Monday 7 October 2019

One of the interesting physiological things about the cruising lifestyle is how quickly you body adapts to life on an uncertain and moving platform. Yesterday, when we were walking down the street the ground seemed to be moving under us and when we step into a shower stall to get clean we find that often we need to have one hand on one of the walls to keep from keeling over. That would be embarrassing! Shower, shower, shower - crash! Thump! And then the inevitable voice from outside, "Hello in there. Are you all right?" How do you explain convincingly that no, you don't need to be taken to the hospital. You really are OK. It's just that you are living in a boat and...... See what I mean?

Last night she blew pretty good. At least 20kts+. We were snug at the dock, well secure with power but the boats out on the moorings were dancing about. We plan to stay here at least another night and then we will see. I'd like the wind to abate if possible or at least shift to easterlies so we would be on a run.

Egad! I am such a wuss! It to me an hour this morning to summon up the courage to try the engine. In the meantime, as I lay in the bunk last night, thinking, lotsa good thinking when you are just lying there, I remembered something. There are two switches to apply power to the engine gauges, one below at the steering station and the other on deck, also at the steering station. If you turn either of them off while the engine is running the alarm thinks that either the temperature or oil pressure is wrong and sets off. The other day, while we were still underway, I was having a wee nap in the cockpit right next to the switch for the cockpit gauges. I believe now that I must have switched it off. In essence the only thing wrong with the engine was one wire to the temperature gauge at the inside station and my fat arse deciding to turn the cockpit switch off.

Panic averted. Hurrah. I simply cannot begin to express my relief that we don't have to call in the big expensive guns to fix this. It's just that my boneheadedness has cost us $350US to find out that we could have been in Port Washington by now if I had realized what I had done. On the other hand we would not have had a chance to visit New Bedford and we wouldn't have had the attitude adjustment that we needed. We are leaning forward a bit and have paid our bill for up to tomorrow in the hopes that we will get away.

Now it's just a search for a weather window (it looks like tomorrow might work. Fingers crossed; eyes crossed; everything possible crossed )and do some more of the smaller onboard chores.

First the RAM mike. I took it apart but couldn't see anything wrong inside but the contacts where it plugs into the cable on deck looked a little green in places. So, we discovered an electronics repair place called Chris Electronics who looked at the unit and agreed to clean them off for us. He did this and when we came back to collect it his boss handed it over and the cost? No charge! How about that?! Plus he gave us some advice for cleaning off the contacts that are fastened to the boat that involved a toothbrush and WD40. I did that and it appears to have improved. Time will tell.

We continued into town and had a coffee and croissant at Tia Maria's European Cafe again. Nice place. So nice we came back for lunch. Soups for each of us.

We wanted to try a different museum but missed our chance as the Fisherman's Memorial Museum is only open from Thursday to Sunday and today, of course, is Monday. Sigh. At least we can get back into the Whaler's Museum. Yesterday when we were here we didn't go into the theatre but this time we did. New Bedford has quite a history. At one time it was the wealthiest community in the US plus it provided most of the oil that lit lamps around the world. I wish I could get my hands on a copy of the film so we could bring it back and show you all.

I have also replaced the mizzen running back stay sheets which were very perished. That makes almost all of the running rigging that we have replaced. Not too bad for a nearly 40 year old boat, eh?

We spent most of the afternoon aboard, me doing chores and Barb doing a laundry. Since it is likely that we will be leaving tomorrow we will be making use of the marina's showers tonight and tomorrow AM.

Two of the other transient boats a 40' something or other and a Tartan 44 got away this morning. They were both equipped with roller furling everything so they will probably be fine but for us the wind was coming directly up Long Island Sound, exactly the way we wanted to go. We could have beat out and across the mouth of NY harbour but we didn't want to be beating into 7-10' seas when, if the forecast is right we can slide down the Sound with the wind astern in .7 days. If we leave at noon and travel through the night we will arrive at Port Washington at daybreak.

As for now we are sitting in the cabin listening to the wind howling in exactly the wrong direction. I sure hope the weather witches are right. We can't afford to keep bleeding money into marinas. Around about supper time the wind died down, it that’s normal. We his time however the skies got darker and I think that it is a symptom of a front coming through in which case we can expect rain and a shift in the wind.

Hallelujah!