It’s a custom now! Give the people what they want! Ahoy! Ahoy! It’s bread and circuses! Memorial Day is here, the time for boating, beaches, and beer! Truth be told it’s the day put aside after the Civil War to honor the 700,000 Union and Confederate War dead. Eventually, it was extended to those “Honored dead who gave their full measure”. Abe Lincoln’s line, for all our wars and that totals 1,500,000. When my wife Lind and I visited the National Cemetery in Pine Lawn on the Saturday of Memorial Day Weekend to pay homage to my wife’s dad and give thought to my father who both fought in WW2, we were the only ones in the ENTIRE cemetery.
Meanwhile, at Zach’s Bay, there were shore-to-shore boats. Million-dollar yachts, $999,999.99 yachts, sailboats, cabin cruisers, center consoles with from 1 to 6 three hundred HP outboards, Maxi-Max dual fuel injected, six props calculated to mitigate thrust incoordination, joy stick operation and an A-I captain to boot. My only friend called to tell me this old timer we know came into Zack’s with his old aluminum Grumman row boat and an ancient 2 hp Chrysler! We see him around the bays a lot, we call him Captain Harry but we know his name is Ned. Ned was the only boater who appeared to know what he was doing.
I gave up boating to this extravaganza a few years ago but when I did go, I noted all the perils one may encounter so that you can learn from my knowledge and thereby have a better experience, thank me very much. The first pointer is how to handle the food for your guests. If you are taking non-boater guests, cut food down to size. Bologna with heavy mayo and mustard work well and dang cheap. Don’t go for the heroes you pig out on when fishing with your friends. Tell the deli guy to make them all on white bread. Then go to the section where they sell the outdated stuff and buy a big bag of stale half-price potato chips. Believe me, no one will notice, on a boat, all that matters is that it’s salty. When the passengers get hungry you ask things like “Who wants the roast beef and tomato, or who gets the fresh turkey with lettuce and all you do is continue tossing them the bologna. The first one who complains- Hey! You’re the captain! Look them straight in the eyes and scream “Shut up or get out of the boat!” That calms them down. Then wink and throw them the stale potato chips, they’ll suddenly feel they have a special connection to you and shut the ———up!
The second pointer is about getting to Zacks, Gilgo’s, Hemlocks or against the north side of the State Channel near the Jones Fishing Dock. You have to get there early. Any passenger, whether family or not, who is not on your boat at the appointed time-just leave ‘em. Even if it’s a 5-year-old child running down the gangway. Just pull away and no matter what cries you hear as you make your way into the bay, remember this. You’re the hero here-It’s called giving “A Life Lesson”! It’s so very important, though no one cares about it anymore-but now that little tyke does!
As you work your way to Zack’s accept the fact it’s gonna be stressful. Thousands of boats zigzag through the cuts to the State Channel from Island Park to Babylon and beyond. The surface will be “Turbo-turbulent” and if you have a smaller boat, expect a couple of wakes over the bow. Everyone should be wearing a life jacket and maybe everyone should be holding a flair and a lighter, just in case. Anything can happen out there. I’ve often thought that flying with the Blue Angels is safer. Yet it’s not all that bad. Your guests will be completely oblivious that you are tempted to just gun it and plow into one of the thatches half a mile up into the salt grass just to get out of the armada of madness you are trapped in. Captains are flipping the bird at every other boater and there’s one pissed-off sailor pulling back on an arrow into his crossbow-You get the idea.
Suddenly, there’s the entrance to Zack’s and your heart says “That wasn’t so bad! We made it!” Let’s take a passenger count. One missing? Not bad! You turn in from the State Channel and see a wall of every boat made by mankind since Noah’s Ark! No turning back now. You slow to a crawl to assess. Every anchor line is lying over someone else’s. The boats are anchored so tightly that as the wind quickly shifts, boats slam into one another, gel coats get scrapped, canvas torn, and boat hooks become dueling weapons and foul language waifs through the air in Staccato assaults. Then there’s some dude throwing lead sinkers at you. Fortunately, he’s so trashed that he has alcohol blindness and his aim is pathetic. You make your way to the east end where the high dunes are and see a guy and his wife fighting as they cut out, leaving you enough space to anchor against the beach. At last, every guest cheers as they are greeted by a formation of Blue Angels passover! Their rumbling harsh noise is so deafening that most folks will be saying “WHAT??? REPEAT THAT!’ for at least 16 ½ days. But that’s ok! Everyone’s digging it! You know you the day is a success when 2 guests ask for another bologna on white!
Then suddenly thick fog blows in off the Atlantic and the rest of the show is canceled. “WHAT! Can’t be! Can’t be!” Well, it is.
Cries of desperation, futility, and anger ride around on plumes of fog. You can’t see three feet ahead. Everyone’s leaving at once. The mothers stick their fingers in their children’s ears and threaten the teens not to listen to a bay of obnoxious, irate captains cursing! “Stop it, Mom, everyone uses the same words at school”! Anchors are clanging. Some captains are reading manuals to the radar they bought but never used. It’s a mess but everyone miraculously gets home safely. But at least everyone had FUN!
Here is the third pointer. Try taking a year off from boating to the Air Show and go early by car. The boardwalk has a lot of good things going on like all types of militaristic displays and programs. One young soldier tried to get me to join. They are taking older folks now. There’s an international assortment of food vendors, one guy was from New Jersey. The air show is right above your head and they even sell giant deep-fried turkey legs, which my grandsons wanted to eat Neanderthal style. The three legs cost me $75 bucks. Next year it’s back to the boat and bologna.
The day after the show, Zach’s was a mess. There were tons of trash thrown on Zach’s beach and, in the water, it took five days for Operation Splash to help clean up. The weekend is to celebrate those who sacrificed their lives for this country and some boaters can’t keep our bays clean. Some mariners discarded a complete colonial canopied bed on the shore and there were two trashed grills. Statically speaking, I was told that 23 % of all trash discarded was “Depends for Men”. Think about that for a while!