[geordie]

A few years ago we were out on the lake after the end of the official season, the lake was low and there weren't many people around. I had rented a place on Patrician Shore Ct near Center Harbor and we had had to survey the lake by canoe to find the safe way to the dock because of the lack of clarity of the paper chart my friend, the owner of the Donzi 21C Regazza, insisted on using. John is old school, he works in technology, we met when I was mid twenties and we were both doing guided missile work. John learned to navigate with the British Army, so he takes great pride in getting around without technology in his home life. I learned as a Scout (Britain dropped Boy from the name decades ago), so I take what help I can get, to be certain. At that time, about ten years ago, the Google satellite images for the lake weren't great, the reflections from the water and low resolution made them almost useless. These days you can clearly see the dock and the deep water exit straight along the shoreline to the north east, and then rounding the point to the south east and into deep water.

Towards the end of the week John suggested we head over to Moultonborough Bay. It was a great day for being on the lake, there was only a slight breeze, it was a little chilly at around 60F but the lake was almost flat calm. This was before speed limits, so we were able to charge along at around 40 knots in open water. At Chase Point we could see everyone was going to the east around Melvin Island, but John prides himself on his navigation and insisted we just continue through The Graveyard. So I told him to take over. He refused, said it would 'do me good'. So I picked my way through, with the lake low those submerged rocks looked very very hard and close and the water between looks very deep. But no problem, we got through and out into open water again.

Returning at moderate speed (25 knots?) I again suggested we take the deep water. "No, you've done it once, you can do it again." Hmm. That sounds like a recipe for disaster. On the way in I wasn't convinced that keeping to the marked channel had had us far enough from the rocks, but fair enough, it's his boat. So back down to a couple of knots, and I picked my way through the five(!!!) sets of buoys again. After clearing the last set the water looked deep and dark again. Escaped. After crawling along a little further the boss told me to go ahead. OK, great. Everyone sitting down? No traffic? Full power! The sudden intake roar, 275hp to the beautiful Duoprop. The stern dug in, we started to climb out onto the plane again... bump. Vibration. Nothing spectacular. Power off and engine off and tilt the drive up and it's a different story. The Volvo Duoprop was pretzeled. Fortunately it still provided some drive. So we crawled all the way back at low speed. Post mortem found that not only were the props bent but the inner shaft was also bent.

Suddenly it was all my fault, and I happily offered to pay to fix the thing, but John wouldn't hear of that. So I asked him the drive model, intending to just send him the parts. He knew he was in the wrong and wouldn't hear of that. After a few days his wife told him "you know it was your own fault, stop being a jerk about it" and that was the end of the matter.

Back home I checked the charts. That day on the lake there was only a straight shot through five sets of buoys, but where I went straight ahead there should have been a sixth set offset marking a slight dogleg to port. Well. There you go. We should have taken the safe route. That incident gave me an abiding love of jet drives.