Our Voyage

I’ve found life a bit more complicated than sound bites.  In the cost estimating community people used to say "In God we trust, all others provide data."  I never liked the phrase because it had a sense of cynicism and disrespect.  But there is some truth with it and I like the trusting God part.  Although sound bites sound good, they tend to obfuscate the real world. The cruising guide, written by "the expert on the Great Loop" says you have to time your transit of the Delaware Bay with the tides.  He then goes on about how awful it could be if you don't.  The Great Loop blogg is full of people extolling the need to do your homework and time your passage with the tides.  One guy did a bit of rant against those who didn't know the difference between tides and currents.  Someone else, claimed to be the Delaware Bay expert, said you should embark 2hrs before slack water of the tide you want to ride.  But none of this talk seems to fit the ...

The ocean can be a scary place.  We've all seen pictures of storms and huge ships being tossed around like toys.  And of course we've sung songs like the "Edmond Fitzgerald" from the comfort of our homes, ever thankful we weren't on board.  But here we are taking off in a small"ish" boat with our entire family, the last thing we want is be a tragic story for one moment on the nightly news. But off we go.  So why not an RV instead, it's safer.  "Higher highs and lower lows" and I enjoy sailing (when it's nice) that's pretty much it.  Many have done this trip before us and the insurance company didn't even care if we told them we were doing this trip as long as we stayed coastal US and Bahamas.  So it must be safe right? Right now we sit at anchor on the Sassafras River at the top of the Chesapeake Bay plotting our transient of Delaware Bay.  It is a dreaded trip.  The bay is very shallow and very large with a huge opening ...

Yes we have a "to-do" list; you can't tell me you're surprised by that.  Interestingly, it's always 2 pages long.  Even now after closing out 427 tasks since last Summer.  Still two pages.  So if its always 2 pages how will we ever depart?  Great question.  We're just going to depart with a list that is 2 pages. Each item is intended to approximate a "work package" broken down by location, trade, materials, work breakdown, scope, and priority.  Below is a snapshot.  It allowed me to slice and dice "the list" just about anyway I was in the mood; lets do carpentry, electrical, not just any electrical but 12VDC that is on the "critical path", or those items I already have "parts on-hand."  It goes on and on but I guess it worked to some degree, we did ultimately leave and yes the page was something close to 2 pages long.

What a mess!  Wires, wires, wires.   Everything gets pulled out, the only things remaining on the boat are those items that are related to the refurbishment.  Stuff is moved to areas so its accessible but not in the way. The binnacle wiring was awful.  Most of what's in the picture is SeaTalk spaghetti.  No wonder it didn't work.  Below is how it would end up after our refurb.

Insurance check in hand, we were off to the races.  Our retirement trip would have to wait 6 months and be re-routed but it seemed like a good revision.  And being retired gave us lots of time to work the task.  We hoped for a swift refurbishment , and set off on our new course of the Islands first and the Great Lakes later. The alternator was the first confirmed damage that could only have been lighting.  Notice in the picture the scorched wire.  The insulation should be red not black.  The tech who rebuilt the unit was amazed at the damage, he'd never seen anything like it. The solar controller worked but had melted.  The first in the category of "working but damaged". If you look at the wire you'll see a section that is blackened.  This was discovered not because the cable failed but because the component that used it had "fried" and I was salvaging the multi strand cable bundle for a single wire to use somewhere else.  There wa...

It all started when I drove up to the boat and saw the broken thru hull above.  I found the flange a good distance from the boat.  Not knowing what transpired at the boatyard where we were on the hard for the winter, I wondered how that happened and groaned at the extra repair I'd have to do before launching the boat.  But this was only the beginning of what would be a long and expensive journey that would delay our retirement goal of extended sailing in 2018. Later that same day, I noted the radio didn't work.  "Guess I'd have to work without music.  The radio must have been at its end of life" was the thought.  I was cleaning the bilges and noted that the bilge pump wasn't working.  But oddly, if I turned the radio on, I could use the float switch to cycle the bilge pump.  "That's not right.  What's going on?"  I still didn't get it but I spent a good amount of time trying to isolate what switchology I could use to cycle the bil...