Greetings from Gratitude!
While Lauren is addressing year end letters, I am doing the first update to our sailing blog. We still are at the boat yard, but we are in the water, so that is progress. We had planned to launch on January 3 and be out of here a couple of days later, but it was not to be.
After working on Gratitude in November, we thought she would be "splash and go" ready. One improvement this year was an advanced regulator and controller to keep the batteries at a full charge. Unfortunately, a wire we thought was one thing turned out to be another and got fried at the first run. That was pulled and some changes were made to the wiring harness (in the process of the first repair, we found an undersized ignition wire). Once complete, we started the engine and it ran fine - until it ran out of fuel because I forgot to check and turn on the fuel tanks. Once a diesel runs out of fuel, it is very difficult to restart. All the lines need to be "burped" and bled free of air. The fuel pump I had put on last year was oversized and it chewed up its impeller in the process of burping. So, that was replaced with a simple pulse type and the lines eventually were clear and the engine ran fine. Next, I tried to start the generator, but it would not go. That was puzzling because its starting battery had tested fully charged and yet it acted like a dead battery. Turns out it was dead; the test had been run with the auxiliary charger running and that, of course, showed plenty of voltage. We jump started the generator and it ran fine, but when the jumper cables were removed, the generator stopped. Not enough electrical support for the fuel solenoid. A new battery was purchased and installed and now the generator can be checked off the "to do" list.
In the meanwhile, we were conducting last minute repairs, provisioning the boat, stocking the fridge and freezer, etc. and Gratitude was in a state of disarray. Yesterday morning, we finally were able to put away tools, spare parts, etc. and start to prepare the boat for departure. I installed the GPS/Chartplotter on the bridge and then went to install the main station down below only to find it missing. We searched high and low, took apart everything we could think of as a hiding place, and never located the unit. I tried to find charts for the bridge unit (the chart chip was in the missing one) but that unit no longer is supported and, while I could find some charts on line, they were limited, expensive, and would take too long to get here. Finally decided to bite the bullet and acquire a new unit - and of course, the wiring is different from the old. I spent all afternoon and evening wiring it up (the wires literally are hair size and counterintuitive - yellow goes to blue, green goes to orange, transmit out and receive in have different colors and coding, etc.), but the unit started up just fine. However, it did not communicate completely with the one on the bridge. It was suggested that the software needed to be updated (which should be done anyway), so I updated the software using the new version. Turned on the unit and now nothing works. Out of deepening frustration, I called the fellow who has assisted in the past on the electronics and he is coming tomorrow morning. If we are lucky, we will get out of the yard in the early afternoon and pass through the lock to the outside at first light and high tide the next day (Tuesday), and then we will be on our way (but with a preliminary stop for fuel, etc.) and an anchorage at Cayo Costa (an island park). We are well behind our planned schedule, and not likely to be able to cross to the Bahamas with the folks we planned to (we have told them to go ahead at the first weather window and we will catch up), but that is one of the lessons of the sailing life - do not let the schedule dictate; that's when one gets in trouble. We are better off having everything ready and right. And, as a friend told us his son had said to him (when he was complaining about boat issues) we suffer from "problems of abundance" and we are grateful for that.
We will provide further updates once we have something better to tell. In the meanwhile, Happy New Year and all good things to all of you!