Our goal was to get to the Seven Seas Cruising Association Gam on Friday, by boat, in time to hear the 4:30pm seminar. It was going to be tough. We had to finish up everything Bill was working on in our garage and clean it up. Our tenants are so wonderful to let us use the garage when we are in Annapolis that we try and make it as pain free as possible for them. Bill also had to go buy all the things he is planning on still installing or fixing as we go along the ICW this fall. The boat was a mess with all the things we had purchased and had finally taken out of the car. We were still eating every meal at a “restaurant” because we had the refrigerator and the stove covered with stuff. We stopped at the local McDonald’s for a quick lunch and saw a couple that always go to the Gam too. We said hello and asked if they were going this year. They were on their way, and driving there in their car. We were going to have to find someone to drive us back to our marina to pick up our car for the next step of our mast repair. We asked if they could possibly drive us back that night and they said they possibly could. One less thing to worry about! After more stress we finally left for the hour boat ride at 2:30pm. We just motored there, taking turns taking showers on the way.

We had a great time at the Gam. We met a lot of couples that were not cruising yet but planning on it. All of a sudden we were the experts! It was an interesting feeling. We also saw a couple that we had met one of the first weeks of our cruising life last year. At the time, Bill was so excited to talk to other cruisers and I was really not ready to talk to anyone at all. I was completely overwhelmed with all the stuff on our boat that seemed to have no place to go and all the other stress I was feeling. Bill dragged me to their boat and made her tell me how wonderful cruising was and I just broke down and cried. We reminded them of that story and they both remembered that day. I’m sure I made a wonderful impression on them. There were a number of other cruising couples, and one single hander man that we’ve met along the way and it was nice to catch up with them all. We found out that the people who told us they could possibly drive us to pick up our car passed up an invitation to go to another cruisers party to help us, so we found another couple we’ve known for a while to take us instead. Cruisers are always happy to help each other. In the end all our logistics worked out OK.

Once the Gam was over it was time to get to work. We had to take off all our sails and the boom to get ready for the mast coming down tomorrow. We were lucky that our son, Ian, offered to come help us. We gladly took him up on the offer and he did most of the hard work I would have had to do. He even brought lunch for all of us!! The picture above is of Bill at the top of the mast disconnecting a fitting. We still have to disconnect all the stays and disconnect the wiring but we have time to do that in the morning. We can’t go into the marina until noon because we have to wait for a rising tide or we will run aground. Hopefully I will have a good update to make tomorrow. If nothing else there should be an interesting picture!