S/V Passage - Refitting a Classic (& Building Our Skills) Before Cutting the Docklines

We are working toward our dream, one step at a time, and are prepared to make mistakes and learn from them so we become better cruisers every day.

Vessel Name: Passage
Vessel Make/Model: 1980 Pearson 365 Ketch #324
Hailing Port: Chicago, IL
Crew: David Cole & Brodi Cole
About:
We started sailing in 2004 when David's dad bought his first sailboat, a 30' Hunter on Lake Michigan. David spent many hours on Lake Michigan and when his dad upgraded to a 42' Hunter, even made several multi-day crossings between Florida and the Bahamas. [...]
Extra:
In early 2010, we made a 5-year plan to pay off our debt, save money, buy a sailboat and take off for the adventure of a lifetime. One year into that plan, Brodi discovered an amazing deal that resulted in us acquiring "Passage"-a 1980 Pearson 365 Ketch-three years ahead of "schedule." We hope this [...]
Home Page: https://www.ouroffbeatlife.com
Social:
14 March 2019
30 May 2012 | Chicago, IL
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16 February 2012 | Chicago, IL
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13 December 2011
12 December 2011 | Chicago, IL
09 November 2011 | Chicago, IL
02 November 2011
01 November 2011 | Chicago, IL
19 October 2011 | Chicago, IL
13 October 2011 | Chicago, IL
12 October 2011 | Chicago, IL
11 October 2011 | Annapolis, MD
10 October 2011 | Annapolis, MD
02 October 2011 | Chicago, IL
20 September 2011 | Chicago, IL
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11 September 2011 | Chicago, IL
04 September 2011 | Chicago, IL
Recent Blog Posts
13 December 2011

Cool Website

I just found a cool new website, and wanted to share. Love the pic/quote on his main page, too!

12 December 2011 | Chicago, IL

A Month of Updates

It's been a rather crazy month for us, without really any time to even sit down and log our updates. The weekend after our last (and only) post in November we did head back down to the yacht yard to get some more stuff off the boat, and try to figure out our head/plumbing system. Our biggest challenge [...]

Cool Website

13 December 2011
Brodi
I just found a cool new website, and wanted to share. Love the pic/quote on his main page, too!

A Month of Updates

12 December 2011 | Chicago, IL
Brodi / Too Cold!
It's been a rather crazy month for us, without really any time to even sit down and log our updates. The weekend after our last (and only) post in November we did head back down to the yacht yard to get some more stuff off the boat, and try to figure out our head/plumbing system. Our biggest challenge for installing our new Nature's Head is that the existing holding tank seems to be larger than the access hatch! Thus, the holding tank is obviously the original one that was built into the boat when she was built. So now we need to brainstorm ideas for tackling this challenge!

The following weekend we met with a sales guy at Quantum sails, whom David has been speaking to about us buying new sails for several months. He also told us we could have him clean our existing sails as well as treat them with an anti-spider solution that'll last at least a month after Passage is back in the water this coming spring. Considering the fairly major infestation that developed towards the end of summer, I was sold! I also did some research and found that citrus, lavendar and tea tree oils all repel spiders so I will definitely be adding some of that to our boat wash throughout next summer!!!!

Over thanksgiving weekend we went to David's grandmother's house in Tennessee to enjoy some TASTY home cooking and spend time with family. It was a nice change of pace, except for when we went shopping on Black Friday and ended up being awake for a full 24 hours! My poor mother- and father-in-law went with us, and were such troopers! We scored some good deals and almost wrapped up our holiday shopping, but I was sad there weren't any good marine places to score boating deals down there. West Marine had some good ones, but I don't want to buy foul weather gear without trying it on first. And as always, I can count on Amazon.com to inspire me!

We also took our sails with us and used her giant backyard to lay out the nylon sails and see what we inherited when we bought Passage. David's dad was a huge help! We now think that the mystery nylon sail is a Spinnaker Staysail since it's the same color and fabric as our symmetrical Spinnaker...a sail that looks like it was possibly never even used...score! Our spinnaker douser that we ordered in Annapolis came in the mail during mid-October so we are excited to try out these sails in 2012. Check out the video of our sail inspection on Passage's Facebook page.

We are looking for a space heater to take to the boat with us so we can continue working on her during the increasingly COLD winter months...I've been scouring freecycle because I am too cheap to buy one, but so far haven't emailed fast enough to actually get one.

I've also started selling stuff on Ebay, that we've had sitting around our condo for a while now and just don't have a use for. We've read several blogs of people rushing to sell it all in time to leave, and so we've decided to start now. Stuff that's still new, with tags, etc is going first because if we haven't yet taken it out of the box then we definitely don't need it! Once that's done we'll move on to gently used items until we are really down to the essentials. This purging process is only partly because we know it'll have to happen sometime...but mostly because when we brought stuff home from the boat for winter storage, we realized that we have absolutely NO SPACE for us! Both our office and our guestroom are full of boating supplies, and that just won't do when we have people come visit!

So even though there hasn't been a blog posting recently, we've still been busy! Hopefully we'll find a winter boatwork rhythm after the holidays are over.