Boat superstitions

We have bought a aluminum boat, and I would like to know if there is any thing I can/should do reguarding our boat. I have read a few things, although our boat is used, I think we should treat her as new. I am wondering if we should not launch her on friday? I'v heard to not take a boat out without naming it. I am wondering about things along those lines. Any thoughts?


Here is a pic of her.

 

Hi Phreak, welcome aboard

Superstitions, eh?.....

Well, she's not green, that's a start.

Do you have a tortoiseshell cat? They're supposed to be good luck.

A boat needs a name, although few folks with small aluminum boats bother... Everyone has their own ritual for this. Some will smash a champagne bottle over the bow, others borrow a local dignitary. George Buehler famously uses "a shot of good bourbon over the bow for the boat, a shot into the sea for Neptune, and pour the rest down me 'cause it's mah party an' I'll do what I wanna".

I have nothing against launching on a Friday, except that the ramps tend to be busy.

 

I'm very obliging of the superstitions. I'll never launch on Friday or make for sea, a boat can have a name that isn't printed on the transom just so long as it's called something (***** works unless it conflicts with a family member's).

Renaming a yacht is a real bugger. The easiest way around this is to have the person who previously owned it rename it, before they sell you the boat. This way any bad juju falls on their head not yours, because the boat was named this when you bought it. Besides it's getting difficult to find real prepubescent virginal pee for the bilge any more.

Launching is fairly easy, the sea gods don't really care much about what you do to the boat before it hits the wet stuff. I pour water from her sailing grounds on the bow and save the good stuff for my efforts.

You can do what you want, but I've pissed off enough of the sea gods to warrant taking some steps to appease them. I figure I owe them a fairly hefty fee, so kissing up can't hurt.

 

A boat is always a "she".....not sure that would hold up in todays PC world

 

Thank you for your thoughts, I have been wondering about these things. She is a Richline 12' aluminum boat, but do you know about what year it may have been made?

 

All through SE Asia, and China boats will suddenly cut across your bow to lose the bad luck that's following their boat and it is then supposed to follow yours. Then nothing else matters (days, names, renaming, women on board ) because all the bad luck gets transferred to the other vessel. This action supposedly stops them sinking and makes possible a catch of sorts and guarantees health on the voyage etc etc. The ships that have accrued several thousand other vessels bad luck and demons seem somehow immune and they often leave on Fridays with women on board. But perhaps that's because they have confident qualified officers and class surveyed vessels, (and good weather forecasting).

As for departing on Friday, you can depart a Samoan island on Friday and arrive in a Tongan island on Thursday, that should get the bad luck demons disappearing in a puff of logic.

Many West African cultures are crippled by superstition to the extent that the bulk of people suffer a debilitating neurosis, this neurosis is really a mind virus. You really have to experience it to understand just how ingrained and how deranged superstition makes people when it is unchecked and pandered to.

In our society you can treat superstition based neurosis by believing in something else like a good luck charm or a lucky tattoo or an omnipresent deity. Otherwise just accept it as good fun but remember many superstitions are passed down from generations that burnt their witches alive for the sake of superstition.

Now how do you know if someone put a curse on the boat at some stage? So really you should get curses removed for a start……………………

It's all in your head to whatever extent that you allow it, and everyone should recognize that.

 

I have an exwife I'd like to burn . . .

 

I could add four or five to the pile, but there goes global warming.

 

Don't bring an umbrella..

Don't bring a rucksack/ backpack....

Don't go out for a longer journey on a friday...

Don't bring females...(That i do not quite understand, it may have something with luck to do, cos I bring my wife along, and if it weren't for bad luck I wouldn't have no luck at all..).

Dont change the name of a boat, and if you do; follow "procedures"... (Procedures are always quite discussed, but they always involve some kind of booze).

 

That'll explain this one then....:
(I've alvays wondered a bit about that one, since I first saw that).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZPWA_3YfIM

So now I know; Chineese driver, and he cut the luck a tiny bit too late....

 

You're allowed to bring women along, just not on sea trials. God I made this mistake once, because after a two year restoration and many thousands of dollars the owner insisted. The boat overheated, we spent several hours out waiting on a buddy of mine to tow us in, with her windmill mouth going the whole time. I was ready to stuff her *** in the heat exchanger.

 

I can feel with you Paul, and I understand you like to burn her until now.
I do´nt understand why did you merry her? Too much Champaign on a christening?

And to topic: never give a boat the same name again after one or more renamings!
I did that once, for some historical reasons, boat was lost at sea within one year.
Regards
Richard

 

German custom says throw a handfull of salt on the bow and give the owner a fresh loaf of bread. Or was that for a new home?

 

Yes that's exactly what they are doing. In many SE Asia and Chinese waters they are a complete pest as they are almost suicidal in their maneuvers to lose the "bad luck" and of course they get sunk doing it.

I know of a vessel and the delivery skipper didn't leave on Friday so he missed the good weather window and got sunk only 30 miles from a safe anchorage. He was airlifted off the stricken boat so he survived. I'd lent him a book and it's sitting in that boat on the bottom of the sea because of a superstition, which I suspect is actually an excuse to spend another day in the seamans bar with dubious female company.