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Wednesday, September 24th

An Addition and High Water

Well, I said yesterday that I was probably forgetting something. It turns out that I forgot to mention the hatches were reworked. We sent them in to have the glass replaced and resealed. It is a relief to not worry if or how much they were going to leak when it rained. We kept putting it off until the leaking was unbearable and we sent them out. The more I looked at it the less I wanted to tackle the job. Sometimes you just need to pay the experts to do what they do best.

We are in the middle of a nor’easter. The wind has been blowing 20-40 since yesterday and they forecast it to continue until mid day tomorrow. The wind isn’t the problem, we just need to double up the dock lines and keep adjusting them. The problem is that the water is being blown into the southern half of the sound and flooding into the creeks. At present it is up about four feet. Another foot and it will be over the dock. Makes getting on and off the boat a bit harder.

Dale on 09.24.08 @ 08:52 PM EDT [link]

Tuesday, September 23rd

The Autumnal Equinox

The autumnal equinox has arrived, bringing the end to summer. It was a busy season. Dale took two weeks after school got out to go back to Minnesota for a wedding and to spend time with family. Cori took a week to go home to help with clean up after a heavy rain flooded the basement and also another week for a family reunion.

We didn’t get much sailing done but we finished off some of our bigger projects that need to be finalized. Prior to moving aboard we tried to get all of the woodwork below deck varnished. We soon learned that there are conditions that will not allow you to varnish. We finished all but the aft cabin. We needed to keep things opened up to vent the fumes but also needed to keep everything closed up in case of rain and to run the air conditioning so it wouldn’t dry too fast. The solution was to move over to Mike and Maril’s boat to sleeping until the project was done. The good news is that we are finally done with the varnishing, except a few smaller areas and it looks really good.

The next big project was to finish the headliner. Again I finished the main cabin and V-berth but did not do the aft cabin. It could be done while living aboard but the tear out was a big mess. We just bit the bullet and got everything torn out and installed the new panels. Another big one checked off.

We were planning a trip down the coast to Southport for a week and decided we needed the bimini on before leaving. Cori tried once before to sew a new bimini but it had problems. After talking with one of the local canvas guys she tried again. I (Dale) now understand why canvas work is so expensive. It turned out pretty good and was appreciated while offshore under the summer sun.

We upgraded our dinghy to a new AB RIB (rigid inflatable) with a Yamaha 9.9 horse outboard. Really cool speeding around the area and it came in real handy when we had to anchor a couple of boats out in preparation for Tropical Storm Hanna. It fits on the davits for short trips and will ride on the deck for extended trips. It is a great change from our old inflatable with a rotten transom and a 3.3 horse outboard.

I am sure I am forgetting some of the other highlights.

Dale on 09.23.08 @ 11:30 PM EDT [link]

Thursday, September 11th

Tropical Storm Hanna

I was going to leave a posting about the end of summer, but we are still in the middle of hurricane season and we just dodged a bullet. Tropical Storm Hanna set her sights on us and raced up the coast. At one point the proposed track was more in the center of the state but each day the forecast moved it our direction. The final day they moved the proposed track just to the west of us. At 3:20 AM the storm came ashore and passed a few miles to the west of us and by noon it had passed and it was time for cleanup.

The marina we are in has a policy requiring we leave the dock for hurricanes. Hanna was forecast to increase to hurricane force winds so we had to move the boat. We anchored her up the creek as far up the creek we could with two anchors out and hoped for the best. Fortunately the storm did not build and stayed a tropical storm. The winds stayed out of the south and south-west blowing the water out of the creek putting almost everyone on the bottom, a very soft muddy bottom. Sunday was a beautiful day, the water was back and it was time to bring Hi Flite back to the dock and give her a good scrubbing.

As storms go it wasn’t too bad but it is stressful to have to deal with all of the uncertainties.

Dale on 09.11.08 @ 12:22 AM EDT [link]