It's been quite a long time since I wrote anything but that isn't due to nothing happening but rather a failure to take the time since arriving back to the boat on 12/30/15. We knew there were a few things to do but were hopeful to be back on the move by 1/2/16 but when do things ever go as planned?
Prior to leaving for the holidays Greg discovered a small crack in one of our lower spreaders but we were lucky that our friend Chuck on s/v driven (aka Capt Ron's boat) for reasons unknown even to him, had a complete set of catalina 42 spreaders which he gave to us...problem solved, of course not. When our boat neighbor Jeff s/v manatee hauled Greg up the mast he discovered the spreader was about 4" too short and of course it was New Year's Eve and no welders would be open until Monday. Delay number one.
While we were waiting for a welder the temperature dropped from 82 to 52 so we pulled out the warm clothes and turned on the heat. Monday morning the welder opened and Greg was on his doorstep. Took him less than an hour, back up the mast, spreader attached and ready to leave but it was too darn cold so we decided to wait.
The two days of waiting included a chili dinner and haircut with Ms. Jill "Beaner" (aka Hendrickson) and a seafood pasta dinner with Jeff, Sandy and Hatch the dog on manatee. Wish we could get people to cook for us every night!! Finally dropped the lines on Wed. morning and headed south to the Cypress Swamp.