"Rainy days and Mondays ... "
24 May 2009 | Inlet Cove Marina, Ponce Inlet, FL
Linda & Chris, 76, Cloudy, rain likely

After our "maiden voyage" we took advantage of some very nice sunny days to paint the crew cabin. This involved placing on deck all the items stored there (lines, spare parts, spinnaker, tools, etc.) Chris rigged up a shade with a tarp and the whisker pole, and he disappeared into the cabin removing, sanding and scraping the foam backing from the headliner that had deteriorated over 24 years, and painting the interior with Interlux Bilgekote. The next day everything we wanted to keep was put back in the crew cabin, after being wiped off to keep it clean(er) in there.
(All new pics are located in "Refit Round Three".)
We spent five days visiting Lindy & Rich in Wellington, enjoying a party they threw on Sunday. Rich has created a 1 hole golf course over his pond, and there was a closest to the pin contest. Chris thought that making it onto dry land was going to be good enough, until Linda showed him up and won the contest! We came home on Monday afternoon to rain. The rain didn't stop until Saturday. Seriously! The locals say they have never seen so much rain. The runoff and storm surge combined to cause the tide to rise about 2 feet higher than we have ever seen it, covering our finger pier by at least two inches Wednesday night for a couple of hours. As you can imagine, we got to see where any leaks were in the boat, and saw a few: around the cabinet surrounding the mast, probably from between the deck and mast collar; a small drip on the starboard side salon, that sneaks out through a screw hole in the headliner near the skylight, and a dribble down the port forward settee section of the hull, we think from where a chock was replaced and apparently needs some more bedding. We had plastic tubs strategically placed to catch the rain and felt like we were in a movie about being in a leaky cabin with pots on the floor!
Today we went to our locker to get some wood (left over from when we created the master suite) so Chris could repair some known rot on the aft head bulkhead, one of the few items left from the original boat survey. I also planned to bring items aboard and store them for preparations to leave. As our luck would have it, every box on the floor was wet and caving in. So, we spent three hours removing everything, and stacking the undamaged boxes in the hallway. We emptied and tossed the wet boxes and whatever items we no longer wanted to deal with or were too wet to keep (including two dead geckos, yuck!)
Thankfully, the worst damage was to some books, which we brought back to the boat and looked up on the internet how to dry them. We figured that the scuba gear handled being wet pretty well, some clothes that need to be run through the washer, and we will need to bring back one of our largest sails and spread it out to dry so it won't mildew.
The past week brought dampness in our boat and in our locker, but it extended to our spirits as well, if only for a short while. This passage from the Introduction to The Voyager's Handbook, by Beth A. Leonard, titled "Is this the Life for You?" stood out for me this week, "The literal voyage, with its pulling up of roots, is accompanied by the figurative voyage and the pulling apart of the self. Both teach you what defines you and fulfills you. If you are ready to face yourself as you are, then you will find this spiritual growth, to be vastly satisfying and energizing."
I think we did some growing this week.