What another day! This story keeps having it's twists & turns, and that's an understatement! We woke this morning and got ready to head into Shelter Bay Marina to get a slip for 2 weeks. Easy enough, or at least is should be. On our way in to side tie up to the dock, when Jim put the throttle in to reverse to back up from the dock & slow down, he hears squeaking coming from the engine room & she won't go in to reverse full power. We ram the dock, I jump off the front of the starboard ama onto the concrete dock & try to push Sunshine away from the dock. Thankfully we only hit once. Then we manually pulled Sunshine up to the dock. Jim tells me the shaft coupling was not tight and was slipping on the shaft even though he tightened it last night. The damage was minimul to the bow, but still not a pleasant thing to go through. After getting Sunshine tied up to the dock, he also noticed a rather large patch of fiberglass hanging off the front center hull. Even though we had her beached & gave her a complete once over only 2 weeks ago, all the force from the water pushing against it must of made it come loose. He sits on the end of the dock for quite some time, then goes up to the office to get definite pricing on getting her hauled out here. Although we would really prefer Bob & Annie's in Ft. Myers, the reality is, it needs done now, not after a week or so of being constantly underway. At B& A's they have a marine railway, here it's a boat lift w/ straps going under the hulls. And Fl. would just be closer, obviously. But here we are, and that's the big story for today. Imagine having your "home" lifted off it's foundation & moved. Even though we didn't do much physically today, emotionally we are drained. The workers did a good job, but it was nerve racking, and nail biting nonetheless. We will have the bottom from the water line down, completely sanded, new bottom paint applied, repair the only spot that needs some new wood on the main hull about a foot long, repair the owie from today, fix the bottom of the keel that is rotten, & install a new prop shaft. Russ, one of the owners of SB, & his guy in charge of the job, both said she's not in that bad of shape. Honestly, Jim & I expected worse, but were pleasantly surprised.
After the incident this morning, I still keep asking myself, "how much more is Jim willing to take?" But after our discussion yesterday morning, I really don't need to ask that anymore.