Pontoon Boat & Deck Boat Forum

I have read all the posts about the difficulty of leaving the slip in windy conditions. I made my first attempt today and there was nothing to it.
I was just glad there were all those other boats to bounce off of...

Leaving my slip is one thing. Getting the beast back into the slip with a side wind is quite another .

I did that today in around a 15 mph wind , its interesting

I've always found it interesting when loading the boat onto the trailer at the lake with a good cross wind, but loading the boat onto the trailer in the river was a bitch... not only strong cross wind, but the current....fortunately I don't toon on the river very often....

Usually, leaving the slip is not an issue since the boats, piers & roofs upon the piers stop a lot of wind. Going slow in a no-wake area gets tricky, as is docking at an open air marina to fuel up. It gets a bit trickier when there's other traffic & the marina is tight with docked boats, not all of which fit their slips.

Keep the power on, and a push-pole helps (as long as it hasn't been lost in choppy weather & you don't realize until too late. Yeah, it happens.), as does someone who can jump off & tie down the front end. Then it's easy to draw the rear-end into the dock.

But don't get complacent about driving in the wind if you hafta dock for fuel (or beer) at an unfamiliar marina. Staying under power is a must, even if you have to keep jiggling from right to left & forward & reverse, which you will have to do to jockey the boat just to stay even at some point. And when the wind is blowin' you can't be subtle on the throttle. (Well, at least I can't with an underpowered billboard on floats)

Just M.D.A.O. on the subject.