Center board issue resolved
20 January 2009 | 26 07.159N 80 06.590W
Randy
The Center board issue has been resolved - for now. I took it out and did not attempt to repair it since fell out of the keel after it was hauled out and I released the line David and I had run under the boat to hold it up as a temporary fix. The brackets were so badly bent that they will have to go to a blacksmith or someone to be rebuilt and that would take a lot of time. The downside to not having the center board available to use is sailing close hauled to a beam reach, performance won't be quite what it was. On the other hand, it has been troublesome enough that I would rather give that up and avoid the hassle and expense in the future. So now I will focus on final preparations and provisioning for the trip to the Bahamas.
By the way, if any of you cruisers are ever in need of a haul out with friendly service, try Marine Max up the Dania Cut-off Canal just south of Ft. Lauderdale. They were great letting me tie up here when I arrived last night, and again staying over tonight - free. Also, the haul out was $400 with tax and they helped me get the brackets off without charging me for that. Granted, it was a short haul without blocking (we worked on it in the sling), but that was an inexpensive as any other option I had found. Steve (who, by the way, is from Winooski, VT - more small world) and Mike were great.
Listening to the folks around here worrying about the cold front coming through tonight is amusing. Wind chill advisories have been issued since they are looking at temps in the low 40's and a wind chill around 35 ABOVE 0. How does that sound to you folks in the northern reaches?