today i am very pleased and proud to announce that pam and i successfully docked cricket with no pressure, no mishaps, no bad feelings! the dock we docked upon was into a fairly narrow opening, into a cute little river that extends up into the town of oxford. it is lined on both sides with boat docks. lots of pretty boats. lots of not so pretty boats. sail boats, motor boats, pleasure boats, work boats. plenty of reason here to feel the pressure, but we took plenty of deep breaths beforehand, and drove in, and docked her. it took two passes at the dock, but we both knew we'd finallize the docking procedures when we were good and ready to do so! yeah for us!
the reason for docking the boat today, instead of simply finding another easy anchorage was not simply for the practice, or to make us feel better about such manoeuvres. nope. we really wanted to figure out our electrical issues once and for all! we pulled up to the dock, walked to the oxford marina buildings, found the offices (more challanging than it sounds. everybody there says, "it's in that blue building over there," but all of the buildings are blue! and the office doesn't say "office" anywhere on it). anyway, when we entered we were greeted by a great big rottweiler dog, with a long string of drewl hanging down his starboard jowl. a very nice greeting, as far as we were concearned. we found out later that this dog's nickname was nettles, after the long stringy nettles jellyfish all over the bay. we were directed into a room with a couple of chairs, a desk and a man behind the desk. as soon as he spoke, we knew we were in the right place! not only was he friendly, and interested in hearing our whole boring story about our electrics, but he also had the best english accent. could listen to it all day, and we did get to hear quite a lot of it, because he took plenty of time with us to explain in patient words we could understand all about how our electric system works. wonderful! he also tested this and that, and fixed a few things that have been annoying us, and causing us to be very electrically "shy." at one point he had his head buried in one of the spots with batteries, voltage regulators and the like, and we saw him pull out his wire cutters and heard "snip." pam and i both gasped, and he said in a very cheery voice, "don't worry! i'm a professional. this won't hurt a bit!" he was right. our battery, the one that didn't start our engine in a crucial time of need was soon charging up like it should have been. it was great to find a competant, friendly, wholistic boat healer.
we celebrated with a pint of homemade ice cream each, and motored our way to nearby latrap river. that is where we are now, anchored in a pretty little "lagoon." there are three other sailboats sharing this harbor with us with their anchor lights shining on the tops of their masts, reflecting on the water.
earlier this evening we had a lovely visit from our news friends, the urban couple, who are also anchored in this bay. we laughed, told stories, and they taught us how to play cannasta. such amazing community on these waters! we are blessed!
Thursday, July 2, 2009
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
20090630:
who knew when we woke up with the breeze blowing through our little bow cabin that the wind would waft us to such lovely encounters with the kindness of God's good folks! you never know what gifts are in store for you each day. and a good thing too. i love surprises.
the adventures of jimminy:
a proposal was made some time ago, and was overwhelmingly agreed upon by all hands of the ship's crew that pam should, at all times, be the captain upon cricket (until further review, discussion and agreement). the reasons for this decision are many, but they mostly have to do with things such as safety, sound judgement, common sense, etc... it was recently agreed upon that, in fairness, i shall be the full time captain upon jimminy, our dinghy (aka: tender, dory, zodiak). jimminy is a little foldable, inflatable boat made of rubber, with a little outboard motor (a tohatsu 4 stroke), and two oars with aluminum shafts and plastic blades (unbeknownst to me, totally useless as oars). she... ooops, i mean HE has been happily tetherred to cricket, and bobs along behind us as we make way here and there. cricket draws nearly six feet of water (her heavy keel is six feet under the water), which hopefully most often, keeps us from visiting about 1/4th of the chesapeake, on account of 1/4 of it being shallower than six feet. enter jimminy. he draws less than 1.5 feet. he will take us into much of the 1/4 of the bay that cricket shouldn't, such as some town docks, little irresistable bays, streams, and rivers, etc. so being his captain is no small responsibility!
this morning we employed jimminy's skills to take us into the town of oxford. we began heading around a point of land towards town. as soon as we rounded the point, and were in sight of the docks and such sputter, sputter, putt, putt, cough, silence... oops! i was kind of thinking before we left that i should have checked the gas tank, but i forgot. oh well. we still have the oars. and how romantic for me to oar my love into town.
marina/rascal ii
paul a martin
daryl and nancy
the adventures of jimminy:
a proposal was made some time ago, and was overwhelmingly agreed upon by all hands of the ship's crew that pam should, at all times, be the captain upon cricket (until further review, discussion and agreement). the reasons for this decision are many, but they mostly have to do with things such as safety, sound judgement, common sense, etc... it was recently agreed upon that, in fairness, i shall be the full time captain upon jimminy, our dinghy (aka: tender, dory, zodiak). jimminy is a little foldable, inflatable boat made of rubber, with a little outboard motor (a tohatsu 4 stroke), and two oars with aluminum shafts and plastic blades (unbeknownst to me, totally useless as oars). she... ooops, i mean HE has been happily tetherred to cricket, and bobs along behind us as we make way here and there. cricket draws nearly six feet of water (her heavy keel is six feet under the water), which hopefully most often, keeps us from visiting about 1/4th of the chesapeake, on account of 1/4 of it being shallower than six feet. enter jimminy. he draws less than 1.5 feet. he will take us into much of the 1/4 of the bay that cricket shouldn't, such as some town docks, little irresistable bays, streams, and rivers, etc. so being his captain is no small responsibility!
this morning we employed jimminy's skills to take us into the town of oxford. we began heading around a point of land towards town. as soon as we rounded the point, and were in sight of the docks and such sputter, sputter, putt, putt, cough, silence... oops! i was kind of thinking before we left that i should have checked the gas tank, but i forgot. oh well. we still have the oars. and how romantic for me to oar my love into town.
marina/rascal ii
paul a martin
daryl and nancy
Monday, June 29, 2009
20090629: wonders and miracles
pam is in the cuddly berth below and i am sitting on the deck of cricket right now. a gentle breeze is playing with my dirty, salty hair and keeping the bugs away. owen and i are just aft (towards the back of the boat from) the mast (the big stick that holds the sails way up in th' sky). right behind me is the main sail's boom (a smaller stick that holds the bottom of the sail out from the mast). it is an absolutely lovely night, with the quarter moon shining over the water, and it's sparkly reflection dancing from the shoreline all the way over to cricket's shoulder, as if asking her to dance along. cricket is more than happy to move in step with the sparkles and the wind. it is a lovely thing to be allowed to ride piggyback in the middle of this lovely dance!
cricket was in her glory today, as she carried pam and i to this beautiful place north of the little choptank river mouth. we're now well in the big choptank bay, up the tred avon river, near a sweet little historic town called oxford. there is another beautiful town nearby called cambridge. i'm no scholor, but do you think this area had any brittish influence in it's history? pam and i are very excited to take jimminy a mile or so to the city docks tomorrow and explore cambridge on foot. we have not set foot upon land for a few days now, so it will be interesting to feel the ground pitch up and down.
we're learning more and more that cricket loves a good wind, and she takes very good care of us in wind and waves, now that she's taught us how to handle her lines. she sails surprisingly well in light airs, but give her a decent blow, and she'll skip up or down the water with real purpose! we're feeling better and better about sailing blue water (open oceans) in cricket! she's truly winning our hearts the more we sail her.
after our great sail in the hot sun today, and our uneventful anchoring (yippee!), pam and i were looking forward to a possible dip in the water to cool us off. when we looked in the cool, brackish water (part salty sea water, part fresh river water), shiver me timbers! jellyfish everywhere! they are a brand of jellyfish known around here as stinging nettle jellyfish, and they live up to their name, so i hear. they are a whitish, translucent color, like little ghosts floating by. the range in size from an inch round to six or seven, with various lengths of tenticals flowing behind them. there were dozens and dozens of them visible near the boat. hundreds and hundreds out there, all flowing in with the tide. no swimming today... i managed to scoop a couple buckets of jelly free water to dump over pam's head, so she could cool off and wash her hair. then while pam stood jelly watch i climbed down our little boat ladder and dunked myself under a couple times when there was a rare break in the jelly flow. after the welcome cool off we posted ourselves facing westward on the deck and watched an incredible sunset!
o. i wanted to mention that pam discovered glowing plankton as she flushed the head (ship's toilet, which uses sea water) in the dark! if that isn't exciting enough, the next night i was out on deck in the very dark bay, and thought i noticed a little glowing in the water. so i took our wooden boathook (a longish stick with a brass hook on the end for reaching and grabbing lines out of the water, or off of posts and such) and swished it around in the dark water and... no way! the water glowed wherever i swished it around! way cool! biophosphoressence!! i hear that when we sail the sea on dark nights we'll see the wake of our boat glowing behind us. can't wait! but for now a stick in the water is plenty good enough!
o my! where'd the moon go? ah, there it is all orange on the horizon, and setting now. must be late! i think that i will lay back for a while and look up the mast towards the skyfull of brightening stars. wow. good night.
cricket was in her glory today, as she carried pam and i to this beautiful place north of the little choptank river mouth. we're now well in the big choptank bay, up the tred avon river, near a sweet little historic town called oxford. there is another beautiful town nearby called cambridge. i'm no scholor, but do you think this area had any brittish influence in it's history? pam and i are very excited to take jimminy a mile or so to the city docks tomorrow and explore cambridge on foot. we have not set foot upon land for a few days now, so it will be interesting to feel the ground pitch up and down.
we're learning more and more that cricket loves a good wind, and she takes very good care of us in wind and waves, now that she's taught us how to handle her lines. she sails surprisingly well in light airs, but give her a decent blow, and she'll skip up or down the water with real purpose! we're feeling better and better about sailing blue water (open oceans) in cricket! she's truly winning our hearts the more we sail her.
after our great sail in the hot sun today, and our uneventful anchoring (yippee!), pam and i were looking forward to a possible dip in the water to cool us off. when we looked in the cool, brackish water (part salty sea water, part fresh river water), shiver me timbers! jellyfish everywhere! they are a brand of jellyfish known around here as stinging nettle jellyfish, and they live up to their name, so i hear. they are a whitish, translucent color, like little ghosts floating by. the range in size from an inch round to six or seven, with various lengths of tenticals flowing behind them. there were dozens and dozens of them visible near the boat. hundreds and hundreds out there, all flowing in with the tide. no swimming today... i managed to scoop a couple buckets of jelly free water to dump over pam's head, so she could cool off and wash her hair. then while pam stood jelly watch i climbed down our little boat ladder and dunked myself under a couple times when there was a rare break in the jelly flow. after the welcome cool off we posted ourselves facing westward on the deck and watched an incredible sunset!
o. i wanted to mention that pam discovered glowing plankton as she flushed the head (ship's toilet, which uses sea water) in the dark! if that isn't exciting enough, the next night i was out on deck in the very dark bay, and thought i noticed a little glowing in the water. so i took our wooden boathook (a longish stick with a brass hook on the end for reaching and grabbing lines out of the water, or off of posts and such) and swished it around in the dark water and... no way! the water glowed wherever i swished it around! way cool! biophosphoressence!! i hear that when we sail the sea on dark nights we'll see the wake of our boat glowing behind us. can't wait! but for now a stick in the water is plenty good enough!
o my! where'd the moon go? ah, there it is all orange on the horizon, and setting now. must be late! i think that i will lay back for a while and look up the mast towards the skyfull of brightening stars. wow. good night.
Sunday, June 28, 2009
20090628: day of rest
such a nice setting for such a lazy day. a little bay with other little bays sticking in here and there. penninsulas with pine trees growing up on them. a few houses dotted sparsely along the shores. a few jellyfish drifting by. waterfoul flying by us.
sunday today. a day to rest and see God's bountiful creativity. a day to bob at anchor, read some bible verses together, pray together, and sing together on the stern of cricket. a great day! spending it "in the southland of the heart, where the saints go lazily." bruce cockburn
ps: i finished yesterday's blog
sunday today. a day to rest and see God's bountiful creativity. a day to bob at anchor, read some bible verses together, pray together, and sing together on the stern of cricket. a great day! spending it "in the southland of the heart, where the saints go lazily." bruce cockburn
ps: i finished yesterday's blog
Saturday, June 27, 2009
20090627: sailing, sailing, then a bit of drama
it's getting to be a bad habit of mine to be too tired to blog at day's end... i did finish yesterday's blog tonight, so refere back to that for now. but i'm too stinking tired to write about today. it's a grand tale, which i shall set about the telling of tomorrow...
i'm sure you've heard a bit about it from pam's blog tonight, but you'll get my take tomorrow.
after pouring over the charts (sea maps), and pouring over the good advice we recieved from our good friends that know this bay, we decided to head out on our wonderful gunkholing adventure for good! we decided to head east south east to the little choptank river. this spot is all the way across the bay (you can't see one side from the other at this point of the bay), and a little north. the winds were blowing pretty well when it was time to leave in the morning, so we decided to try for the first time to leave anchor without the use of the diesel (real sailor like!). if you would have been on board you might have had quite the amusing time at the little comody of errors going on while i tried to hoist the anchor, and get the sail up at the same time! we are true sailors, but inexperianced true sailors as of yet. this time we were working with just two crew, so i didn't have time to wash the anchor chain as it came up. sounds a bit silly, but it isn't just a matter of persnicketty "ship shape and bristol fashion." the chain comes up all mucky gooey from the bottom of this bay, and if you don't wash the lion's share of it off it goes right down to the chain locker, which is one little cabinet door away from where we sleep. if too much gets in there it can begin to get a bit smelly, like sleeping in a swampy swamp. but today there was no one to wash the chain as she came up (papa jerr bear had been helping with this before) , and my hands were getting muddy from handling the chain. there is a manual winch to heave the anchor and chain up with, but inevitably one must help it with the hands. but now i need to use these same hands to handle the halyards (the lines [ropes] that pull up the sails. you don't want to handle these lines with muddy hands because it gets into these expensive lines and prematurely wears them down. so i had to throw our little sea bucket on a rope into the water, and hoist up water to rinse my hands. all the while the boat is pitching, and as soon as the anchor is off the ground, cricket is begining to move i think that's enough explaining so you get the idea. i'm sure you're wondering at this time where pam is in all this mess? well, she's at the wheel trying to keep us from going too far astray into shallow water, or into another boat, or into someone's crab pot buoys, etc. she's got her hands full too, especially when we don't have steerageway ( the boat's not going fast enough to steer her)...
anyway... after we'd finally gotten off, and tacked (zig zagged) here and there to dance around a lot (and i mean a lot!) of saturday boat traffic (i think Pam counted at least 100+ boats behind us when we were clear of them all), and tacked to avoid shallows, and got heading in the ultimate right direction we had a wonderful, smooth, slow sail. the winds died down for quite a while, but we were in no hurry. there was usually just enough wind to go in our intended direction. sometimes we sat there bobbing like a cork waiting for the wind to pick up, and today it always did. it was so nice to be out there trimming sail, navigating and just being! there was a good long time that i sat on the bowsprit, in the shadow of the jib reading the last of "kon-tiki." fantastic!
long about 6:00 we were just about to turn the engine on because we were at our "drop dead" time to make 5-6 knots, or anchor in the dark, when a beautiful wind swept up and pushed us along at a great speed! for the last leg into the choptank river we were making 6-8 knots, and cricket was cruising along very cheerily! it is so fun to be sailing like that! healed over, moving like the wind!
we rounded the corner, sailed up the river, picked out where we wanted to spend the night, and got to where we needed to start our engine in order to safely make it to anchorage. it turned the key and the starter twirled once and quit... oh no! dead battery! i tried again... nope. o boy. now what do we do? turn off all electronics ( including the nav instruments [yes, this will come into play soon]), so thatcthe batteries can hopefully recoup soon. guess we'll have to do it the old fashioned way and sail all the way to anchorage. things were going fairly well at this, when all of a sudden our bow swung around for no apperent reason. she had run into some mud on the bottom, and was now grounding herself up in some shallows! without words we both said short prayers, i doused the sails, and we decided to try the engine... she started! i tried to back her out. no go. tried to push her forward and around to get out of the mud. she came around a bit, but we couldn't get her off. the wind was pushing us in further and further. right then we heard a man calling from the channel. we looked over, and there was another sailboat with a man and a woman aboard. he called, "how much do you draw?" i called back, "5' 11" " he said we'd better do something to get us out quick, and suggested that we bring him a line in our dinghy. like lightning Pam began to tie a bunch of our docklines together, and i hopped in jimminy to get him untied and started. by the time i did pam had the lines ready, so she handed them to me and i motored to the channel. it was quite a chore to drive the bobbing dinghy, controling her outboard with one hand, and trying to keep our wet docklines in the other hand, and try to get to the other boat! the lines didn't seem long enough, but after he'd made a couple of passes i was finally able to grab his dinghy, and pull myself up to his boat boat. he took the line and made it fast on a cleat, and started to pull. his little sailboat pulled and pulled until finally cricket began to suck out of the mud, and was pulled free into the channel!
we both anchored near each other, and pam and i went over to their boat ,spellbound to thank them again. pete and pam are their names. they were so gracious! they invited us aboard, gave us some good wine, and we had a wonderful conversation! he made a few suggestions that i'm sure we'll follow. a few places to see, and a few things to consider for cricket. when we headed back in jimminy it was dark, so we had our headlights on (flashlights you wear on your head). it was very cute to see two little yellow eyes shining back at us from cricket's deck. owen had come out to greet us!
i'm sure you've heard a bit about it from pam's blog tonight, but you'll get my take tomorrow.
after pouring over the charts (sea maps), and pouring over the good advice we recieved from our good friends that know this bay, we decided to head out on our wonderful gunkholing adventure for good! we decided to head east south east to the little choptank river. this spot is all the way across the bay (you can't see one side from the other at this point of the bay), and a little north. the winds were blowing pretty well when it was time to leave in the morning, so we decided to try for the first time to leave anchor without the use of the diesel (real sailor like!). if you would have been on board you might have had quite the amusing time at the little comody of errors going on while i tried to hoist the anchor, and get the sail up at the same time! we are true sailors, but inexperianced true sailors as of yet. this time we were working with just two crew, so i didn't have time to wash the anchor chain as it came up. sounds a bit silly, but it isn't just a matter of persnicketty "ship shape and bristol fashion." the chain comes up all mucky gooey from the bottom of this bay, and if you don't wash the lion's share of it off it goes right down to the chain locker, which is one little cabinet door away from where we sleep. if too much gets in there it can begin to get a bit smelly, like sleeping in a swampy swamp. but today there was no one to wash the chain as she came up (papa jerr bear had been helping with this before) , and my hands were getting muddy from handling the chain. there is a manual winch to heave the anchor and chain up with, but inevitably one must help it with the hands. but now i need to use these same hands to handle the halyards (the lines [ropes] that pull up the sails. you don't want to handle these lines with muddy hands because it gets into these expensive lines and prematurely wears them down. so i had to throw our little sea bucket on a rope into the water, and hoist up water to rinse my hands. all the while the boat is pitching, and as soon as the anchor is off the ground, cricket is begining to move i think that's enough explaining so you get the idea. i'm sure you're wondering at this time where pam is in all this mess? well, she's at the wheel trying to keep us from going too far astray into shallow water, or into another boat, or into someone's crab pot buoys, etc. she's got her hands full too, especially when we don't have steerageway ( the boat's not going fast enough to steer her)...
anyway... after we'd finally gotten off, and tacked (zig zagged) here and there to dance around a lot (and i mean a lot!) of saturday boat traffic (i think Pam counted at least 100+ boats behind us when we were clear of them all), and tacked to avoid shallows, and got heading in the ultimate right direction we had a wonderful, smooth, slow sail. the winds died down for quite a while, but we were in no hurry. there was usually just enough wind to go in our intended direction. sometimes we sat there bobbing like a cork waiting for the wind to pick up, and today it always did. it was so nice to be out there trimming sail, navigating and just being! there was a good long time that i sat on the bowsprit, in the shadow of the jib reading the last of "kon-tiki." fantastic!
long about 6:00 we were just about to turn the engine on because we were at our "drop dead" time to make 5-6 knots, or anchor in the dark, when a beautiful wind swept up and pushed us along at a great speed! for the last leg into the choptank river we were making 6-8 knots, and cricket was cruising along very cheerily! it is so fun to be sailing like that! healed over, moving like the wind!
we rounded the corner, sailed up the river, picked out where we wanted to spend the night, and got to where we needed to start our engine in order to safely make it to anchorage. it turned the key and the starter twirled once and quit... oh no! dead battery! i tried again... nope. o boy. now what do we do? turn off all electronics ( including the nav instruments [yes, this will come into play soon]), so thatcthe batteries can hopefully recoup soon. guess we'll have to do it the old fashioned way and sail all the way to anchorage. things were going fairly well at this, when all of a sudden our bow swung around for no apperent reason. she had run into some mud on the bottom, and was now grounding herself up in some shallows! without words we both said short prayers, i doused the sails, and we decided to try the engine... she started! i tried to back her out. no go. tried to push her forward and around to get out of the mud. she came around a bit, but we couldn't get her off. the wind was pushing us in further and further. right then we heard a man calling from the channel. we looked over, and there was another sailboat with a man and a woman aboard. he called, "how much do you draw?" i called back, "5' 11" " he said we'd better do something to get us out quick, and suggested that we bring him a line in our dinghy. like lightning Pam began to tie a bunch of our docklines together, and i hopped in jimminy to get him untied and started. by the time i did pam had the lines ready, so she handed them to me and i motored to the channel. it was quite a chore to drive the bobbing dinghy, controling her outboard with one hand, and trying to keep our wet docklines in the other hand, and try to get to the other boat! the lines didn't seem long enough, but after he'd made a couple of passes i was finally able to grab his dinghy, and pull myself up to his boat boat. he took the line and made it fast on a cleat, and started to pull. his little sailboat pulled and pulled until finally cricket began to suck out of the mud, and was pulled free into the channel!
we both anchored near each other, and pam and i went over to their boat ,spellbound to thank them again. pete and pam are their names. they were so gracious! they invited us aboard, gave us some good wine, and we had a wonderful conversation! he made a few suggestions that i'm sure we'll follow. a few places to see, and a few things to consider for cricket. when we headed back in jimminy it was dark, so we had our headlights on (flashlights you wear on your head). it was very cute to see two little yellow eyes shining back at us from cricket's deck. owen had come out to greet us!
Friday, June 26, 2009
20090626: lazy day in the bay
what a nice, mellow day! pam and i decided that today could be a day of rest, even though it is not sunday. we've been doing this and that and going here and there every day since we've arrived. it was time for a rest...
this mornng we were awakened to the anchor alarm going off again, we sprang up to find papa jerry sitting in the stern of the boat soaking in his last moments aboard. we didn't appear to be dragging anchor, but that got us going for the day. we made ready, pulled anchor, and headed for the docks one last time; this time just long enough to drop jerr bear off at his car, and bid him fare well. he'll be visiting a few friends around here for the next couple days, and then fly back to his home in florida on sunday. pulling up to the dock went off without much excitement (a very good thing). only little bit of excitement was that owen waited to be near the dock and then bounded off the boat, which was very brave of him. he got to the dock and didn't really know where to go from there, so it was easy to "catch" him again. he walked with us on his little kitty leash. we said goodbyes at the car, and then in good midwestern style, said goodbyes a second time at the boat (he'd forgotton a few things, and came running up the dock before we left). thank you papa jerr bear for your help and your company these last 12 days!
now it is "me and you and a dog named boo," exept it's not a dog, it's a cat, and his name isn't boo, it's owen. when we left the dock the wind had died down to near zero, so we decided to take it super easy and simply motor out to the bay around the corner, where we'd been last night. it was nice yesterday, it'll be nice today! so it was down with the anchor, and soak in the surrounding seas.
[going to bed... i'll finish this post in the morning... good night]
we had a lovely, easy afternoon and evening. t'was a rather warm one, so we swam twice, and i figured out how to attach our little tarp (kell called it a bimini, but i don't see how to use it as one... yet). however, as a camper i have learned to absolutely love the invention of the tarp! there have been many hours of pleasure in the boundary waters canoe area when i've put up the ol' tarp, taking lots of time to adjust this rope and that rope, on this tree and that tree to get it perfectly over the fire grate, so that we could sit there in the pouring rain, with a warm fire burning with narry a drop to wet us as we cheerily chatted the storms (or when i'm alone to read and dream the rain away). so it was pure joy for me to figure out how this here piece of white canvas would fit on cricket. i fiddled with this and that line to my heart's content. it was blissful to realize i had all the "trees" one could want to tie the lines to in the form of stays ( the wire lines that hold the mast in place). in a couple of hours we had a sweet little tarp hovering over us, not to keep us out of the rain, but rather to shield us from the sun's intense rays. we didn't have a campfire under it since it was too hot already ; ). the tarp will work very well for shade on hot days when we're anchored, but not while we're under sail. we're finding that the sails themselves work well enough for that. most boats have a bimini over the cockpit to shade those under it. our good friend john of the "seawing" told us that we'd soon be real sailors, and real sailors don't use biminis. we're finding that when you're sailing on this boat you can get the sail trim just right, put on the auto helm, and keep watch anywhere on the boat, thus being able to sit under the shade of a sail (as long as there aren't too many other boats around to run into). sweet huh! anyway... back to the subject of the tarp... we sat under our new discovery and had a lovely dinner Pam had prepared while i played with the thing, and read, and talked, and didn't get a severe sunburn.
in the evening dark clouds moved in, the sky turned stormy purple and pink colors, lighting bolted around us, and the winds began to blow up. cricket made a 180 turn around her anchor, and we watched as we dragged anchor and chain here and there until the wind decided which direction to blow in, and then the anchor set itself in the mud once again. we weren't too concearned because we had given her plenty of sea room in all directions. then came the rain. it was nice to have the rain fall once again, as we haven't had any for well over a week. we welcomed the little storm. i took down my little tarp, because i'm not sure how much wind it can take (or how much wind we would get), so pam and i sat in the stern with our new umbrellas (which we bought to shade us from the sun... but still no bimini, so we're still "real sailors!") as long as we could in the rain. as we watched to storm move to the east into the darkness of night, we watched the boat lights move across the bay, and listened to them talk on the marine band radio. the clouds began to break, and stars began to appear. another great day. even though the day was fairly lazy, we felt plenty tired enough.
this mornng we were awakened to the anchor alarm going off again, we sprang up to find papa jerry sitting in the stern of the boat soaking in his last moments aboard. we didn't appear to be dragging anchor, but that got us going for the day. we made ready, pulled anchor, and headed for the docks one last time; this time just long enough to drop jerr bear off at his car, and bid him fare well. he'll be visiting a few friends around here for the next couple days, and then fly back to his home in florida on sunday. pulling up to the dock went off without much excitement (a very good thing). only little bit of excitement was that owen waited to be near the dock and then bounded off the boat, which was very brave of him. he got to the dock and didn't really know where to go from there, so it was easy to "catch" him again. he walked with us on his little kitty leash. we said goodbyes at the car, and then in good midwestern style, said goodbyes a second time at the boat (he'd forgotton a few things, and came running up the dock before we left). thank you papa jerr bear for your help and your company these last 12 days!
now it is "me and you and a dog named boo," exept it's not a dog, it's a cat, and his name isn't boo, it's owen. when we left the dock the wind had died down to near zero, so we decided to take it super easy and simply motor out to the bay around the corner, where we'd been last night. it was nice yesterday, it'll be nice today! so it was down with the anchor, and soak in the surrounding seas.
[going to bed... i'll finish this post in the morning... good night]
we had a lovely, easy afternoon and evening. t'was a rather warm one, so we swam twice, and i figured out how to attach our little tarp (kell called it a bimini, but i don't see how to use it as one... yet). however, as a camper i have learned to absolutely love the invention of the tarp! there have been many hours of pleasure in the boundary waters canoe area when i've put up the ol' tarp, taking lots of time to adjust this rope and that rope, on this tree and that tree to get it perfectly over the fire grate, so that we could sit there in the pouring rain, with a warm fire burning with narry a drop to wet us as we cheerily chatted the storms (or when i'm alone to read and dream the rain away). so it was pure joy for me to figure out how this here piece of white canvas would fit on cricket. i fiddled with this and that line to my heart's content. it was blissful to realize i had all the "trees" one could want to tie the lines to in the form of stays ( the wire lines that hold the mast in place). in a couple of hours we had a sweet little tarp hovering over us, not to keep us out of the rain, but rather to shield us from the sun's intense rays. we didn't have a campfire under it since it was too hot already ; ). the tarp will work very well for shade on hot days when we're anchored, but not while we're under sail. we're finding that the sails themselves work well enough for that. most boats have a bimini over the cockpit to shade those under it. our good friend john of the "seawing" told us that we'd soon be real sailors, and real sailors don't use biminis. we're finding that when you're sailing on this boat you can get the sail trim just right, put on the auto helm, and keep watch anywhere on the boat, thus being able to sit under the shade of a sail (as long as there aren't too many other boats around to run into). sweet huh! anyway... back to the subject of the tarp... we sat under our new discovery and had a lovely dinner Pam had prepared while i played with the thing, and read, and talked, and didn't get a severe sunburn.
in the evening dark clouds moved in, the sky turned stormy purple and pink colors, lighting bolted around us, and the winds began to blow up. cricket made a 180 turn around her anchor, and we watched as we dragged anchor and chain here and there until the wind decided which direction to blow in, and then the anchor set itself in the mud once again. we weren't too concearned because we had given her plenty of sea room in all directions. then came the rain. it was nice to have the rain fall once again, as we haven't had any for well over a week. we welcomed the little storm. i took down my little tarp, because i'm not sure how much wind it can take (or how much wind we would get), so pam and i sat in the stern with our new umbrellas (which we bought to shade us from the sun... but still no bimini, so we're still "real sailors!") as long as we could in the rain. as we watched to storm move to the east into the darkness of night, we watched the boat lights move across the bay, and listened to them talk on the marine band radio. the clouds began to break, and stars began to appear. another great day. even though the day was fairly lazy, we felt plenty tired enough.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
