Sailing with Nine of Cups

Vessel Name: Nine of Cups
Vessel Make/Model: Liberty 458
Hailing Port: Denver, Colorado, USA
Crew: Marcie & David
About: We've lived aboard Nine of Cups since 2000 and have managed to accumulate 86,000+ nm under the keel since that time. We completed a circumnavigation in April 2015 and managed to sail around the five great southern capes. Come along with us for the ride!
Extra:
Visit our website at www.nineofcups.com for more photos and info about Nine of Cups and her crew. We also have a more extensive blogsite at www.justalittlefurther.com. Are some of our links broken? Links break from time to time. Please let us know which ones are broken and we'll fix them. You [...]
05 January 2017 | Chesapeake, VA
07 July 2016 | Us: East Walpole, MA / Cups: Chesapeake, VA
06 July 2016 | East Walpole, MA
04 July 2016 | East Walpole, MA
02 July 2016 | East Walpole, MA
01 July 2016 | Virginia Beach, Virginia
30 June 2016 | Chesapeake, VA
29 June 2016 | Chesapeake, VA
28 June 2016 | Intracoastal Waterway from St Augustine to Norfolk
27 June 2016 | Intracoastal Waterway from St Augustine to Norfolk
26 June 2016 | Intracoastal Waterway from St Augustine to Norfolk
25 June 2016 | Intracoastal Waterway from St Augustine to Norfolk
24 June 2016 | Intracoastal Waterway from St Augustine to Norfolk
23 June 2016 | Intracoastal Waterway from St Augustine to Norfolk
22 June 2016 | Intracoastal Waterway from St Augustine to Norfolk
21 June 2016 | Intracoastal Waterway from St Augustine to Norfolk
20 June 2016 | Charleston, South Carolina, USA
19 June 2016 | Charleston, South Carolina, USA
18 June 2016 | Intracoastal Waterway from St Augustine to Norfolk
17 June 2016 | Intracoastal Waterway from St Augustine to Norfolk
Recent Blog Posts
05 January 2017 | Chesapeake, VA

Happy 2017!

Happy New Year, Everyone!

07 July 2016 | Us: East Walpole, MA / Cups: Chesapeake, VA

Taking a breather ...

Since we'll be off the boat during July and August, we plan to post only three times per week. The Captain will continue writing a practical Blue View post each week, we'll keep you up to date on what's happening with us and then throw in some cruising nuggets as well.

06 July 2016 | East Walpole, MA

Keeping fit

We’ve written before about keeping fit on the boat. David is so much better at a regimented exercise program than I am. I have all the best intentions, but I can always think of something better to do than sit-ups, push-ups, leg lifts and running in place. It doesn’t take much to distract me. Walking, [...]

04 July 2016 | East Walpole, MA

Happy 240th Birthday, America

Growing up in New England, I took for granted just how lovely a summer’s morning can be in Massachusetts. It’s comfortably cool and everything smells clean and fresh. Spider webs glisten with morning dew and it’s just great to be alive and breathe in the new day. Being back at Lin’s house conjures up wonderful childhood memories of summer mornings past. And this is not just any morning … it’s the 4th of July, the best holiday of the summertime in the USA.

02 July 2016 | East Walpole, MA

Leaving Cups and a Road Trip

Leaving Nine of Cups is never easy. We know she’ll pout while we’re gone and so we do our best to make sure she’s as comfortable as possible before we leave. We were whirling dervishes trying to get everything ready.

01 July 2016 | Virginia Beach, Virginia

Hunting & Gathering - Virginia Beach

We had lots to do before leaving Cups. David was intent on getting as many chores done in advance of our departure as possible so that once we return in September, we can spend time sailing in the Chesapeake rather than doing repairs and maintenance. Much of what we needed in the way of parts and supplies, [...]

Blue View - A Couple of Screws Loose

13 May 2016 | Culebra, Puerto Rico
David
Blue View �- A Couple of Screws Loose

On passages, one of my morning rituals is to do a deck 'walk-around'. My morning watch starts at 0900, and after my morning cuppa, I take a walk around the boat, tossing the night's catch of flying fish overboard and checking for any potential problems. Any lines chafing? Are the dinghy and anchor still lashed and secure? How do the sails look> - any issues? The stays and shrouds and other parts of the standing rigging are looking good? ... and so on.

On one morning's walk-around during our Trini-Puerto Rico passage I found two screws lying in the port side scuppers. Not a good sign and something that required immediate investigation. I had visions of the radar module coming loose from its mounting and self-destructing or the whisker pole coming apart and folding in half �- after ripping a large hole in the yankee. Pic of screws

I remember talking to an avid racer who said that during a close race, one of his crew mates would sometimes use a slingshot to fire a screw or two into the mainsail of the boat they were trying to beat. The screws would drop to the deck, making enough noise to be noticed. At the very least, the crew would be distracted while trying to figure out where the screw came from and whether they were about to lose the rig. I'm not sure if it was BS or not, and even if it wasn't, I can't imagine the ploy working more than once, but it was a good story. At any rate, there were no boats within sight, so unless the screws I just found came from a drone, they were most certainly from Nine of Cups.

There were a few clues. The screws were just aft of midships in the port scuppers. This eliminated anything further aft, since it was very unlikely they rolled uphill from the place on deck that they landed. They were 5/16�" diameter screws, eliminating stanchion screws. They were also coated in Tef-Gel, a substance I use to prevent galling and corrosion when I attach a stainless screw to aluminum �- like the mast and boom. So, the most likely places to check were the mast, forward end of the boom, inboard end of the whisker pole, and the furlers. That's still a lot of possibilities.

I had removed the forestay in Trini so that Cups would fit on the Travelift, and this required partially disassembling the jib furler. I thought maybe I had neglected to tighten everything when I reattached the forestay �- but everything looked good there. I checked all the screws on the boom and the lower part of the mast �- all present and accounted for. Pic Camera

In the old days, the next step would be to lie on the foredeck with the binoculars and try to spot any missing screws further up the mast. Now, with digital cameras and great zoom lenses, it is much easier. I sit on the deck, zoom in and focus on a fitting, then shoot half a dozen photos. Next I review the photos, zooming in as much as possible to try to locate the screw-less hole. I spent a half hour or so carefully checking the possibilities, but still couldn't spot any missing screws. Pic Screws in Place

As I was pondering where to check next, I grabbed the staysail furler to re-position myself. There, just below my hand, and not two feet from where I had been sitting for the last half hour, was the furler collar with an empty screw hole. I checked the other side of the collar, and sure enough, the second of three screws was missing. The third screw was partially unscrewed, but still in place. Had it come out, the result wouldn't have been catastrophic, but we wouldn't have been able to bring in the staysail when it was time. It took but a few minutes to put the screws back in place and tighten, and add a note in the log sheets to remove them, re-coat with Tef-Gel and tighten back in place once we arrived in Puerto Rico. Pic Found It Pic Fix

Later, as I was pondering how these three screws could have come loose, it occurred to me that last December, when we were getting ready to haul-out in Trini, I had loosened them in the event we had to remove the inner stay in order to fit into the Travelift at Power Boats. This is sometimes necessary, and we once tied up a haul-out facility for an hour or so while I worked on removing a seized screw - because I hadn't prepped the furler ahead of time. Not only had I forgotten I had loosened them, I had neglected to add it to my to-do list at the time. They weren't loose enough to notice during all my pre-passage checks, but were loose enough to work their way free. My bad.

I will make a note to add this to our splash checklist �- if I can just remember where I put the damn list.

To see the pictures, visit our regular blog at www.JustALittleFurther.com
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