Because of Bill’s health issues we decided that the smartest thing to do was to haul Moonraker out of the water for the winter. The Friday after Thanksgiving, along with our son and our grandson, we motored the boat over to Port Annapolis Marina. We were so lucky that the temperature was reasonably warm and there wasn’t much wind. Unfortunately we never did get a chance to take the boat for another sail or a night out at anchor, as we had hoped for. It was a nice ride up the bay. There was only one other small boat at the haul out dock but for some reason they put it right in the middle of the long dock so docking was not as easy as it could have been. With the help of our son and our grandson we were able to get the headsails off and all the cushions home. We spent Saturday, with both of our sons, removing the rest of the sails and bringing the dinghy engine and dinghy home for the winter. None of those things are easy to begin with but Bill was really not able to help at all, only with advice and direction. Our sons couldn’t believe that we generally do those things alone. Yep…no one ever said owning a sailboat is easy. Bill did manage to get the oil changed for the winter and we got one of the guys who work in the boat yard to help us fill the diesel fuel tank from our jerry cans. We got the engine and the water system winterized while the boat was still in the water. We still have a few more winterizing tasks to complete.

The haul out went OK. They pulled us out of the water pretty early in the morning but it took them some time to move us up to the yard. We weren’t sure where we were going to end up but are pretty happy with our spot. We are up on a hill and I do believe we can actually see Back Creek from the deck. We don’t expect to spend any time working on it though. Hopefully life will be back to normal next spring and we can just have the bottom painted and be put back in the water and get sailing again.

For now life is anything but normal. Bill hasn’t really felt well at all since he got home from the hospital. He has been weak and tired and the coughing has gotten much worse. Our family doctor actually sent him to the emergency room the day before Thanksgiving to see why he was so worn out. There were no conclusive results, just mostly six wasted hours of our life. Not that we are doing much but hanging out at home right now. We have had some friends and family visiting and that is always nice.

This week Bill had the cyber knife radiation treatment on his brain that is the standard follow-up to his brain surgery. They also got him set up to have five radiation treatments on the tumors on his leg. On the way home our oncologist called and said that he thought it was time to find the next treatment option because there isn’t a lot of chance the current one is working. We were hoping to have Bill get in to a really promising clinical study at the National Institute of Health but the doctor told us that wasn’t really going to be an option for us now. Instead he is going to try a new method they have come up with of using the two kinds of immunotherapy Bill has already tried but giving them together at the same time. That along with the radiation treatments he will be getting on his leg might actually make the immunotherapy work even better. We are starting that next week. We are also going to consult with the top melanoma doctor at University of Pennsylvania to see if she has any other ideas on what we can do.

We are hoping for more energy and less coughing and good things to happen with the new treatment plan to get us through the rest of this year so we can start 2016 a lot healthier.