[Rhodes22-list] Re: the official Annapolis Rhodes 22 Show Report

[kuzzal at comcast.net]

Thanks, Stan, for a very entertaining story!
Sorry we missed the show, rain and all.
It's always an adventure when you have a boat!
Maggie & Nick Kuzniarski

-------------- Original message -------------- 
From: "stan" <stan at rhodes22.com> 

> 
> The Show started on a balmy note as Art and I motored into our rented 
> slip and raised the mast just outside the show entrance in time to beat a 
> radical weather change. Five days later we are happy to report a successful 
> show, a wiser and older crew and a safe at home call - after a series of 
> offensive and defensive errors. 
> 
> As the only surviving charter exhibitor still showing a 22 foot 
> sailboat at the greatest sailboat show on earth, we had been given a gold badge 
> on the show's 25th anniversary (some many years ago) and invited to an exclusive 
> party where we were allowed to tell our story: 
> 
> For years we had been taking the same space and show biz was good. 
> One year we came and could not fit into our sacred territory. I called Carol, 
> the show manager, and explained the problem. She explained that we had fit this 
> space for all these years so we must be cheating and showing a bigger boat this 
> year. We explained that we had managed all these years by projecting into the 
> exhibitor's space in front of us and allowing them to project into our space and 
> that this year she had put a tented exhibitor in our projected area and so this 
> year we could not fit. She explained that the show was sold out and that we 
> would have to cut 3 feet off the boat and call it the Rhodes 19. I explained 
> that there already was a Rhodes 19 and that, in fact, another exhibitor was 
> showing it at this very same show and therefore the public would be confused - 
> but not to worry, I would go into my creative mode and scan the show for a way 
> out. She gave me one hour to come up with an ingenious idea and get the boat 
> out of the aisle which, she explained, the fire department considered a fire 
> lane, or go buy a chain saw. I looked up and in 2 seconds saw the solution. 
> w 
> "Carol" I said, "take that row of toilet booths and put them in our 
> space and move us into the toilet exhibit". 
> 
> "Brilliant" she said, "Maybe you should be managing the show", and in 
> two seconds a fork lift was lifting the first of the green toilet booths high 
> into the air, when I noticed the door of the booth starting to open. 
> Immediately I wanted to shout a warning; what came out was, "Watch that first 
> step". Other exhibitors were envious when they saw the crowds at our exhibit 
> during the show, not realizing the public was lining up to use the Rhodes head. 
> 
> But now Carol, the show owners and all our old friends from the 
> original show team have passed on and new management, seeing us as the tiny 
> nothing company we are and nullifying longevity values, put us at the end of the 
> line, squeeze us in between Catalina and Hunter and take away our free 
> in-the-water demo space. But not to cry for good old GB - we manage a slip just 
> outside the show for our demo boat sailing while loyal Rhodies like Art, Jay, Ed 
> and others are showing up in our doting years to give us a Tom Sawyer like hand. 
> 
> This year it was Art helping the demo boat launching at the Thruxton 
> Park ramp. And when we parked the emptied, unsecured trailer there, I explained 
> I simply remove the 2 extension tongue pins so any trailer thief would soon find 
> he was pulling a ten foot length of clanking metal tubing down the street while 
> the falling-behind-trailer was causing a massive car pile up behind him that 
> would undoubtedly result in his being called by the court as a witness. 
> 
> When we were finally set up to slay the giants, the weather suddenly 
> turned on us. It rained, the winds howled and the temperature convinced us the 
> wizard had moved us to Minnesota. Nevertheless Art gave demonstrations - 
> unfortunately, to prospects who already owned Rhodes 22s. Jay and Art did sell 
> some boats. Unfortunately, they were not Rhodes. (I think Art sold one 
> Catalina and Jay two Hunters.) 
> 
> During the show I noticed that Art was explaining the Rhodes swing 
> keel to prospects. Now I know for a fact that the Rhodes does not have a swing 
> keel since every few years I read the promotional material we hand out at the 
> show. But Art is a smart guy and has not one but two "Rhodes" with swing keels 
> so they have to be counterfeits. Or, I must have been remiss in explaining to 
> owners the difference between the Rhodes combination keel/centerboards and swing 
> keels. So let me state right here, if you have a Rhodes with a swing keel, you 
> do not have a Rhodes, no matter what the year. 
> 
> The last day of the show the weather changed again. The sun came out 
> and the temperature rose and the wind died, completely. This gave us the 
> excuse to pull out of the war zone before the 5 o'clock massacre when all 
> sailboats must evaporate to allow the circling motor boats into their spaces for 
> the US Motor Boat Show. (You have to see this amazing annual ritual at least 
> once in your lifetime.) With Art an Annapolis graduate, I gave him the job of 
> navigating the boat back to the ramp while I drove the car there to position the 
> trailer for the retrieval. 
> 
> Another instruction booklet failure: My van has this great feature 
> of a second hitch, this one on the front bumper so I have this great view of my 
> retrievals. I could see Art raising the centerboard in preparation to motoring 
> onto the submerged trailer, now attached to the front of my car. So let me 
> state right here: With a real Rhodes and a real Rhodes trailer, you lower the 
> center board before sailing, motoring or pulling the boat onto its trailer, not 
> raise it. 
> 
> Remember the trick of pulling the extension tongue pins to foil a 
> trailer crook?. Well, I found the enemy - and he was me. As I backed up the 
> ramp to pull the rig out of the water, the boat and trailer stayed put and the 
> 10 foot extension bar came out of the water just as easy as can be. I sat 
> there and watched the entire foiled heist. My first fear was that, now detached 
> from the van, the boat and trailer would roll down the ramp. And, while the 
> boat floats, trailers generally do not. And once off the end of the ramp our 
> only Thruxton Park trailer would join the Chesapeake ship grave yard. And, sure 
> enough, the rig started to move down the ramp! Then, a miracle, the law of 
> gravity was repealed, long enough for Art to jump in the water, Gucci shoes and 
> all and hang on for dear life; a miracle to give me pause to raise my faith one 
> notch, from atheist to Brad's category. I quickly recovered from that lapse and 
> jumped out of the van and cleverly disconnected the trailer winch strap from the 
> boat and attached it to the car and started to winch the boat back up the ramp - 
> and got punished for jumping faith by the fabric strap parting in the water and 
> a drowning Art again having to hold on for dear life. 
> 
> Art then got the brilliant idea that the trailer would be a lot 
> lighter if we floated the boat back off it. So we tied a line to the car and 
> backed the rig deeper into the water and relieved the trailer of the boat load. 
> With some miner engineering feats and submerged jacks, we got the run-a-way 
> tongue back into the trailer sockets and eventually got the boat out of the 
> water. Besides shoes, I think the only casualties were some landside watchers 
> deciding that buying a sailboat was not for them. 
> 
> It is all relative. Up to now things were going relatively smoothly. 
> Outside a-by-now dark Washington DC, just before the new Potomac River bridge 
> where the shoulders disappear, on highly utilized, high speed I-95, the trailer 
> bounced off the hitch ball. Someone had forgotten to tighten the coupler's 
> locking knob. You do not want to hear the rest of this story but when it was 
> all cleared up and I asked the Maryland Highway crew chief what I owed for the 
> wonderful service, the graceful response was, "Nothing. Just get out of my 
> state". 
> 
> Virginia State Route 460, for the first time in my experience, 
> suddenly ended with a barricade. If I had known then it was merely because of 
> flooding, having a boat, I would have gone for it instead of taking the hour and 
> a half detour. Actually I would have enjoyed seeing the new-to-me rural 
> countryside detour - if it were not so dark and I wasn't driving in my sleep. 
> 
> As I learned to chant as a kid growing up in Brooklyn and rooting for 
> the those bums, the Brooklyn Dodgers, "Wait til next Year". I think I got it 
> down pat now. 
> 
> To Art, Jay, Mary Lou, Michael, the Greens and all the other Rhodies 
> who showed up at the show to lie about the boat to all those prospects who 
> braved the elements, many thanks. 
> 
> stan 
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