Swearing in French

Vergennes, Vermont
44 10.17 N 073 15.50 W

Here below the waterfall, the current is really swift. Yesterday I decided to move Tarwathie forward on the dock about 10 feet. Doing so would make enough room for another boat to fit in behind us. I started the engine and asked Libby to man the lines. Well, I didn't allow properly for the current. Tarwathie's nose swung out away from the dock and the bow line pulled tight. Libby, very intelligently, quickly tied off the bow line rather than trying to pull on it. That left us nearly broadside to the current and the dock lines were stretched very tight. A bunch of neighboring boaters, all Quebecers, rushed to help. One man, having less good sense than Libby untied the bow line and tried to pull. He almost lost the whole thing which would have been a disaster. Finally, with the help of at least 6 strong men, we wrestled Tarwathie in to place. In the meantime, I was immersed in a live language lesson learning how to cuss in French. (Don't ask me to repeat it.)

Anyhow, all that effort left room for a 38 foot boat behind us. Within minutes, another boat came up, but it was (whoops) 39 feet long. The skipper skillfully managed to parallel park the boat, but his bow was banging on Tarwathie's stern while his dinghy astern threatened the boat behind him. Once again, swear a lot in French, get lots of help, and finally, we got that man's dinghy down and out of the way and had him tied with inches to spare. (No mor than inches thought.)

We've been meeting some wonderful people here at the docks. Last night is was Dave and Nadine from Burlington. Dave is an ex Burlington Cop and Nadine is a public housing lawyer in Burlington. Sounds like the making of a TV series; right? Anyhow, they were very nice and very interested in the cruising life. Dave's dream is to cruise. Nadine didn't contradict but I didn't hear her enthuse either.

This morning we met a delightful couple, Pierre and Christina on the yacht L'ecclume Des Mers. They live in the Laurentian Mountains north of Montreal. Their steel boat, they hand built themselves. Pierre's story of building his steel boat was very reminiscent of the stories we heard from Captain Barr from Nova Scotia who we met on Green Turtle Cay last winter. Pierre's profession was to create jewelry. He scaled up his metal working skills from ear rings to yachts. He did it very well. Pierre and Christiana have cruised extensively so they and we had fun swapping stories. I hope very much to meet up with them another time.