Boat people

Matey has been fascinated to encounter some of the fellow travelers living on boats – an eclectic bunch and possibly/hopefully some likeminded souls among them. While the lone male living on his monohull is a common sight, there are also numerous couples from various parts of the planet, slowly making their way around it.

One of our neighbours is unusual in that she is a lone woman living on her boat – we haven’t encountered many of these. She’s lived on the Brisbane River for a number of years and survived the flood – only just – her dinghy engine failed in the raging torrent and she was rescued from the water. Didn’t put her off though as she’s still living here. She has the appearance of being a party girl from way back – Matey is curious to know more …

Matey was interested to meet another neighbour who is 85 years old and living alone on his boat. After hearing his cursing as the City Cats speed by while he’s attempting to climb from dinghy to yacht (creating swell havoc causing the catamaran to rock, so it must be positively uncomfortable on a monohull), Matey expected to find him to be a grumpy old git. Instead she discovered a sweet old man who was grateful for our assistance as we towed him to the ‘dinghy dock’ – his dinghy motor having failed. He’s from Sydney originally but has been living here for four years. Soon after arriving in Brisbane his foot was run over by a car. Numerous hospital visits followed, including skin grafts, and he’s never been the same since. He wants to get back to Sydney but is clearly beyond doing that on his boat. His only complaint though was that he can’t maintain his boat properly any more. Watching him slowly get in and out of his dinghy and boat makes Matey anxious, but somehow he manages. Even walking up the ramp from the dinghy dock is clearly a challenge. If he were land-based surely he’d be eligible for meals on wheels and other services. Matey can’t help thinking he’s nursing home material – but hey – he’d probably rather die than end up in one of those – as would the Matey! One of these days he’ll probably topple in and that will be that. He’ll go out living the lifestyle he enjoys – what more can you wish for? Meanwhile the informal community of boat people helps him out.

Someone needs to tell the City Cat drivers to be more considerate. As one of the other yachties protested ‘anywhere else in the world they’d slow down to pass anchored or moored boats, but these guys seem to speed up as they pass to deliberately make it as uncomfortable as possible’. Sometimes they actually create surf, which breaks against the river walls. Captain and Matey are both glad to have two hulls.