View Single Post
Old 08-17-2012, 11:03 PM   #2
Long Pine
Senior Member
 
Long Pine's Avatar
 
Join Date: Apr 2007
Posts: 93
Thanks: 12
Thanked 33 Times in 12 Posts
Default

I agree that I have seen a lot of inconsiderate boating behavior this summer. We live in an area of the lake that is frequently used for pulling skiers, wakeboarders, wakesurfers, tubers, etc. I have had similar situations of boaters following in the path of the person I am towing and have also had to swing around quickly to put my boat in the path between an oncoming boat and a skier I had in the water. The boat passed no more than 50 feet away at around 20 mph pulling a tuber.

Anyway, the courtesies I try to extend to others (because I hate when they are not extended to me) are:

1) Never follow in the same path directly behind a boat that is in the process of towing a skier, tuber, etc. Even if you are at a reasonable distance and paying attention, you will make the driver of the boat pulling the skier extremely nervous because he/she will assume you are not.
2) When you are pulling tubers and swerving back and forth, don't send mixed signals to another boater about where you will steer your boat - if there are any boats in the general vicinity, just pick a line and go straight for a while; resume swerving only when you have some wide open space and there are no other boaters nearby who may be confused by your path and have to alter theirs.
3) If you can reasonably spread out on the lake and avoid sending your boat wake at skiers looking for calm water, do it - especially if you are pulling someone at a slower speed where your boat throws off a huge wake.
4) Always be looking forward while driving - let your spotters do their job.
5) While pulling someone or passing another boat that is pulling someone, go out of your way to put as much space between you and the other boat as possible. In addition to the obvious "don't break the 150 ft rule", if you can put more space between you and them, all the better.

There are probably others but those are the ones that come to mind for me.
Long Pine is offline   Reply With Quote
The Following User Says Thank You to Long Pine For This Useful Post: