the ladder of doom

dave hooking up some thingy

see the boat hovering 60 feet over the sea? i was the winch wench.

dave climbing down the ladder of death

claudia and me hanging on to one another, we have built in floats.

claudia after the climb up the ladder of death, see her wounded leg? the red on her thigh is ladder damage. 

boat adventure report: it's all about the ladder, the evil ladder of death that swings in the air between pier and sea, swaying and jiggling around, slippery when wet and you either hang on for dear life or die, there is no in between.  we took our little boat out today for a boat swim trial run, dave and i launched the boat from the pier using a winch. it was easier than i expected and dave was smart enough to warn me in advance that he would be hollering directives at me, that he would be speaking very loudly, lest i think he was simply ordering me around to be a dick. (we have been in this territory before like when he ordered me to 'stand by'. you can imagine my reaction) the boat is down and now the ladder for me. i don't know how to articulate my feelings over the ladder, i was nervous but i work out, i'm strong and dave assured me that if i didn't let go, i'd be fine.  i walk to the hole in the pier and begin my 50' descent and i can tell you now that all that core training doesn't mean jack if the mind is akimbo with fright. i go down, down, down one rung at a time saying 'oh my god oh my god oh my god' all the way. ok, under control, right? wrong, silly people! commander queeg is now telling me, loudly, that i have to swing my body around, cirque du soleil style, to the front of the ladder since i was climbing down the side. i bet you didn't know that this kind of ladder requires you climb from the side, did you? after a mini freak out i managed this trick and then all i had to do was leap into the boat from 6 feet up then immediately unclip the boat from the ladder. keep in mind that everything is swaying and rocking, the boat is drifting fore and aft, (check my new boat lingo!) i managed all this and then cried for a few minutes. i would have preferred swimming out in a hurricane.   however, i'm on the damn boat and i'm going to enjoy it for a bit so we cruise around, waved to some loose swimmers, parked at the marine room where i jumped out and swam around and felt right at home. i'm better suited for being in the water rather than on it. claudia met us, we swam around together for awhile and then gracefully (hehe) climbed back onto the boat. claudia bravely decided to back to the pier with us for moral support during the climb back up the death ladder.  it still sucked, i was still scared and couldn't look down due to the bobbing boat, sea and ladder, i couldn't look up because it showed how much i had left to go and i couldn't close my eyes because i needed to see the rungs. it was all a blur. i did it though, claudia did too although she was much quieter and no cursing! she did however get chain burn on her thigh due to being pantless. some people take no pants to extremes. way to go, claudia! we managed to recover the boat and while captain ahab collected all his gear, claudia and i watched two more boats come in. i was deeply interested in how these people, and dave too, managed that ladder. they just climb up and down that thing like monkeys, swinging on it one handed, jumping on it, leaping off several rungs at a time, simply manhandling that sucker. as an aside, i swear to god when we arrived, the boatmaster or whatever he's called, was talking about banana sandwhiches! how apropos is that? dave tells me that with experience i too will be a monkey on the ladder. he's so wrong. 
so there is the boat adventure report which reads more like a ladder report. 
water was 65, very little viz, very cool air and that damn ladder. 
lftc-out