Maybe we should be fitting a 500 million volt force field around our boat when it is berthed?

We were happy tucked away on this windy wet morning snug in the boat and at peace with the world. Then we saw a sailboat making for the empty berth space next to us.

They came in fine and then, suddenly, took off again at speed and proceeded to knock and scratch and rough up our boat on the way out.

John jumped up to see the boat moving away at great speed.

“Sorry!”, the skipper shouted back.

Looking down at our beautiful shiny dark blue hull were three equally spaced, 6 inch square scuff marks, 90 cms from the water line olong the hull length, proudly displaying their light blue destruction of the hull gel in their glory For all to see!

S*** !

Despite the rain, John jumped in the dingy and hunted down the offending destroyer of hulls around the marina. As it turned out they were a training boat (as well as being a 20 tonne weapon) and when John caught up with them they were trying another ‘stern to’ docking between two other unsuspecting victims and no doubt leaving them both with their unique ‘love bites’.

The careless, unthinking, out of control, unprofessional, liar of a Spanish skipper denied all knowledge of hitting us.

He said the most they did was a slight ‘fender kiss’.

“Your scratches must have been there before and you hadn’t noticed them – No, I’m not going to bother coming and taking a look at them. Your scratches are nothing to do with me us. Why not just try buffing them out.” He confirmed with his student crew that this was nothing to do with them and completely ignored me.

I know people have to practice mooring. But surely it’s too not much to ask of a marina to police local training boats. This is not the first time instructors have chosen to practice next to our boat. It seems normal practice. It seems they pick on any empty berth near bye and decide it’s their right practice there. The pressure on their students must be overwhelming, the cost of damage runs into the thousands of dollars – Geeeesh!!!

They do this knowing full well that as a training vessel, they are inherently a RISK to other boats in the marina. Why can’t they organize student practice at their own berth!

We hate these types of moorings. The only benefit of them as far I can see is Marina operators can pack more boats in to fuel their profits!

John spent the next day and 200 Euros trying to repair the damage without success. This will be a 1500 Euro repair job before the next season.

..having calmed down