Hello boys & girls, a new blog is long overdue, so let's get to work!

When last I wrote it was early October and we were in hot pursuit of about a score of major and minor rust repair areas, mostly on the caprail and bulwarks. Due to the vagaries of Bodega Bay weather, we were unable to get beyond the grinding/sanding/acid etching and priming phase, and there things were left while we headed north for almost six weeks.

Following Dorothy's clogging group -- Redwood Country Cloggers' -- annual Late Harvest Stomp, we drove north making our first overnight stop in Klamath Falls. The following morning we had snow on the road for a couple of hours and more than a foot in areas off the road. Rusty and Rascal got the chance to leap about in new snow and drifts having a great time. A further great time was had at a deserted roadside picnic area with a stream running thru it, when Rascal found a river otter which took off into the water, easily making it's escape. But for the next hour, in freezing weather, both the Rs ran up and down the banks of the stream, jumping in and out of the water, trying to find that otter.

After two days drive, we landed in Post Falls Idaho where Dorothy took a 2-day course in wood finish repair offered by Mohawk Paints. Dot says she had a great time scraping and gouging her sample piece of wood, then repairing it so well it was near impossible to see. Her purpose, of course, it to be able to deal with the various dings we've collected in DavidEllis' teak interior. Dot says it was a great course; more than met her needs and she's got the tools and technology to deal with our dings.

From Post Falls (just east of Spokane WA) is about five hours drive from Seatle, complete with snow falling in the Snoqualamie Pass. Back in our little hobbit-hole of an apartment on Sunset Hill, Ballard, Seattle; just up the hill from the Chittenden Locks between Puget Sound and Lake Union. We had a week's break before starting our Celestial Navigation class at Crawford Nautical School. David C (proud new owner of MV Shearwater, lying Aberdeen Typhoon Shelter, Hong Kong) Dorothy and I joined a half dozen professional mariners for the 2.5 week course. Some serious brain-strain going on here. I mean this course is about the movement of the cosmos man and how to use that to calculate where one is standing on our insignificant little blue marble. The number of ways to screw up these calculations in mind-numbing and more than a little frustrating. At the same time, how cool to be exploring the same relationships of time and space that has captured the imagination of people and civilizations since forever. We may have multiple GPS units on the boat which can do all this for us, but to be able to do it yourself is very, very gratifying.

As we were 1,000 miles away from our immediate family, we participated in an orphan Thanksgiving at our friend Wade's home in Suquamish -- a ferry ride from Seattle. Wade has crewed with us in Alaska several times as well as down the Pacific Coast from Ketchikan to Bodega Bay in September 2011. We met Wade in 2004, crewing aboard the an ill-fated Nordhavn 62 from Vancouver BC to Southern CA. Joining Wade, Dorothy, the Rs and me for turkey were John, who lives on Bainbridge Is and also crewed down the coast September 2011 and another friend of Wades. We ate much more than we should've of course, then played Liverpool Rummy which Dorothy is pleased to report, she won!

The last week of November was pretty exciting; four friends from Hong Kong -- Andrew of MV Lady Dragon, Aiden & his mate Dave H who both live-aboard Seahorse 52s at Hebe Haven Yacht Club and Fido, the yard manager at Seahorse Marine -- builder of our Diesel Ducks and the 52s, arrived within hours of one another. The gang was all here for Bob Senter's 2-day "hands-on" class at Northern Lights / Lugger / Alaskan Diesel. Along with David C and a couple of Nordhavn owners, we had a great two days learning shit and gettin' dirty. This same week the workboat show -- Pacific Marine Expo -- was running at the convention center in Seattle. Lots of boat stuff to see and people to talk too. We had a visit to Hatton Marine -- where they treated the boys like VIPs -- everyone there is the best. From the owner Craig to the general manager Rick, to the techs -- Greg Anderson is always helpful -- and best of all Barb and Bill in the parts department. Of course there was also Fisheries Supply, Sure Marine, REI, West Marine and a pub or two. The last night there, David C hosted a crab feed at his home, which was of course great!

My buddy Roger -- former co-worker -- who crewed with me aboard Jubilee, Chesapeake to Lake Ontario in May, joined us for dinner at David's. Roger and Wade (see above) will be joining the crew of Shearwater for a mid-Pacific crossing, starting in March out of Hong Kong. As we all know, no good deed goes unpunished and Roger's short notice trip up to Seattle from Santa Rosa was rewarded with the cold/flu I was nursing (maybe a gift from one of my HK visitors?)

There's been a rumor that Aiden & David H's families may have been a bit dismayed at the ratio of boat parts and tools to gifts for spouse and kids that the boys came home with. Wait'll Mrs H finds out about the additional stuff coming with David C's shipment of boat parts for Shearwater in HK...

Earlier in this email I brought up Dorothy's clogging addiction; while in Seattle Dorothy got her fix dancing with Heels Of Thunder, a Bainbridge Is clogging / tap group. Our visit up north coincided with a "Christmas In The Country Craft Fair" at which HOT danced to a live band "Natural Disaster".

And once again we were on the road again, southbound I-5 in the rain. Just coming through the pass, south of Ashland and north of Yreka, rainy skies changed to blue and we were back in CA.

The good news is only one small location of the twenty or so areas we'd worked on the hull, showed some new rust on our return to DE; the bad news is that the boat fairies did not come and finish the job while we were gone. And so amidst, rain, fog, wind, dew and low temps we're persevering on our rust repair. Today, Wednesday 19 Dec, I sanded the last (hopefully) of the filler on these sites and Dorothy painted them over with epoxy primer (first of many coats).

And speaking (writing actually) of sanding. Dorothy bought a German-made Fein tool at Fisheries in Seattle. Holy crap, that thing works like a champ! Currently my favorite 'implement of destruction'.

Poor Rascal has some kind of yeast infection which is secondary or tertiary to something unknown. The poor guy is off his food -- unbelievable -- is worrying many areas of skin, shivering (he has a low fever) and just generally not loving life right now. We gave him a shower with special soap this evening; he shook thru the whole thing. Currently smells like a salad as the last rinse was with diluted vinegar (to help deal with the yeast). Rusty, seeing that Rascal was getting the bath/shower treatment, took off for the farthest place in the boat he could get away from us. I'm including a photo of Rusty, poking his head through the (heat barrier) curtain between the pilot house and rest of the boat interior, as he 'hides' from the possibility of his turn in the shower... ssshhhh, don't tell him, but his turn comes tomorrow...