as i’ve written about, something is always going wrong with our pontoon boat.  yes, it’s very old, but kevin replaced everything from the floor up several years ago, the pontoons are fine, in theory it is perfectly seaworthy.  lakeworthy.

the issue is always the motor, which was always breaking down, and we replaced a couple of years ago (two years ago?  three years ago?  i thought it was last year, but kevin assures me it was before that).

we had gone to our boat repair guy, josh, to see about fixing the old motor once again and they’d just got another used motor in, and we said we wanted it.  josh hadn’t inspected it or anything yet, and there’s the problem.

so once again, this year, all kinds of motor problems.  we had something fixed on it, took it out again, and there was still something not right.  josh said that water was getting into the engine, and the problem could either be a $500 issue, or he’d have to take the motor apart and that would cost more than the motor was worth.

oh boy.

so josh sold us a new used motor last week, and i was reservedly excited about it.  it’s more horsepower than the old one, and kevin picked it up on monday.

yesterday at 3:10, kevin said “do you want to go launch the boat?”  i said i had to give a massage at 4:00, but he said it woudn’t take long.

we drove over to the boat launch and i climbed into the boat, kevin backed me into the water, unhooked the boat and set me free.

i pushed the button to lower the motor into the water…and it woudn’t budge.  uh oh.

i yelled at kevin THE MOTOR ISN’T GOING DOWN!  he climbed in back and hung onto the railing and tried with all his might to get the motor to lower, but it wasn’t working.  the wind had picked up and the boat kept ominously hitting the end of the ramp with horrible scraping noises.

he called josh, who didn’t answer, so kevin backed the trailer into the water and tried to pull the boat out.  since his vision is impaired he couldn’t see the boat exactly and somehow the front of the boat got trapped under the back of the trailer.  we spent a frantic amount of time trying to pry them apart, involving kevin lifting up the trailer and me lamely trying to push with all my might, which wasn’t mighty at all.

somehow the boat got dislodged, so i stood on the deck clinging to the ramp while kevin went back to the car to take a call from josh.

i’d watched a guy sail boarding nearby, and he paddled up.  “it looks like you were having fun,” i said to him.”  “it was at first” he said grimly.  i know he wanted to drive his car down the ramp to get his board and sail out of the water but he didn’t say anything about it, just swimmed around to the other edge of the ramp.  i asked him if he needed any help (what kind of help would i have been able to give him???), but he said no, he was fine.

kevin came back and said that josh was on his way!  josh is a really good guy.  kevin had unhitched the trailer and told me to drive the van home so i wouldn’t be late for my massage, so that’s what i did.

my client was late, and while i was waiting for her, kevin came home on the boat.  josh had fixed it enough to lower the motor into the water, but the piece that you push to get the boat into gear had snapped off.

whew.  it was an intense bit of time, but now the boat is OK to go until the new parts come in that josh ordered.  meanwhile, kevin says i’ll be able to take the boat out just fine.  he says that when he and josh took the boat out to test it, they were able to converse even though the boat was going really fast – that’s never happened before with our older, slower motors.

so we’ll see.  we’re going out right now and take it for a test spin.  wish us luck.

ok then,

mrs. a perfectly cool and lovely wednesday morning in late august hughes.