Ernesto This!

Yesterday it looked like the path of Ernesto was going to bring it right to our little piece of Florida. So this morning we took off the sails and the Mack Pack sail cover. Put the cooler (we use it for paint and other nasty liquids) below. Water Gerry cans below. Took the fins off of the wind generator. We tripled up our lines to the mooring ball. Took down the radar reflector.

Then we checked on the latest on Ernesto. Looks like it is going to miss us by a LOT and go to the other coast. Well that is the more glamorous coast of Florida I suppose. Well, good drill for us and the sails had to come off before we returned to Chicago anyway so those will stay off for now. We've not removed the dodger yet as we wanted the shade for as long as possible. Now if the winds are going to stay under 30 knots we'll probably leave it up.

Tricky business tracking hurricanes. Which track will they really take? How intense will they really get? You don't get to know until they're on you 24 hours out. At least now we do have an escape hatch....the trusty '94 Mazda which Sue is more apt to use than Scott. And the parking space is working out just fine.

We did hire a diver, Bryant who did an excellent job on our bottom, if you know what I mean. It was a bit exciting when his hose broke and the line was a 'live wire' in the water until we turned off the tank. It took Bryant one hour to clean all the remaining barnacles including the bottom of the keel which we never painted! He said it wasn't really that bad. We have him scheduled to come back each month until we leave in December.

And so what does one do while waiting for the next forecast for Ernesto? You watch the rays swim by your boat:














You talk to the daughter via computer video phone:














And you go to happy hour at Parrot Key which is right at the marina and..........
where the beers are $1 for 16 oz drafts....really! Yeungling has become our favorite. And Chad the barkeep is ready to draw you a cold one in an iced glass...really a glass which is not a plastic cup...whenever you're ready.
















By the way, Gracie is not happy with what happended to her back bedroom when the sails came down today. She is really singing the blues. No more cereal for us!

Catalina Enee still for sale!

First of all...a contest! Write an "appropriate" caption for this picture! Look close. Click on the picture to make it bigger. Just put your entry in the comments. Enjoy!





Yes fans it's true. Good old Catalina Enee is still on the hard up near Baltimore. Let me just say that boat brokers are all pirates! The ones I left Enee with did nothing to try to sell her over the past several months. So, I've put her up on Ebay. Check it out and spread the word to anyone in the Chesapeak area who want a great first boat!

In other news...we finally got our wifi straightened out and we now have a signal right on the boat. Works a little better if we go in to the marina but still better than schlepping the computer to McDonald's! Note to anyone looking to start a business: Ft. Myers Beach needs an internet cafe desperately! Remember Plantation Coffee in Key West? That place was always jumping and the wifi was free!

I think I'll contract with a local diver to take care of the baranacles once a month. That's only $100 each dive and worth it. I want to make sure our bottom is nice and clean when we take off from here at the end of November. I'm also looking into SCUBA class for myself. Ultimately I'd like to just be able to keep the air tank in the dingy and use a long hose to go around and inspect and clean the boat myself. There is a two week class near here in September for about $275. We'll see.

In any event, breathing through a long hose with the snorkel mouthpiece attached doesn't work! It was a good idea in theory but once in the water captain snappy couldn't get a breath! No comments necessary on this pic, OK?

We are enjoying NOT having refrigeration for awhile. It is so hot here that I have to run a lot of engine to keep up with refrigeration. We have been toting ice every day or two and just not keeping a lot of perishables on board. When it's so hot we don't feel like eating a meat and potatoes dinner anyway. When you are on the go the engine tends to get run twice a day anyway getting off of and back onto the anchor. I should have bought the refrigerator that exchanges heat with seawater instead of air but it was more $$$ and required two more holes in the boat. I already have 9!...at last count.

We've retrieved our car again. I swear I should hang that Mazda from the dingy davitts! It was still up in Clearwater so we finally found a parking space for it, rented a car, and brought it down a couple of days ago. Now we can use it to shop if we want or get propane, explore downtown ft. Myers, etc.

Here's the story of getting the parking space.... I was asking our friendly bartender at the Parrot Bar if he knew of anyone in the neighborhood who might let us park a car. The lady next to me over heard and told me she might have a slot at a condo that she owns but she'd have to check with her partner. I told her I could pay $50 a month (the marina wanted $200!!). She got back to me a few days later and said that they had talked and thought $100 was better. I said well, than try zero on for size! I mean these people are not in the car parking business and the $50 came out of nowhere but suddenly they want $100. She is from New York.

Two days ago I was walking down the street by the marina and a lady was out working in her yard. I asked her if there might be a place to park our car nearby. She gave me her neighbor's number as he was in Tennessee until winter. I called him (his name is 'Baldy') and asked and told him I'd be willing to pay for the privlege. He said, "Hell you don't have to pay me partner. Just go ahead and put your car there". Tennessee - New York. Coincidence? Maybe not.

That's for now. Remember there's a boat out there for sale and Gracie is still available!

Best Windscoop Ever!

A traditional wind scoop consists of some light material that is hauled up on a halyard and aimed forward so as to catch more wind and guide it down a hatch. They work great as long as you are on the anchor and the boat points itself into the wind. We are on a mooring ball in Ft. Myers where there is a pretty hefty current that changes as the day goes on. We point a variety of directions depending on the relative strengeh and direction of the wind and current. So a traditional wind scoop is almost useless to us and let me tell you, you want every atom of wind you can find for sleeping at night.
We stumbled upon the ‘Best Marine” wind scoop while surfing the web. This clever design consists of four panels that open at 90 degrees from each other. Which ever way the wind blows is pretty much gauranteed to inflate one of the panels and guide the wind below. It works great! It is anchored into the corners of our forward hatch by hooking the corner tabs around 4 cup hooks that we screwed in. We open the hatch all the way back by disconnecting the arm. Then we just haul it up using our spinnaker halyard. They come in a variety of sizes depending on hatch size. We have a really big (28” square) hatch so had to get the big one for $70. Smaller ones range downward in price to around $50.

In other news, yes sadly, it's true that Gracie the Cat that Sails has gone nearly completely blind. Bravely she still finds her way around by feel, smell and memory. If I could teach her to meow on command I'd take her to Mallory square, put dark glasses and a pork pie hat on her and bill her as Gracie - the Blind Blues Cat....Meow, how, how how.... Could be a money maker! Anyway if anyone would like a nice blind cat she could use some cooler and more pleasant surroundings to finish out her days. Email me.

Making mosquito screens for hatches or How to Keep the bugs out!

It’s amazing how few bugs we’ve encountered on this trip. However, being bugs, they will find you. So while moored in a slip in Clearwater I began making screens for the four hatches. Scott got the idea from a similar design that he saw on a boat way back in Charlevoix Michigan. It’s a simple design where a fine netting is placed around the outside of the hatch and chain is then sewn along the base to hold the netting down. At least this is the approach I took to making them. I sewed them by hand since I have no sewing machine.
(Above photo is taken from inside the hatch looking out at sunrise.)

The difficult part was accurately measuring how much material to use for each hatch. The sales lady at Sailrite in Ft. Lauderdale and Scott both laughed at me when I said I wanted 3 yards of 45” wide material. How big are the hatches? Well the 2’ square hatch covers are not all that big but when they’re opened up at a 450 angle there is much more area to cover. I had no idea how to measure for this (spatial relationships has always been challenging for me) so I wanted to be sure I had plenty of material. Good news is that this mesh is reasonable... the 3 yards costs $15.
So 3 months later as I sat on deck unfolding the netting, I laid a portion over a hatch until I thought it was fully covered with enough material to fold over the chain. In fact I also laid the chain over the netting and had Scott cut and relink it to fit. When I checked and double checked that I had enough material covering the hatch I marked where to cut the material for one hatch and then did so.

It took between 1.5 to 2 hours to sew all the way around one hatch capturing the chain inside the bottom edge of the netting. I had to fold the material over itself at the corners making sure I wasn’t pulling too much material and shortening it on the other corners. After 2 or 3 stitches I would recheck to make sure chain and material were in the correct position and that the netting would still fit the opened hatch.

This was definitely a custom job. Each cover was unique to each hatch. I soon realized that I needed to not only keep track of which screen went on which hatch but also which corner covered which corner! I drew a black ‘x’ on each starboard aft corner. Of course the screen also has an inside and an outside. They don’t fit inside out.

Interestingly enough I had enough material for only 3 hatches! This has worked out since the forward hatch has a screen that velcros to the inside of the frame. Having the screen inside the hatch allows us to use a windscoop on this hatch which is in the v-berth where we sleep. The windscoop is a story in itself.

So far they’ve worked well. The mosquitos and other flying creatures can’t come in but the breeze does. There was only one more opening not screened in...the campanionway. Until recently we would put the board in and close the slide cover during the night. This of course cut off much of our air flow and believe me we want all the air flowing possible. The solution - make another screen. I ordered more netting from Sailrite (another 3 yards just to be sure) and received the package at Salty Sam’s marina within the week. Great service. Also as it turned out we had just enough chain left over since I didn’t use any for the forward hatch and I always get extra.

This screen should be a piece of cake. The opening is straight forward...basically an ‘L’ shape. Just cut the netting to fit then sew in the chain. No need to sew at the opening. I had the leisure of sewing at the table in the cabin with the fan on!

So what have I learned since making the first screens and what might I do differently with this screen? Some of the chain is already breaking through the stitches in the original screens so I decided to add a cloth basting to this new campionway screen. This was fairly easy to do since I had the table surface to work on.

My first attempt of attaching the chain and basting to the netting was a disaster. I had a good stitch going through all material knowing I had plenty of material. My only concern was the flexibility of the chain. I didn’t want to capture it in any stitches. I wanted it to move freely within the seem.

After sewing 2 sides of the screen I realized that I didn’t have enough chain to make it all the way around. What the hell happened? I knew I left way more material for making a hem than I needed but planned to just pull the chain through, pleating the material, to cover the perimeter of the shape. Okay, time to pull. Oh no. Pull as hard as I did, the chain wasn’t budging and the material wasn’t pleating. Too much friction!

After much sweating and swearing and waiting a day, I took out all the stitches and saved the thread and prepared to start over. My second attempt was more successful. Scott connected the chain end to end since we knew it was the exact length we needed for the opening. Then I laid the chain on the basting on the netting on the table, measured and remeasured how long and wide the sides needed to be (44’ x 55) and stitched away. This time it worked.


I still want to add some support to the netting where there is stress at the corners by sewing in a basting. For now we are very gentle when covering and uncovering the campanion way. The netting material if a bit fragile. It has made a difference in our air flow although these past few nights there has been zero air flowing. The windscoop which picks up any particle of wind has been very limp.
So we have managed to keep the bugs out. This new screen also keeps Gracie in! Of course now that she’s blind she’s not quite as adventurous. But she does wait on the top step in the morning for us to open the screen so she can get some fresh air in the cockpit. (By the way she has the best airflow in the cabin. She sleeps in front of her fan on the deck below our bed.) She could easily push the netting and get out but she doesn’t. She probably can’t even see the netting but senses something there so stays on the step. This top step is also her perch for ‘viewing’ the galley in hopes that some treats will emerge. Sometimes she gets lucky! Even a blind cat.......

Life in Ft. Myers Beach

Ft. Myers Beach is a strange place. Especially in the off season. As you would expect there are big expensive condos along the beach side although we think most are not occupied during the summer. So, who is here then? Carny people apparently! Yeah, there is a rough looking crowd here that lives on the other side of Estero Blvd… not the beach side. Nothing dangerous just a lot of tattoos (but the prison kind) on leathery skin and not so many teeth. The guys don’t look much better. People who are here on vacation are here because the rates are cheaper now and they need that because by the look of them, they’ve spent most of their expendable income on snacks. Lots of parking here too for their Harleys.
(Above photo is of Salty Sam's Marina where we also dingy ashore and purchase ice, use showers and do laundry.)

The good news is that there is a trolley that runs the length of Estero Island all the way from Bonita Beach north and across the bridge to Summerlin Mall. Price? 25 cents! Really! Runs about every hour so we can time our going ashore to catch the trolley going which ever way we want. To get ashore we take about a 10 minute dingy ride down this one canal that cuts into Estero Island. At the end of this canal is the “dingy landing”. This is mostly mangroves with a couple of grooves someone cut out for dingys to pull up. Depending on the tide this can be some ugly docking especially because the shore is crawling with hundreds of little crabs that go underground when you step ashore. Yuck. (Photo at left is of the yukky, mukky 'dingy dock') From there we walk one block to Estero Blvd on which runs the Trolley.

Right at our dingy landing is the Topps grocery store which is really handy for us. One block south of our dingy landing is the public library with free internet. We’ve used that a lot! Sometimes we have to wait a little to use the computer so I use that time to read the NY Times. Looks like the world is going to hell in a hand basket! Across the street from the library the library runs a used book store with paperbacks 50 cents and hard backs $2.00. Yeah! If we take the trolley north it is about a 5-10 minute ride to ‘Times Square’ where the pier, beach, and lots of bars and restaurants are. As to the beach they’ve done a nice things here. Although the beach side of Estero Blvd. is lined with big condos and hotels there is beach access for everyone between the buildings and these places are marked with signs along Estero. So nobody owns the beach itself and anyone can walk out to the beach at any of these points. Nice. If you stay on the Trolley it goes over the big bridge and ends up at a largish mall – Summerlin Square where the West Marine lives. Always need to find the West Marine, right? There is also connections here for other buses that go to the airport and downtown Ft. Myers – yet to be explored by us. If we take the trolley to the south from our dingy landing you first come to the Red Coconut trailer park. Notable only because it’s been here since at least the 1940’s and it is RIGHT on the beach. Further along is a movie theater that serves real food, beer and wine with the movies. Haven’t tried this yet but we plan to. Beyond that there is not much until you come to the Santini Square mall. Here we find a nice little hardware store, a book store, drug store, some restaurants and other vacation type beach stores. Beyond here the trolley leaves the island and goes across bridges to Lovers Key and on to Bonita Beach and Bonita Springs. At the end of the line (in a mall of course) there is a K-mart.

We’ve fallen into a pattern of working on the boat until about noon followed by some exploring of Ft. Myers Beach, library, reading or naps during the hot part of the day. Maybe happy hour at the marina later on and then some chess and snacks back on the boat. It’s a hard life but someone has to do it. (Photo at right shows Scott working on the teak-an ever ongoing project.)

As to the boat we recently installed a new 8D battery. I had to get some hired help from the marina to be able to lift the old one out and put the new one in. We could tell that we needed a new battery as twice the voltage would suddenly drop to 10.5 volts! That ain’t right and probably indicated a shorted cell or two. The old battery came with the boat so we had no idea how old or how many charging cycles it had been through. No battery lasts forever. The refrigerator is acting up. It will come on but really it is only the fan coming on and not the compressor. Then the fan shuts off and the next second both fan and compressor come on. It is still making cold but for how long? I called Adler Barbour (and by the way, when you call them a person answers and transfers you to Lester the tech guy who is very helpful and friendly. Why don’t more companies do this. Aren’t we all sick of the menu and then the long hold?) Lester had me rewire the thing to do a diagnostic that showed that the little pc board was probably fried. He is sending us a new board as this thing is still under warranty. He says it is easy to swap them out….we’ll see. Finally, I installed a key switch where we used to just have a toggle switch. Now it will be harder to steal the boat! Sometimes when we press the start button nothing happens. I had this before and found that it was the button itself and put in a new one. Now it’s not the button so I suspect the solenoid and will put a new one in soon. When it doesn’t start I have to jump it at the starter motor. Yikes! Love those big sparks!

So, all in all, Ft. Myers Beach will be an ok hidey hole for us during hurricane season. I may look for work soon to feed the sailing kitty. Would really like a new auto helm. We’ll see.

Since writing the above the new pc board arrived (it has one resistor, one capacitor, 3 fuses and 1 relay on it. I don’t think anything on there can even break.) I swapped it out and the frig does seem to be running more normally. In the mean time however we find that two bags of ice lasts about a day and a half. I calclated the difference in cost between running engine two hours a day or buying ice. Buying ice wins! Plus I don’t have the constant worry about the state of the battery or the operation of the frig. Maybe we’ll use the frig when it is cooler or when we are on the engine all day. I’m kicking myself for not paying more originally and getting the frig with the option to exchange heat with sea water rather than with the ambient air. Even though the air is cooler than the water at night the important thing is that water is a better conductor of heat. At the time I didn’t want to put two more holes in the hull for input and outflow of water. Well, too late.

As of this writing we've been moored in Ft. Myers Beach for almost one month. Yesterday we decided to replenish our water and fuel supplies and then go sailing. As we threw off the mooring line we discovered that we couldn't move forward. Barnacles! Luckily we quickly retrieved the mooring line and secured the boat before the current got us. Time to dive and scrape. A nasty, nasty job but a few hand and head cuts later the prop and most of the rudder were barnacle free. We also floated the dingy around the boat and scraped along side the hull. We' ve learned that the waters we're in are rich in nutrients and the worst for barnacle bombardment. Diving and scraping will be an on-going project. How long can you hold your breath under water? We may have a job for you!

We were very happy to have Donna and Ken (Scott's sister and brother-in-law) visit us this week. We were going to go out for a sail but the winds and waves were high so we stayed in the mooring field. As it turned out we wouldn't have gotten very far with the inch thick layer of barnacles on the prop!







Although Kenny was ready to tackle the bottom had we sailed and anchored as planned (we knew barnacles were growing, we just didn't realize how thick) we still had fun watching the afternoon storms with our snacks and cocktails.

Finding wifi access is still a problem. I (sue) am currently sitting in the lobby of the Best Western where Donna and Ken stayed where we discovered they have wifi. So far no one has noticed me.

Stay tuned for future posts on: hiring a diver; the new wind scoop; making net covers for hatches; happy hour at parrotkey; the amazing gracie, the blues-blind cat; teak for two; plus much more.

A PLAN EMERGES

(Note to the faithful reader: This is a longish post. The first is a travel update followed by two boat project essays- ‘The Day the Engine Wouldn’t Start’ and ‘A Light For the Cockpit’. So go get a sandwich or beer or both and settle in. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, and at the end you’ll say, Hemingway WHO?. AND....sorry for the delay but we finally received our new MAC computer and boy is it fast and slick. Like me! Bill Gates Who?)

Getting up to date (internet is rare here in Ft. Myers Beach) - On Sunday the 9th we traveled south from Haze Point and anchored off of Useppa Island. From this anchorage you can take the dingy across the channel to Cabbage Key. This is an old fishing outpost that is now a pricey restaurant/bar. They have cottages to rent that look to be just the old fishing cabins. The story goes that the old fisherman wanted to guarantee that there’d be a beer waiting for them when they got back from fishing so they’d put their name on a dollar bill and pin it to the wall. So started a tradition for visitors to leave a dollar on the wall with a message on it. To date they estimate that there is over $50,000 taped to the walls several layers deep. We had a $4.00 beer each and then walked their little nature trail. There is a water tower along the way that you can climb up and get a pretty nice panorama of the area. Useppa island is a private club/development but there are no tall buildings just really nice looking houses. Elsewhere around there is wild undeveloped Florida landscape. Yes, there is still some of it!

This is a very pretty anchorage and perfect for bird watching. As the tide went down and the mud flats showed themselves quite a variety of birds came in to feed. There were the white ones and some brown ones. We are getting very good a spotting the differences like real birders. OK, actually there were Osprey (with a nest), Egrets, Blue Heron, Green Heron, Ibis, and the spectacularly colored Yellow-Crowned Night Heron. As we looked through the bird book to make our identifications we saw that in this region there lives a goofy looking bird called a Roseate Spoonbill. It’s big and has gauche pink wings on a white body and this really silly spoon shaped bill. Sue said, “Wouldn’t it be neat to see one of those fly in here”. About 3 minutes later (I’m not making this up) one of those flew in there! Spectacular colors. As the tide continued to fall Sue (always thinking) put on the depth sounder. Yeah, we had about half a foot of water under our keel. Time to move out a little!

The next day we continued on the inside track to Ft. Myers Beach. A longish 25 mile run but only one bridge across San Carlos Bay. The cruising guide described the large anchor field just after Mantanzas Pass Bridge between Estero Island and San Carlos Island. When we arrived however we see a large mooring ball field. We called the harbor master to be assigned a ball and began to look for it. Beyond the mooring field however we noticed several boats on anchor. Well, anchoring is so much more free than a mooring ball so we called the guy back on the radio and said we’d anchor instead. As we passed the last mooring ball however the depth began to drop rapidly. We don’t actually know how those boats got back in there. At under a foot under the keel we put on the brakes and backed straight up. Note: It is important on your way into unfamiliar territory to remember the approximate route you took in. You KNOW that’s deep enough. If you just start spinning around in a panic you may find that slim water. OK. But, backing a sailboat straight in a current is another matter. Of course like all sailboats she’ll crab to port because of prop walk. The idea is to get some way on and then put it in neutral so you can steer. Repeat. By this method we were able to retrace our steps and get turned around. Right about then the harbor master, Dale, was out in his boat watching us with a big grin on his face. “Just thought you might change your mind so I came out to help you get a mooring ball”. Nice guy. The mooring field is operated by Salty Sam’s (really) Marina and everyone there is very nice. The mooring balls are $13 per day or $260 for a month. Same price as Key West for the monthly. The marina is about 500 yards from our ball and has a nice restaurant, and small store.

Now what? We’ve now been everywhere south of here and everywhere worth going on Florida’s east coast. It is becoming more and more hurricane season so we are not going to venture out to the Bahamas or Mexico at this time. The mooring balls here are screwed into the sea bottom to as much as 30-40 feet to get a good hold. The line to the boat is braided and about 2” thick. My point is that I don’t think we could do better for a hurricane hole. We have nowhere we really want to be this time of year anyway. Plus, daughter and son in law are coming to wherever we are for a visit in late August – early September and there’s lots to do here in Ft. Myers Beach. Also, we are planning to travel back to Chicago for a month’s visit from Oct. 22 through Thanksgiving and leaving the boat here is no problem.

The down side: I get a little crazy when the boat doesn’t move for extended periods of time. Internet is almost non-existent in this town. It rains everyday…but that will probably change, right?

Of course there is always little boat maintenance and big boat projects. An extended stay allows work on the bigger projects. While we’re here (I swear) we’ll finish all the teak on the outside of the boat, install a new autohelm, finally get the SSB working (still not broadcasting!). Now that we’ve been on it for more than a year there is probably some more writing we could do and if we bring our car down from Clearwater we can explore land in a larger radius. So settle in for occasional reports from Ft. Myers Beach and lets just keep the hurricanes on the other side of the state, ok?



THE DAY THE ENGINE WOULDN’T START

Scott Says:

We motored from our little anchorage by Haze Point down toward Gaspirilla Island today. The little town, Boca Grande (not Boca Del Vista, Phase III) is supposed to be neat. So we anchored by a big sailor/trawler outside the channel that leads into the now closed marina there. We set the anchor and then it seemed to be dragging so we went to start up the engine to re-set it. To start our engine you flip a switch which on any other boat would be a key switch but on our is just a ‘simple’ toggle switch. (Thieves can please ignore the previous sentence.) The oil pressure buzzer sounds (it’s supposed to since there is no oil pressure yet) and then you press the start button which engages the starter, starts the engine and turns off the buzzer. Fine. When we flipped the switch …nothing…no buzzer. No buzzer, no start. Now what?

I took off the panel in the cockpit that contains all of the instruments and looked at the wires going to the switch of which there are four.

WARNING WARNING WARNING…PHYSICS LESSON ENSUES

Now a word about switches. A simple switch is a place in a circuit where two wires are not touching but then when you close the switch (turn it on) you connect those two wires and thereby complete a circuit. Pretty straight forward stuff. Usually all of the switching happens on the ‘hot’ side of the circuits that being the positive side by convention. So, in the simplest of all possible of switch applications you’d have a battery with a wire coming from the plus terminal going to one side of the switch. The other side of the switch would go to a light bulb for example and then the other side of the light bulb would go back to the negative side of the battery. Now flipping the switch turns on the bulb. My point is that the negative side of the battery has no business being connected to the switch itself in any simple application.

Upon inspecting my switch I note that there are four wires connected to it. That in itself is not that uncommon. A switch can actually be a little more complicated where it completes more than one circuit at once or breaks one circuit while making another. Still there should be no negative lead going to the switch. But there it was. My switch had power coming to it ready to be connected to other things via closing the switch. It had a place for the power to go, namely the push button to start the engine. But what the heck were the other two wires for, one of them being the negative of the battery?

I had hoped to map out exactly what kind of switch this was with my multi-meter. But when I stuck the probe into the hole where the connector had broken it just went in and jammed the switch itself. This is bad. Now I can’t figure out electrically how the switch works. Damn! I’ll have to fix it by thinking about it. ( A reference to my hero Richard Feyman who made money as a kid by fixing radios in the Brooklyn of the 1930’s…by thinking about it!)

What had happened to the switch is that one of its four terminals had rusted through and become disconnected from the rest of the switch. The one that came off was the one bringing the positive power to the switch. So, I understand that when I close the switch power is brought to the push button to start the engine. Now to discern what the other two wires are about. I connected a little piece of wire from the plus to the button wire and sure enough the buzzer sounded and the engine started when I pushed the button ok. Now I have two wires dangling in the air so something should be NOT working but I can’t find a thing. Hmmmm. Not that I’m against ending a project with a few wires left over.

I decided that starting the engine was key and the other two wires be damned. I had a spare 20 amp breaker which is really a simple switch as long as you stay under 20 amps and connected the ‘important’ wires to that and taped up the other two mystery wires. (Maybe they’re for the stereo…yeah!)

This works and we brought this improvised switch to the outside of the panel via some auxiliary wires and sealed it in a zip lock bag. When we find a West Marine or Radio shack we’ll make proper repairs.

Now I can have at the original switch and take it apart to see how it worked and what those other two wires are for.

Ah HA! Upon disassembling the switch I find that it is in fact a stupid simple switch to connect the two wires together that I thought. The OTHER two wires, a plus and a minus, are only there to LIGHT UP THE SWITCH ITSELF! I forgot that this switch was lighted. The ‘mystery’ wires are no longer a mystery and nothing bad will happen if they are never connected to anything again.

I love it when mysteries are solved. I almost look for boat problems just to have the chance to solve them.

Almost.

Sue says:
Isn’t it amazing? He really fixes things that I think can never be fixed. All the while he is putzing around with wires and volt meters and this and that, I’m thinking, ‘will we ever get this engine started? I would have had to call Tow Boat US or paid someone to buy a part at West Marine or I don’t know what to get the boat started again. Okay, we could have ‘jump started’ the thing but I don’t know how to do that either. What I’m trying to say is that I’m glad (and I know what I’ve got here) that captain has the ability to fix things on the fly and also has the ability to fix things by thinking about it. I really don’t mind getting the beer in celebration either and along the way I’m learning a lot about how to fix things!



A LIGHT FOR THE COCKPIT

This boat came with no light to put over the cockpit table. This is something that is really nice to have for those late night dinners or for just sitting around (in a bug free location). The boat does have a round two-prong 12 volt socket available at the binnacle post. So, I started inventing. I figured that I could clamp some sort of light to the round handle of the binnacle post that comes up above the wheel and run the cord to the outlet. It’s got to be removable as it will be in the way while sailing.

My prototype is done and works great and like a lot of working prototypes we’ll probable never see the final version! I screwed a spring type clamp with rubber jaws to a piece of teak about 10 inches long. I bought a plain 12 volt socket and 12 volt, two prong connector from West Marine (Their Motto: We sure hope Scott and Sue come to town.). This socket exactly press fit into a 3 inch long piece of ¾ inch pvc pipe. I cut the pvc pipe longitudinally so as to make two tabs that could then be bolted through to the teak. Now the bulb and pvc assembly can pivot on the stick to aim the light correctly. Wiring was simple. Just used some wire I had to connect the bulb socket to the 12 volt outlet connector. Now for the shade. I thought about dedicating one of my small plastic funnels but then Sue showed me the top to a lemonade container. Cylindrical, translucent, and about 4 inches in diameter with a rim about 2 inches high. This could work! I cut a hole in the center of the top to fit snugly on the pvc pipe and just pressed it on. It works! We tried it last night. by aiming it upwards it provides very nice indirect lighting via being scattered off of the bimini (which is oyster color). Via the pivot you can aim the light directly down for writing, or working crosswords, suduko, cat maintenance, etc.

These are the things that are best to do when we are on the move. You cannot stare at the horizon when you are not at the helm. You’ll go nuts. Reading is good, futzing about like this is good, playing chess against the computer is good…napping is BEST!

Hello to all from computer hell. We have lots to post and lots of pics but...
Can't put up pictures from the Ft. Myers Beach library. Don't know why. Computer guy is off today. The marina that we are moored by has wifi but our laptop is DONE. I quit messing with it forever. We are shopping now for a Mac. They work. Let's remember that 'windows' was a way to make a pc act like a mac. That's all its ever been and since its inception it is just patch after patch after patch and LOT of clever marketing! As to other computer options, there are basically NONE in Ft. Myers Beach. There was a internet cafe. We found it. Out of business and gutted. Some day wifi will just be in the air like AM radio. I hope I'm around to enjoy it!

So stay tuned...more info to follow in a few days...I hope.

Random Thoughts at 4:30 AM in Venice, FL

Weather Radio- You've heard me complain about NOAA before in this blog. This isn't really a complaint it is just a clarification. When you listen to the radio and they say, "Friday - winds south-west at 10 knots" what you don't know is WHEN on Friday. We were going to make an outside run from Venice to Charlotte Harbor today. To do so we want to leave at first light so as to get there before (hopefully) the pm thunderstorms. So I'm up at 4:30 making coffee and futzing with the boat. The wind is pretty strong and it is definitely NOT south west. It is South. Of course it is barely Friday! So sometime today the wind MIGHT shift to the south west but when? We need to run SSE to charlotte Harbor and need all the west we can get out of that wind. And, what do they mean by south-west? The wind could just be a litte west of south and that's not good enough. If I wait for the wind to spin around I'll be leaving later than I'd like. So, like the day before we will take the inside option. If I think I'm going to end up grinding my engine down the Atlantic Ocean in 2-3 foot seas I figure I might as well grind the engine in flat water on the intercoastal. The good thing about the Intercoastal is that you get this option. There are not many inlets along this coast so on the ouside you end up jumping past some very nice anchorages. The downside is that motoring down a straightaway gets a little tedious but our run will be only 17 miles to get to Englewood Beach and a supposedly fine anchorage. The other down side is bridges. We negotiated 4 bridges yesterday. The fourth one comes with about a knot current taking me toward the bridge. In those cases you really want the bridge to open! As I slowly approached the bridge having already talked with the bridge tender, she calls me back on the radio: "Enee Marie? I have a problem." I don't want to hear this. REVERSE! Now it's not that I can't turn around and buck a 1 knot current. It's just that it is so shallow off of the main trench that you are unsure which way to turn. As it turned out her 'problem' went away quickly before I even considered turning and we passed through ok.

Dolphins - Two interesting dolphin sightings yesterday. (Dolphins are getting as common as pigeons for us but they always still draw our attention because they are just so amazing.) First, while on the move yesterday an adult and a young dolphin were swimming parallel with us. The young one suddenly jumped completely out of the water continuing parallel with it and turned a little sideways as it to give us a better look. Nice. Secondly, last night I was sitting on the boat just staring at the water (I do a lot of that but this time I wasn't drooling.) and about 4 or 5 dolphins began swimming right there. The were huffing loudly but even more interesting is that they would roll up on the water like dolphins do and then smack their tails on the water. It sounded like Elizabeth Taylor doing a cannonball from the high dive! I'm not sure what this behavior is. Herding fish toward each other perhaps?

Weather - Hot. No really it's real HOT. Actually it gets hotter in Chicago often but the sun and the humidity just make it very intense. This is not a great time of year to be cruising this coast but I don't really know about other times of year here. I do know that winds are typically light and there is clouding and rain/thunderstorms somewhere on the west coast everyday. The storms we have been in on anchor can be a little intense but short lived. I'm curious to see how this pattern changes, if it does, as we continue south.

Plans - Plans come in a variety of sizes.
Small: There is what do you want to do tomorrow? Go or stay? Inside our outside? Check tides. Check weather.
Medium: We're heading south...where to? Key West? Dry Tortugas? Both? Which one first?
Large: Stay in Florida waters for all of huricane season? Head out to the Bahamas for some of it? Come December, head for the islands? Invade Cuba?

It was actually easier for the first year. All we had to do was keep heading south until we got to Key West! We are thinking of finding a place for the boat for ~Oct 20 through end of November while we come up north for the Chicago Marathon followed by Thanksgiving. Maybe have her hauled back in Ft. Lauderdale while we are away. The neat thing about plans is that they slowly (like everything else with sailing) emerge and mutate.

Well, sun is up and Sue is making breakfast. Onward...

Sailing in Thunderstorm Alley

Greetings from Sarasota FLA. We left Clearwater on Saturday July 1 and sailed to Egmont Key which sits right in the mouth of Tampa Bay. There is anchoring on the east side of the key. This makes the key a lee shore but it has been so deadly calm at night I figured this wouldn't be a problem. I said the same thing about "helping out" in Vietnam. While it didn't storm directly on us, those were visible to our south, it did become very rolly. We bounced up and down all night. At times the boat would bounce and spray would come in through the forward port and THAT AIN'T RIGHT! A long night indeed.



Above is the lighthouse on Egmont Key.
At the right is a sampling of the waves we hobby-horsed with all night. Gracie, are you still alive?







We got away early on Sunday heading for Longboat Key. There is an inlet there and opportunities for protected anchorage. Wind was ok at first then turned to our nose (how many times have I typed those words?) and we motor sailed into the inlet. When you make the drawbridge you are about a quarter mile from the anchorage but you can't get there from there (!). You have to go all the way around an island to avoid a large sand bar. More on that later. We negotiated the buoys ok and found the anchorage that had about 5 other sailboats in it. Always room for one more though. This is a very nice anchorage. There are two resturants 100 yards away, tons of dolphins, and that sand bar attracts hundreds of boats and families to enjoy the shallow water, look for sand dollars, be lazy, swim, and so forth. Very laid back.












We found in the cruising guide that if you follow a channel called Bishop Bayou it will lead to a little market and liquor store. This is a nice little dingy ride past some very impressive homes and equally impressive wildlife. We pulled up to the cement wall and thought we were in someone's back yard. It was the back end of the mini mall. On our way back we spied a huge crane that let us creep up slowly to get several photos. Fun.















After the dingy ride we relaxed on board reading in the shade when suddenly 4 ultra light planes came flying overhead. Hey, it looks like they are going to land on the water right by us! How spectacular.




You can tell when it's 4 o'clock because that's when the evening storms arrive. It's also validates cocktail hour or hours. Last night (July 4th) however as we watched the dark clouds and lightening moving our way we heard NOAA weather radio's 'beep beep beep' distress sound.
A water spout had been spotted 15 miles east of Clearwater Beach heading southwest. Guess where we were? Of course southwest. We quickly decided to set a second anchor and kept a close eye on the low dark clouds near by. Yes that does look like a dropping cloud that could be the shape of a funnel. Oh but look, it went back up. Then a second funnel shaped cloud appeared but it too dissipated. Whew! It rained very hard for about 10 minutes with some wind but not too crazy. Sue was ready to run the dingy ashore and head for someone's basement. This wouldn't have worked since there are no basements in Florida!

The storm passed and it turned out to be a beautiful evening. We had a great cool breeze all night. Who needs airconditioning? Well, not counting the hours between 9 am and 6 pm. We had spaghetti dinner and watched firework shows from many locations on the horizon. Quite a show.

We originally decided to head to Venice back out on the ocean but the winds were predicted to be 5-10 k from the southeast, in other words, in our face. So we decided to take the scenic route inside and stop at Sarasota instead. We did sail Sarasota Bay until reaching the highway bridge then manouvered our way to the anchorage just outside Marina Jacks.

And here we are in town at a local bookstore/cafe. The whole city has wifi so you can be just about anywhere and get connected. Can't wait until the whole planet is a hot spot! Sweet. We'll head back to the boat soon since it's already past 4 o'clock and some kind of storm is bound to be heading our way. Tomorrow we may head down to Venice also on the inside. No good inlet to take from Sarasota. But maybe we'll stay another day. Too soon to tell. More later.

Onward

Our mission in Clearwater has come to an end. So we are heading back south to explore some of the places we passed over on the way up. We came to Clearwater in two hops: Key West to Marco Island and then Marco Island to Clearwater. I think there are some stops in between. Tomorrow we plan to sail to Egmont Key and anchor. That key sits in the mouth of Tampa Bay. Should be a great view of the Sunshine Bridge.

So Scott and Sue are on it again! No definite longer range plans. We may take a run out to the Dry Tortugas, maybe back to Key West. Not to late to make a run to Mexico. We'll just have to keep a sharp weather eye. So stay tuned for more (mis)adventures of Enee Marie.

Scott & Sue's New Drawers!

Extended stays like the one we are involved in in Clearwater Beach allow the completion of larger projects rather than the mundane day to day boat maintenance. This is especially true now that I have access to my Dad's woodworking shop. As you may have read earlier, we ripped out the old freezer compartment that was along side the companionway to the aft cabin. In this space we have now built 8 drawers and a nice work top. My new 'workbench'! Here's a brief blow by blow picture story of the building process.

Here in the shop I'm repairing the frame that was the front of the freezer compartment. This frame had two pretend doors in it. I'll not use the doors but use the frame and build 8 drawers to fit within the frame.








Finishing up one drawer. The fronts are teak and the sides and back are poplar. Bottom is eighth inch fiberboard. Yeah, it's hot in the garage!
Of course, all phases of the building project have to be checked and approved by the foreman.











The runners are built off of the frame. The divider in the center holds up one side of the runners and will also help to support the top when it is all installed. Of course it will all fit perfectly when I get it all back to the boat, right?





Hey, not bad. Of course the center partition will have to be trimmed at the bottom to allow for the shape of the hull. Back at the boat I only have one small (and dull) hand saw. But, several minutes of sawing allowed me to finally trim off the lower corner...but wait...why doesn't it fit right. ARGGGGG...After all that sawing I sawed off the upper corner! Time to quit for today. I'll buy a sharper saw tomorrow






Here's Sue painting the wooden handles we bought for the drawers. We're using Spar Urethane. Notice the drawers are different depths. The upper ones can be longer than the lower ones due to the shape of the boat.









Here's the finished product! I found a piece of melamine for the top. I used the old top to cut out this piece. Because it is in a companionway there is no good place to stand to get a picture. This is about the best I could do. The eight drawers will be used for tools and engine parts. I am going to install a better light above the table. This is a huge increase in available storage space. Always at a premium on any boat.

A Retrospective: Enee's One Year Cruise

Scott and Sue have combed through their many, many pictures and consulted the Captain's log to put together a slide show detailing their long, winding trip from Chicago, IL to Clearwater, FL.

It's pretty amazing how much they have done over the course of the last year.

Click on the link to download in either: (pdf) or (powerpoint). PDF is recommended if you have the means to view it. If you can't view a pdf and don't own powerpoint, go here to download the free Adobe pdf reader. The files are pretty large so try to be patient while they download. My advice: click on the link, go make a sandwich, come back and enjoy slide show with sandwich.

If you have any problems downloading and viewing it, feel free to send an e-mail and Jason will be happy to help.

You can find the link to the slide show in the slide bar from now on.

Un-Freezing In Clearwater

Well, the big news is that Alberto was small news. Enee weathered the storm just fine. As Alberto approached we put on extra lines (but didn't remove the dodger) and headed for my Dad's in Temple Terrace. This morning we drove over and checked things out. No damage. Nice and dry down below (except for the drip on my side of the bed where we cleverly had placed a pan). We wanted to stay until high tide to see how high it would go in case we had to adjust lines. So...as long as we're here...

Might as well RIP out the old freezer!

This boat originally had a large freezer AND a fridge. Fridge in the galley and freezer beside the walk-through to the aft compartment. They both worked off of a engine driven compressor. Early on I had converted the fridge to a 12 volt system and had already thrown out the compressor. This freezer is a beast of a box taking up valuable space for us. The boat actually came in two models - with or without this freezer. The front of this unit looks to be two hinged doors but in the freezer model they don't open. Behind these doors there's just a big freezer box with two chiller plates inside.

Things go together much more simply than they come apart. I wanted to save the front to use the frame for the starting point of turning this valuable space to a 'work bench' with maybe 6 drawers underneath. I couldn't find A screw to begin taking anything apart. Maybe a Sawsall is what's needed!

In frustration I began chipping away the laminate of the top surface. Hey! There's
some screws holding the top down. I'm on my way. Apparently the top is also glued down...with 5200. Many pryings back and forth (and much sweat) and I got the top off in one piece. I'll use this as the template to make the new top. Can't use this top as it has a square hole in the center to extract the no longer existant ice cream.

Now what? I'm hoping to extract the white tub that is the freezer box. First I lightened the load by removing the two chiller plates at the ends. I sliced off the remaining tubing with the dremmel. I found four screws that held the tub somewhat in place but the real thing I was up against was that they filled all the extra space with that foam that expands and fills all the available space. It is sort of a glue too....apparently! Much rocking back and forth and I was able to lift the tub out of its location. However, since they stuck all that foam in after the fact, the tub no longer fits down the walk-through. Many minutes of trimming that rotten stuff back with a bread knife. What fun. It's about 110 degrees down below. I'm sweating and all the dust I'm making is sticking to me. At times like this you just have to focus on the job, think of the shower and beer waiting for me at the club when I'm done.

We finally got the whole tub out and shoved out into the cockpit (after removing the companionway stairs). Last picture shows the new avaiable space (with those doors laying on the deck). Whew! We cleaned up quickly and did in fact enjoy that promised shower and beer.

Back at my Dad's in Temple Terrace we'll work on the design of my new workbench over the next few days. This will be a nice use of what was for us unusable space. Stay tuned for Welty Tool Time!

Make no small plans
- Daniel Burnham

A Year at Sea

GREETINGS! Yes, believe it our not we have now been on this adventure one year. Seems impossible that it was a year ago already that we shoved off from good old Burnham Harbor, Chicago but time flies when your whipping the crew of a sailing vessel. It's funny, I guess, that on this, our anniversary, we are holed up at my dad's house in Tampa while Enee Marie is strapped down to her moorings in Clearwater awaiting Alberto. Just a little wind and rain but we came here to be safe.

This map roughly shows our route. The website is really for logging your running routes but I liked that it calculated miles for me so I used it. When you go to the site you can move the map by clicking and dragging or zoom out. The program automatically puts in mile markers but only up to 99. That's why when you are zoomed out you see that fat looking line across Lake Michigan. Along the path there are 92 places where we actully anchored or moored the boat for at least one night. You'll notice a leg going from Baltimore up to Long Island. That represents us moving to the new boat via truck so those miles shouldn't be counted. In any event we sailed around 3200 miles.

It's funny to read the log for the early part of the trip. I was so possessed! We spent exactly 5 days "exploring" Lake Huron...and that includes a day with a breakdown! Remember...lakes freeze in the wintertime so we HAD to keep moving! I'm lucky Sue is still with me on this trip! Apparently I calmed down along the way as we spent over a month enjoying Key West!

Now for some awards...

Favorite Places: New York City, Baltimore, Savanah, Manhassat Bay (Long Island), Key West
Worst Places: Rome, NY on the Erie Canal
Favorite Sail: Hawk Channel along the Florida coast. 15-20 knot wind from the east with 1-2 foot waves. Whee!
Scariest Moment: The day I mistakenly put my bathing suit on inside out without noticing (ok...it was backwards too!).
Funniest Moment: (See above)
Longest Sail: 57 hours from Long Island to Portsmouth VA
Best Deal: Elizabeth City. Free...two nights with wine and cheese party.
Worst Deal: Atlantic City $4.00 per foot per night PLUS they make you lose another $300 in the casino!
Favorite Anchorage: anchoring off into the 'weeds' along the intercoastal in South Carolina. Just us and the dolphins.
Worst Anchorage: St. Augustine - bad holding...really crowded
Most Loyal Readers (not including family nor former friends from Chicago or nearby suburbs nor people we worked with when there...my friend): Sally from Lorain, OH and Stan from San Diego

Now we are sticking around Clearwater for awhile. Where will we be next year at this time...we'll just have to wait and see! Maybe we'll become Scientologists!