Footsteps on the ladder. Doc’s craggy face appeared over the gunwale.
‘Making progress?’
‘Oof. Slowly.’ Jamie sat back on his heels, looked at the deck he’d been attacking with a hot air gun and steel scraper all morning. All the while cursing the silly bastard who’d painted a seventy-year-old Huon pine deck with layer upon layer of bitumen – instead of repairing and caulking it with the respect it deserved.
That was the trouble with a working boat, though, Doc had said. Quick and dirty was good enough, when it came to repairs. Just get it done and get back to sea, making money.
‘You won’t regret it when it’s finished. Bastard of a job, though. Reckon you could use some time out. Come on.’
‘What? Where are we going?’
‘Out on the river. We’ll take Misty for a spin.’
Misty Mornings was Doc’s little runabout, a twenty-four-foot motor launch. Immaculate timber deck and cream topsides. A real head-turner on the river. Jamie knew how proud he was of her. This was a rare honour and not one to be passed up.
‘Grab your fleece and beanie, it’s a bit breezy out there. See you down at the boat.’
Jamie joined Doc on the timber wharf.
‘See how she’s tied up?’
It looked like a cat’s cradle of ropes.
‘See the warp from the bow for’ard? That’s the bow line. Stops her drifting away down river on the ebb. Find me the stern line.’
Jamie took a punt on one rope out of the cat’s cradle.
‘Correct! The stern line runs from the stern aft. So she can’t get away up river on the flood. The two of ’em together keep her parallel to the wharf. Now, here’s the stern spring and the bow spring, see? The springs run the opposite way to the warps, from the same point on board the vessel.’
‘Sorry, Doc. Are they supposed to be that loose, the ropes, err lines, warps?’
‘Good question! They aren’t bowstring tight, because you’ve got to make allowance for the tide. Otherwise you’ll come back at low tide to find several tons of boat hanging off the wharf, and your cleats about to rip through the deck. So she can still sway,’ he indicated a side-to-side motion with his hand, ‘and that’s why you need the fenders – stop her getting scratched by the rough timbers of the wharf.’
It still seemed a lot of ropes, to tie one small boat to the wharf.
‘Reason I’m telling you this, is it’s important to know what each of these warps is doing. Each one is holding forces at bay. As soon as you take it off, those forces will be released – and things will start to happen to your boat.’
Things will start to happen. What things?
‘So, which two lines are doing the work right now?’
‘The bow line and the stern line?’
Doc shook his head. Jamie looked again.
‘Which lines are taut?’ prompted Doc.
‘The bow line and the stern spring?’
‘Got it! We’re on the ebb and the current is trying to pull her downriver, see?’
Jamie saw.
‘Now, when we’re on board, and we cast off the bow line, what will happen?’
‘The bow will swing out?’
‘Exactly. At least, that’s what we’re hoping for,’ Doc winked. ‘And when that happens, what’s she going to do?’
‘Drift backwards.’
‘Not if we can bloody well help it, she won’t. We don’t want her arse slamming into the wharf. We’ll already have the motor on, idling. Ready to ease her into forward gear. As the bow swings out, we’ll give her just enough forward to keep her stern off the wharf, and we’ll cast off and retrieve that stern spring, quick as you like, get the rope out of the water, away from the prop. There will be plenty of water flowing over the rudder, so we’ll have steering.’
What did he mean? Of course they’d have steering. That’s what the steering wheel was for, surely?
‘When all lines are cleared and retrieved, we’ll ferry glide out into the stream, and off we go. Ready?’
‘Ready as I’ll ever be.’
‘Right-o. Make the lines ready, deckie!’
What, me? thought Jamie. He can’t mean me. I have no idea what I’m doing.
Doc was standing there expectantly, arms folded. Clearly, he had no intention of laying hands on any ropes himself. Warps. Springs. Lines. Whatever the hell they were called.
‘Don’t worry. I’ll let you know soon enough, if you’re doing it wrong.’
In the event, it required a lot more instruction and demonstration, before everything was to Doc’s satisfaction.
As they motored upriver, Doc glanced sideways at Jamie behind his sunglasses.
‘Lovely stretch of water, ain’t it? Nothing better than to be out here on a warm afternoon.’
It was glorious. The motor purred and the bow pushed the waves aside with a gentle rhythmic splash. The leather seats were warm in the sun.
‘Thing is, Jamie my friend, a boat is not a vehicle. It’s a vessel. Completely different kettle of fish.’
Jamie said nothing, waited for the explanation he knew was coming.
‘A vehicle operates on a fixed and stationary platform. Terra firma. Apply torque to the wheels and it moves; apply friction, and it stops. Angle the wheels left or right, and it tracks accordingly. Turns around a pivot point that’s always the same for that vehicle – unless we’re on a low-friction surface, or overcome friction with excessive speed, then there’s drift. With me so far?’
Jamie nodded. Of course he was.
‘A vessel is different. It moves through a medium which is always changing, itself moving. The pivot point is different – every damn time, because there’s always drift, constantly varying.
‘But there’s still friction, and your medium has mass, lots of it, a tonne per cubic metre, which you have to shove out of the way. Water resists your passage. Try walking through water and you’ll find that out. Still with me?’
‘Yup.’
‘Unless you’ve got a planing vessel, more akin to an aircraft in some ways, the water’s resistance limits your speed. You just can’t go very fast, no matter how big your engine or your sailing rig is. Once you get up to hull speed, you can’t push the water ahead of you out of the way any faster.’
Hull speed?
‘Now, here’s a thing. Your hull speed depends on your waterline length – and nothing else. So your boat, with a waterline length of thirty-six feet, can only go as fast as any other thirty-six foot boat. About eight knots.’
Jamie tried to get his head around that.
‘Meanwhile, the natural forces acting on the vessel are much more powerful than the vessel itself. The waves, the swell, the wind and the tide, they can’t be ignored or defeated. Even if your vessel is a big bully tug or a container ship. Or a forty-four-foot cray boat with a hundred and fifty horses down in the engine room. You literally have to go with the flow.
‘Bear in mind, there are places around this coast with eight-knot currents. At pinch points like Hells Gate, Macquarie Harbour, you can get more than that.’
‘Sure. But –’
‘At the same time, your vessel has a lot of mass. So it has a lot of momentum. And no brakes. Disasters at sea happen slowly – but inexorably. You have time to watch the shit slowly hitting the fan, and curse yourself for a fool all the while. And to grieve – for the loved ones whose lives you’re going to scar by your inevitable death.’
Jamie thought of his brother Lachie. Sixteen years old. Struggling in the white water with a pot line around his ankle. Seeing his life torn away from him, feeling the last breath sucked from his lungs, while his father watched on, helpless.
‘You all right, mate? Look like you’ve seen a ghost.’
‘Yeah. Yeah, fine.’
‘Okay, your turn to get a feel for her. Take the helm.’
It wasn’t as if he had no experience around boats. He’d rowed a dinghy, paddled a kayak down the Hunter with Mags. Hired a tinny at Bateman’s Bay a couple of times, when the kids were young.
The launch responded quickly to tiny turns of the wheel. The river was flowing fast, and there were eddies and counter-currents, and a sudden breeze, now, blowing from the other bank. He tended to over-steer at first. Doc made him do some doughnuts. There was a huge difference in response from the helm, whether you were turning against the current or with it.
‘With an inboard motor, you’re not turning the whole motor to turn the boat, like in a tinny with an outboard. You’re relying on the flow of water over the rudder blade. If the rudder is stationary relative to the water, you’ve got no steering. Put her in neutral and let her drift … That’s it. Don’t worry, we’ve got plenty of clear water.’
The boat slowed until it was carried by the current. Soon it began to rotate slowly.
‘Right, now turn the wheel. Get us pointing the right way.’
‘Fuck.’
‘Quite. Doesn’t do a damn thing, does it? Because we’re moving with the water. Back into forward gear.’
As Misty Mornings gathered speed, Jamie found he could steer again.
‘Now I want you to do a neat figure-of-eight. Nice and tight and symmetrical. Then you can do the same thing in reverse.’
He tried several times and failed to meet Doc’s exacting standards.
‘What’s going on, Jamie?’
‘Buggered if I know.’
Doc laughed. ‘Prop walk.’
‘What’s that?’
‘The prop – or screw – doesn’t just screw the boat forwards through the water. It also chucks water out to the side. That creates a lateral force acting on the vessel. Some props turn clockwise in forward gear. We call ’em right-handed. They push the boat to the right. Left-handers turn anti-clockwise, push the boat to the left. In reverse, the effect is reversed – and much stronger. As you’re discovering right now.’
It couldn’t be denied.
‘If you know your boat, you can prop-walk the stern in, when you come alongside. You can use it to turn the boat on the spot in a tight corner. If you think you can ignore the prop walk, on the other hand, you’re bound for a world of disappointment.’
Doc was staring at him earnestly now. Almost glaring. Jamie felt uncomfortable.
‘You’re going to be in command of a thirty-five tonne, one-fifty horsepower wooden vessel, Jamie boy. Not Misty. If the Audrey Liza comes into contact with waterside infrastructure or other vessels in an uncontrolled way, even a little bit too fast, even half a knot, she’s going to fuck stuff up. You’re going to have a bad day. Really bad.’
‘And don’t be thinking you can just sit safely on your mooring, and never go anywhere. You’re going to have to move her regularly – manoeuvre alongside fragile, expensive objects. Soft, squishy human beings. Some clown in their million-dollar plastic yacht at the fuel pontoon. A teenage girl in her kayak who shouldn’t be between you and the wharf – but suddenly she is. You’re going to have to take on supplies, and pump out your black water tank. You can either find a quay with a dump point, and good luck with that, or you can motor fifteen miles offshore to empty your tank legally. You can’t just pump your shit into the river. Not any more.’
Fifteen miles! And that would be after leaving the estuary.
‘Boat handling is a very particular set of skills, to coin a phrase. I know, I know: you’re a good driver. Is there an Aussie bloke alive who thinks he isn’t? But that means bugger-all on the water. It’ll be no help whatever in understanding what your boat – your big, expensive, beautiful, old boat – is going to do in a given situation. Let alone making her do what you want.’
It was the most he’d ever heard Doc say in one go. The shipwright took a big breath, grinned, patted Jamie on the shoulder.
‘Here endeth the lesson. Take her back in. We’re going to do some bump-and-go alongside the pier. Leave this mark to port … Yeah, that’s starboard, mate.’
Coming up:
This Friday in The Last Orchard: Leigh resolves to take care of herself better, tries to meet the neighbours and invokes Jamie’s name for a convenient fiction. (Paid subscription.)
Next Tuesday in Audrey Liza: After a drunken run-in with Stan, Jamie decides to take some time out.
I'm still trying to digest all of that. Poor Jamie 😂