Dave Selby
When it comes to having a regulation for everything, you canÕt beat a bit of yacht racing
Last month, what with a little bit of time on my hands, I made a solemn vow to PBO readers to produce the world’s first English-language version of A Seaman’s Guide to the RULE OF THE
ROAD. I’m afraid it’ll probably have to be next month now at the earliest as Google Translate can’t identify the source language.
I hope you’ll bear with me as I’m sure there are some really great rules in there, and like most British leisure sailors – apart from my mate Tommy the racer with his fully-battened jacket made out of the mainsail of a defeated Cowes Week contender – I particularly enjoy spending most of my time afloat, ashore, aground, in the pub, at home or asleep wondering what regulations I’ve broken and whether anyone will visit me in prison.
This peculiarly British trait of looking for rules to obey is one of the reasons we left the EU: there just weren’t enough rules.
You see, no one – not even my other mate, Sir Tom Cunliffe OBE, who invented sailing in the 1960s and who I’m sure would be among the very first who’d like to see me in prison, even if he didn’t visit me – knows the rules as well as Tommy the racer.
A few summers ago I got embroiled in what’s known as ‘a fast developing situation’ with a lot of people on the boats all around me shouting a lot.
Apparently the correct nautical term for lots of boats near each other shouting a lot is ‘yacht racing’.
For reasons quite possibly explained in Yachting World all the boats were aiming for a floating mark with a flag on it. And so was I: as the buoy wasn’t on my chart I thought I’d go and investigate and report my findings to Trinity House, who may well have lost it.
To be frank I also felt a bit out of my depth as 9ft of water is quite deep for a Sailfish 18, and I was aiming in shore to alleviate my vertigo.
It was round about then that Tommy the racer started calmly shouting at all the other boats along the lines “vessel abaft the starboard futtock gunwale, I shall give you water” and “vessel full and by the lee mizzen scupper, I shall also give you water,” and rather more stridently, “vessel closely resembling a soap dish, port-a-loo, wheelie bin or whatever, but certainly not a boat, I shall NOT give you water.”
Call it intuition, but I had a vague inkling he meant me, and so I replied: “No worries, Tommy mate, I don’t need any water, I’ve got plenty of lager on board.”
I can only surmise that what he said next was a direct quote from the Rule Of The Road because it didn’t even sound like language of any kind.
Later, in the Queen’s Head, Tommy separated himself from his fully-battened jacket colleagues and said: “Dave, you’ve let yourself down yet again.”
Call it intuition, but as I was the only Dave present and Tommy was also standing right over me, I had a vague inkling he meant me. What with general life experience and such situations not being entirely unfamiliar to me I replied: “Would you like a drink?”
Later, when most of the fully-battened brigade had sidled out on account of not being able to go through doors front ways because of their battens I said to Tommy: “I know I let myself down but I’d be fascinated to know if I’ve discovered a new way of doing it.”
“Well Dave, according to the rule of the road you should have been showing two all-round red lights in a vertical line, two balls or similar shapes in a vertical line and sound three blasts, to whit one prolonged one followed by two short blasts at intervals of not more than two minutes.”
“Thank you, Tommy,” I replied, “very interesting and informative and possibly even life-changing. What are you on about?”
“Well,” blurted Tommy, “those are the internationally recognised signals for a vessel not under command and you’re clearly not in command of your vessel… or of your senses.”
“Thank you, Tommy, very much indeed,” I replied. “I’ll bear that in mind. Would you like to co-author my translation of the Rule Of The Road?”
‘Like most British leisure sailors I particularly enjoy spending my time afloat, ashore, aground, in the pub or asleep’