06/21/2009, Baltimore, Md
Carl asked me this morning what my fondest memory was of my father. Without hesitation, I went into the head and rummaged around until I found that which I have kept since my fathers death, a small gold skeleton key.
With the gold key in my hand I began to tell Carl of the many times my father would come into my bedroom at night to tuck my in and sing "You're Daddie's Little Girl." After he finished he would show me the key and tell me that it was the key to my heart and that it belonged only to him. He would reach out with the key and pretend to un-lock my heart and then he would tuck the key away in his pocket.
My father was in his early sixties when he became sick and died a year later from lung cancer. After the furneral I asked my mom if she remembered daddy coming into my bedroom and singing and she said "yes." I then asked her if knew about the gold key that he would used to un-lock my heart...she rose from her chair and left the room. I thought perhaps what I had asked was too much for her to bear at that moment but a few minutes later, she came into the room with a small box in her hands. She gave me the box and I opened it to find two Gold Cuff Links, one of which my father used to sing me to sleep.
As a child, I never knew the Key was anything but the Golden Key to un-lock my heart.
|
05/20/2009, Baltimore MD
Today is our 3rd Wedding anniversary, and it marks 3 great years of being together and living our common dream. I'm a very fortunate guy in finding such a beautiful, loving, fun woman who has helped make my life as rich as anyone could ask for.
We're going to celebrate today on the water enjoying this beautiful day and I can only feel that even with the obstacles we've endured together that we have been extremely fortunate in building our lives together around a life that some only get to dream of. I look forward to many more years enjoying this life with Carrie and all of our incredible friends.
Thank you, baby.
|
05/18/2009, Baltimore, MD
Along with the projects to install new things to improve our capabilities or living conditions we sometimes overlook some of the essential tools on the boat that are only noticeable when they stop working. Murphy being the bugger that he is, that moment will likely be when we need it most, so you try to keep things in good shape along the way. Winches are one of those items, and when I opened the two main 2-speed winches up for the first time in at least 3 years I felt that I'd made a good investment. After scraping the grease that was caked on like mud and removing the verdigris from the drum and post assemblies, I got to spread fresh grease and lubricant on all the moving parts and put things back together again; luckily there were no broken parts to replace. Would it have failed the next time we needed it most? Maybe not, but I feel better about knowing the insides of the boat and doing that cruisin' thing.
|
05/17/2009, Baltimore, Maryland
Speaking of Projects...this was a project we elected to hire someone to do for us. It's not that we couldn't do it ourselves, but it was something we treated ourselves to because we had to spend yet another winter in the cold north for health reasons. We had an entire new enclosure made for Sanctuary. It's pretty awesome! Even when it's cold, if the sun is shinning it's warm inside the enclosure.
Next project, Winch Mantainence. We have ten winches that have to be taken apart and serviced.
|
05/03/2009, Spa Creek Annapolis
Well as you can see from the above picture, Carl has quite a black eye. He is OK but he sure gave me a scare on Saturday. I was sewing in the cabin and he was preparing the boat for our trip to Baltimore. While cleaning off the Solar Panel he got too close to the Wind Generator. An emergency room visit and 20 stiches later you see the results.
Cruisers are amazing people. Carl was cut and bleeding badly, I was a little shakey and so called out to our next boat neighbor Stanley, to come get us and take us to shore. In the meantime I'm grabing anything to hold pressure and stop the bleeding. As soon as we hit the shore, Marci and Jay, friends we met during our first boat show stint were driving up to give us some flyers for the upcoming Nautical Flea Market in Annapolis. They drove us to the hospital and then went back to get our car.
We are now sitting at our new dock at Anchorage Marina where we will stay until October when we will leave for the South.
|
04/30/2009, Annapolis Maryland
Tomorrow is my last day a West Marine in Annapolis. We celebrated at EYC (Eastport Yacht Club) with some of my fellow peers. We leave for Baltimore Saturday (weather permitting) with one of Carls good friends and fellow Academy Graduate Jim Janosek.
Going back to Baltimore will bring back some fond memories of a year spent in a big city. This time our stay will be much shorter as we will work for only 6 months before leaving for warmer weather, hopefully the BVI's.
All projects have stopped for now until we get settled in our new home at Anchorage Marina. I will work one day per week at the West Marine and begin my own Canvas Repair business while helping out Michelle with her detailing business. I'll be pretty busy while Carl continues with Key Logic doing his consulting and his two day per week Captain's job.
|
04/24/2009, Baltimore MD
Several years ago I encouraged Carl to get his Captain's license. It seemed like a good idea since he is a retired Naval Officer and he taught Sea Scouts. So he went to a License Prep School on Kent Island, took the class and passed with flying colors. Here comes the hard part. You have to be able to prove you've got 360 days on the water, 90 of which have to be within the last year. Well, he certainly had the 90 days as we had been on the water since our marriage in 2006 and had over a thousand miles up the coast but, the 360 could only come from his Navy days as Commander on several ships. Seems easy enough to prove, NOT! He had one year to prove his hours before he would have to take the course over. The request for Navy time was submitted after passing the course and it took almost one year to get the correct information we needed to submit for his license. Moral of this story...don't use your military time!
All the time and trouble has paid off because Carl is now Skipper of a 46 foot Bertram, (picture above.) He will be out on the water two days per week on Tuesdays and Sundays. So if you see someone at the helm with a great big smile on his face...that would be Captain Carl!
|
04/23/2009, Spa Creek, Anapolis Maryland
It's a crappy job...but someone had to do it! Last weekend, Carl had planned to replace the Plates in our Electra Scan. For those of you who may not know, an Electra Scan is a mini sewage treatment system on Sanctuary. We originally bought this system thinking it was the best way to go, to be responsible sailors. As with all technology, things are changing fast and our once "New" system is soon to become outdated. In the meantime the plates had to be replaced and so Carl jumped right in...so to speak.
If you read our last post, I said there may be cussing involved...all I'll say is Whoa! Having said that, the plates are in and it was time to test the system...flush, flush, flush. Oh no! back to the drawing board because the system wasn't getting the proper amount of salt. More cussing, more looking and Viola! a blockage in the line. With that cleared and another test, I am happy to say the system is working just fine. Carl however is sleeping on the other side of the boat! "PU"
|
04/18/2009, Spa Creek, Annapolis Maryland
The first Project of the season is under our belts...Solar Power! In this picture you see is the finished product. It was a fairly simple installation with minimal cussing, fighting, yelling etc. The panel itself is mounted on top of the dinghy Davits and the hardest part of the installation was drilling into the 2" stainless steel rail that is part of the Davit tower. We added a cross bar towards the end of the davits for extra support as we will need that for offshore cruising.
We left Ego Alley Sunday afternoon and went on the hook in Spa Creek. With three days of rain we still did not have to crank up the generator. That's what I call living of the grid! Today is sunny and we have seen as much as 13 amps from the panel. With the Panel, (210watts) and our Wind Generator, we should do well.
Next project...replacing the plates in our Electra-San. Since this is a crappy job (LOL) there will more than likely be some cussing involved in this project. We'll let you know.
|
04/05/2009, Annapolis MD City Dock
As the weather in Annapolis improves and we get closer to moving out on the anchor once again we spend our weekends (and other non-working time) doing boat projects. The list has been dusted off and added to over the last few weeks as we eagerly anticipate warmer weather and the hope of periodic adventures around the Chesapeake through the summer.
Our latest project over this weekend was installing a new solar panel along with the wiring and control equipment that will allow us to charge our batteries from sunshine, thereby boosting our independence from the world, what we call "living off of the grid", for longer periods of time. As you can imagine a project of this scale requires some upheaval on the boat caused by moving gear around to gain access to the right places, crawling into small spaces to run the wiring, mounting and hooking up the new control box and readout, and making some minor structural modifications to mount a rather large (60" x 40") solar panel up away from the shadows on deck but secure enough to withstand whatever weather we might encounter. As we launch into projects like this Spike always gives us that "I am outa here!!" look so we help him find a hiding place near his box and food for the duration.
Projects, like most things, rarely go as you envision they will, and we normally run into obstacles that we didn't count on. Most of them can be overcome with some thought or imagination, but some put us back a few steps trying to find a solution. Mounting the solar panel itself on our non-commercial davit became a real issue and we weren't able to finish up the installation as we'd hoped. I have to talk with a welding service tomorrow about some alternatives and the boxed up panel still takes up precious space in the cockpit.
We're sore and tired from the project, feeling at times like we're getting too old for this stuff, but a little rest and a new day will more than likely shed some new light on things. Stay tuned for the impending victory dance and fanfare when we check this project off of the list.
|
