Weblog Home

Weblog Archives

Return to Web Site

Our Weblog

Wednesday, November 30th

An offer to go sailing

I have been fortunate to receive one of those offers that just can’t be turned down. One of the boats in the marina has been sold and the new owner wants it delivered to Miami FL. I have been offered the position of “crew” for the trip. We are planning on leaving next Monday and try to make the trip offshore rather than travel the ICW. We are figuring four to five days of travel if all goes well. Obviously the weather will determine our schedule.

This will be my third time making this run, but this time we will be traveling south and staying in closer to shore to avoid the Gulf Stream. My first trip was in 2003 when I helped deliver a 40’ Tashing from Daytona Beach FL to New York City NY. The second was December2004 when we brought Hi Flite up from Florida.

Tomorrow we will be checking out the boat and seeing what we need to do to get ready. There is also the job of figuring out what gear and clothes will be needed.

I will be updating here as preparations continue.

Dale on 11.30.05 @ 05:08 PM EDT [link]

Monday, November 28th

After the Thanksgiving Holiday

We hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving. Being this far away from family we were not sure what to plan. Fortunately our new friends in the marina came through. We got together with the other live-aboard’s for a Thanksgiving feast. I barbequed a turkey and everyone brought more dishes of food than we could eat. On the negative side, we are still eating leftovers.

The weather has been nice again. All the reports from up north were a lot colder than we are experiencing. We had a short cold spell with lows in the 30’s at night. The electric heater was working overtime. We found that our reverse cycle air conditioner/heater was not working. The technician found that the reverse cycle switch was not working and we only have air conditioning. It presently is in the shop getting a new switch and being converted over to the newer Freon.

We used the long weekend for projects. Cori has the sailcover 90% finished. I have been working on re-bedding the porthole in the galley. It turns out that there is only a half inch of material between the inside frame and the outside frame. I am making a wood spacer to increase this. My first attempt looked good but it split in several places when I attempted to install it. Unfortunately I had caulk all over everything by the time I had it all taken apart again. I have a lot of clean up and have to start over with “plan B”. I should have it installed in the next couple of days.

Dale on 11.28.05 @ 09:13 PM EDT [link]

Saturday, November 26th

Had to make changes

I am sorry to say that I had to remove the guestbook. We really enjoyed everyones responses but all good things have to come to an end. Someone decided that this was a good place to copy URL's for a number of commerdial sites and they proceded to fill the page with their junk. I am going to look for another version of a guest book to see if there is a solution, so it may be coming back. For all who sent comments thanks for visiting.
Dale on 11.26.05 @ 09:05 PM EDT [link]

Thursday, November 10th

Life back to normal

Our company is gone and life is back to normal. We did go out with them and traveled down part of the Intercoastal waterway and anchored out for the night. We spent the evening celebrating Cori’s birthday then called it a night. While anchored Cori spotted a boat coming into the anchorage and pointed out that there was “a ketch coming in and it is a big one”. It turned out to be another Pearson 424. We aren’t used to seeing our boat from a distance and the size is deceiving. It was Veritas from New Jersey making her way south. In the morning everyone in the anchorage pulled anchor and continued on their way south. We unfortunately had to go back upriver and continue our lives. The main excitement was when Cori ran us aground. I had just finished stowing the anchor and cleaning the deck. I asked how we were doing, she replied “all right” when we came to a sudden stop. Fortunately we were only doing about 3 knots. It turned out we were cutting across an area the charts listed as 2 feet deep. Not a good idea if you have a five and a half foot draft. This is why I moved the chartplotter out to the helm. A strong use of reverse got us going in the right direction again.

The next problem was that “Otto”, our autopilot decided he wanted to go south, not north. After exiting the ICW and heading up river we set the autopilot since we were motoring and he steers a straighter course then I do. All of a sudden he turned the helm all the way over to port and we did a tight 360 degree circle. Halfway around the second time he straightened out and was heading back to the ICW. Evidently Hi Flite doesn’t want to spend another winter in North Carolina and is ready to head south. It is time to pull out the autopilot manual and find the problem. On the other hand maybe Hi Flite has the better idea.

Dale on 11.10.05 @ 03:14 PM EDT [link]

Monday, November 7th

Sailing and Shark's Teeth

Tony and Kris are still visiting, their plans are to continue south on Wednesday. We have had a few days of running around re-provisioning, seeing the sights and even got a day of sailing in. Sunday we battened everything down and took Hi Flite out for a sail. Winds of 10-20 knots gave us a great ride up the river and back with speeds of 6 to 7+ knots. Not exactly setting speed records but a real fun ride with one tack up and one tack down the river. What made me happy is that the TV/computer monitor stayed in place. I was concerned now that it is mounted on the wall that it might move or bounce around when we are underway.

Monday we went out for an “adventure”. We didn’t tell them where we were going or what we were going to do. We went to the fossil museum in Aurora NC. The largest phosphate mine in the world is located there and it is a source of many fossils, especially shark’s teeth. Along with their displays and multimedia presentations they have several piles of dirt from the mine where you can hunt for fossils. We found quite a few teeth ranging from very small to about an inch long. We had been there before but I have wanted to go back and look for more.

Our next plan is to sail out Tuesday and spend the night at an anchorage with Tony and Kris and see them off when they leave on Wednesday.

Dale on 11.07.05 @ 11:46 PM EDT [link]

Thursday, November 3rd

Company

We have company. Our friends Kris and Tony have been on the water for five months working their way from Bayfield Wisconsin to Florida. Check our "Links" page for a link to their blog. They arrived on Tuesday and will be staying for about a week. Unfortunately, Cori is out of town on business and won’t join us until Saturday then she will take a couple of days off. While staying here they are anchored out in the creek and we are traversing back and forth with our dinghies. With the end of daylight savings time the sun sets even earlier. This means that when it is time to call it a night one of us has to dinghy back in the dark. That is not much of a problem, since the marina is well lit, but there is an additional bonus. There is phosphorescence in the wake and bow wave on the way home. Up to now I have only seen it when out in the open ocean. It looks like small sparks in the water. Way cool! It makes me want to go out in the dinghy at night now. I may have to break down and actually register the little boat so I don’t get into trouble.
Dale on 11.03.05 @ 05:31 PM EDT [link]