Right after buying Pitufa in 2008 we got our first dinghy. It was a cheap boat+outboard set from an Austrian DIY store and made of PVC, so nobody expected it to last very long in the searing tropical sun. In our rookie ignorance we towed it in rough conditions in the Med and tore off most of its straps, rolled it up on deck with the aluminium floorboards still in and punched a hole, but it forgave us these beginner’s mistakes and just carried on.
Little dingsy made it over scratchy reefs, took us to remote beaches, endured bashings from big bully dinghies on busy cruiser’s docks, sturdily carried cartloads of provisioning, took us over miles and miles of choppy waters in anchorages like Spanish Waters or Bonaire (splashing like crazy, but then what do you expect from such a tiny dinghy?) and even learned to plane when we recklessly fixed a gigantic looking 9.8 hp outboard on its little stern.
Last week we made the mistake of leaving it unattended at a dock in Papeete and when we returned, dingsy was sitting half-deflated in the water–a ferry or freighter had just ignored it when going alongside the dock and squashed it completely, ending its long, eventful life with a big POOFFF. With the seems of the tubes ripped, repairs were impossible, so we had to order a replacement from a local chandlery (fortunately they get one with adequate dimensions delivered this week). In the meantime we are lucky to have friends in the anchorage who let us use their dinghies to run errants.
There is a heaven for god dinghies!
