Launching by Yourself

[MOPanfisher]

Time and some medical drama are making it increasingly difficult for me to launch my boat solo.  I know some of you guys have figured out ways to do it easier.  I am contemplating using a pop and drop with a rope tied from the boat to the trailer but see an awful.lot of stories of boats floating away when the road breaks or comes loose, and I don't want to be that guy.  I have plenty of rope and can tie Bowlin knots all day long, but I have found what appears to be a halter rope (1/2 inch with good snaps one each end) but is only about 4 feet long.  Do you think that would be enough? Or get some good rope (not polypropelene), and make it longer utilizing the good snaps, if so how long is enough?  Or other better options beside my wife's suggestion that maybe fishing alone isn't a good idea, cause that dog don't hunt for me, not yet anyway. 

[Ham]

there are some products for sale to help with solo launching

[rps]

I have used a longer rope, hooked to the bow eye, that I feed over the pickup bed and through the driver window to my hand. That way I can apply friction to slow the boat down before I pull gently up the ramp. Looks very make do but works very well and safely. Eliminates the broken rope/boat drifting away problem.

[fishinwrench]

I pull in until I see the back of the boat float up off the bunks, then I unhook the bow eye and shove the boat back about a foot.  Hop in the boat and power it off the trailer.   

Even when my knee was all jacked up I was able to do it.  Just gotta watch your step and don't get in a hurry.  

Now with a deep V boat that is harder to crawl up over the nose from standing on the trailer frame....either take a ladder or drop your tailgate and hop over the bow from there.    If you still can't do it then it's time for some physical therapy, excersize, or a serious diet.  

The rope technique only works if the wind is right.   It's just as easy to step up in a boat from the trailer frame as it is to step into it from the bank.

[Al Agnew]

I launch mine with a rope, and never worry about it breaking or coming untied. I simply tie it to one of the handles on the front end of my boat (it stays tied to that. handle permanently, but I do check the knot each time I launch) and tie the other end to the tower that holds the winch on the trailer. Back it in, tap the brakes when it starts to float, and it slides right off. Give it time to drift away and clear the trailer, then slowly pull up until the front end of the trailer is out of the water so you don't have to get your feet wet. Get out, grab the rope, untie it from the trailer, and pull the boat into the bank or dock. Of course, you need a rope long enough to do all that...I think mine is about 20 feet. And when you tie it to the trailer, then you pile it up on the deck with the section closest to the the boat on the deck first and the rest piled on top of it (and make sure you don't have anything around the pile of rope to get it tangled up in. If your rope is good and strong and you tie a decent knot, it shouldn't ever be a problem.

[Mitch f]

I do the same but I have an anchor tied on the end of the rope

[fishinwrench]

My method assures that if BY CRAZY CHANCE you have a starting problem, then it's no problem getting the boat back on the trailer. Cuz it's already there, just gotta winch it back up a foot.  

If a fella who isn't physically able to crawl in his boat, slides it off on a tether and then it doesn't start.....then how the hell is he gonna get it back on the trailer and get it pulled back out ?

[MOPanfisher]

Wrench that is how I have always done it, howe've last year after a diagnosis of  multiple myeloma and subsequent massive chemo and bone marrow transplant, joints simply don't work quite as well as they did.  Part of the issue is that the ramps I use are just right that for the boat to float up at the stern I have to wade a little water to get up on the tongue or climb up over the side of my pick up which is worse than climbing into the boat.  If weather is warm no problem I wear my sandals and it feels fine, colder water in spring well I am a wuss.  It would probably help me slide it off if I back in a little further and make sure bunk boards are fully wet.  Plus after a year of Dr. and wife forced no fishing I simply haven't been enough to get my groove back on launching yet.  I may try the short rope because I can float it back a few feet then pull up enough I can climb up on the tongue and up over the bow if left knee will cooperate a little bit.  Working at the lakes for many years I have seen a lot of ugly accidents at boat ramps and would really like to avoid being one of them.  Definitely not being in a hurry is a huge part of it. Will see how  this spring goes and maybe adjust as I go along.  Thanks fellers.  Heck maybe I should take my wife with me more often, she can do the final few feet of backing for me.

[fishinwrench]

Yeah, if you don't feel comfortable launching and loading solo then just don't do it.     The ramp I use most often is slicker than a greased cat below the water line.  Everytime I see someone wading in to launch/load a boat it makes me cringe.   8 times out of 10 they go down like a sack of bricks then slide to the end of it as they struggle to stand back up.  

[MOPanfisher]

Loading is no problem I can keep the trailer a little further out of the water and power it on n or almost all the way on, then finish it with the winch.  I hear you about the slick ramps in aummer, closest I ever came to drowning was at a ramp on Pomme late one summer while working.  Waded out to fill a 5 gallon bucket and started sliding, kept my balance and the bucket, when the water got almost to me my belly button I said screw it and threw the bucket and started flailing for the side of the ramp.  Finally got back to enough gravel and grit I could climb out. Weren't fun at all.