In early May, at the start of what was to be one of our coldest summers, the newly appointed President of the Pontoon Camping Association decided to encourage new membership and extend the BBQ experience of existing members, beyond the confines of the Harbour by announcing that the first ‘President’s BBQ’ would be taking place in some far flung Bay …” Bring a boat… and a woman… for a romantic night afloat!!”
Only two ‘new boats’ fell for this ‘lure’… one upped anchor after 15 minutes… the other made a rapid departure soon after dark… in both cases the ‘female’ passengers were just a little sick!
After sixteen years of aquatic camping, the vagaries of nautical terminology such as “lee-shore” and “prevailing wind” still elude me. What eludes me more is why we always seem to anchor half a mile offshore and why we always seem to BBQ in the shade. Thus I was put ashore with all the elegance of a beaching whale, and despite the inevitable wet knickers and boots full of water, made it up the steep shingle incline, dragging astern a plastic bucket into which had been stuffed the contributions to the BBQ… we won’t mention what else had occupied the bucket on some of our previous voyages!!
In the fast fading light, a straggling band of nautical fugitives, huddled together around the charcoal embers, teeth chattering over last season’s purchase of 1 Euro per bottle ‘boat red’ and inhaling the carcinogenic fumes given off by anything flammable that could be scavenged from the beach, in an effort to keep warm…
The sausages, more drunk than the cook, rolled off into the sand, the oozing grease binding on a coating that resembled bread crumbs which, with kitchen roll forgotten, no amount of dusting with near numb fingers, could remove…
A romantic night afloat, being rocked by the rhythm of the swell… ever at odds with the movement of the boat, is not to be recommended. A roll to starboard and one’s fleshier parts become impaled on the locker catches… a roll to port… precipitates an unfortunate collision with snoring stubble… After half an hour ‘the skipper’ didn’t know whether his luck was in or out… and any tentative approach of salt encrusted, mackerel smelling breath was rebuffed by pre-mortem groans … “oooohhhhh… so… s…i…c…k!
The romantic night afloat is a fantasy, a rumour, put about to encourage jealousy among those in the fleet whose other halves have sensibly abandoned their men folk to ‘hot water bottles and army issue long-johns’.
As for the BBQ… only the ‘President in Passing’ complained about the somewhat ‘gritty texture’ of his hot dogs… some people are never happy!
