso this course as
a gift. “Who was the gift actually for? That is the question,”
she laughs, adding that she was as excited as he was about taking the
course.
But it was my classmate
Marjorie Tompkins’ reasons for taking the class that most surprised
and inspired me. A widow in her 70’s, she recalls when her kids were
younger, the family used to go out on their 32-foot cruiser. Her husband
would drive, and she would take care of the “little stuff.”
Now that her husband has passed and her kids are spread out along the
East Coast, she wanted to have a place where her family could come together.
So she bought herself a 36-foot Marine Trader. Although she was in the
class for the same reasons as the rest of us, this woman needed no lesson
in confidence.
For that matter, neither
did our teacher. Moore is a licensed Coast Guard captain and spent many
years as a sailing teacher and delivery captain before founding Sea Sense.
She has the patience of a saint and the ability to explain something technical
in layman’s terms (like when she used a grapefruit and a marker to
show how currents affect a boat’s course).
She also has a sense
of humor. “The first thing I am going to teach you about is where
the brakes are,” Moore told us during our orientation at the marina
in Bradenton, Florida. After giving us an overview of what we would be
learning in the next few days, we talked in depth about close-quarters
maneuvering, the helm controls, and, of course, how to stop the boat.
Next page >
Part 3: My favorite lesson was the man-overboard drills on our last day. > Page 1,
2, 3, 4
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