Hi All:  Have been working hard on poor old Daruma to make ready for the Bahamas in a few days. (Jan. 2).  Weather allowing, we are heading on Wednesday at high tide, about 7 am, out the canal and into the Gulf of Mexico to see what the world has in store for us this year. 
Above you'll see the Admirals kitchen, we're supposed to call it a galley, after Traci painted and ripped up the old flooring.  Below are pictures after we went at it for a few days.

I'm expecting a few quality meals now ;)  I still have to pull some drawers out and reset the frame and roller rail thingies so they fit better but pretty much everything else has been touched and fondled in some way, new propane line and valves so we don't have to run outside and shut it off every meal.  The oven is next, gonna pull and have a look at everything but I think I'll do that while lolly gagging in the Bahamas.

Above, the little engine that could with a shiny new exhaust mixing elbow with stainless steel bolts and washers and a shiny new fuel filter and primer bulb inline to help with the task of bleeding the fuel system.  It also got new exhaust hose, the fuel injector pump and injectors were sent to Orlando and rebuilt and set up and reinstalled and the injector timing set and today both engines are getting an oil change. 
The guest bedroom got a new toilet, (head), sorry Brandy, you still have to pump it, new starboard bilge pump, the water maker is now hooked to port and starboard water tanks, the fuel tank has been emptied and about a cupfull of water removed, the windows have been resealed, a new radio with the ability to show other vessel names, direction of travel and speed (called AIS) and transmit this info onto the chart plotter has been installed, a broken wire was found and repaired on the fluxgate compass, a speaker for the new VHF radio was installed outside so it can be heard, some leaky old plumbing has been removed, the bilges have been washed and vacuumed out and I'm in the process of experimenting with a $30.00 gyro and voltage regulator from Radio Shack which should work and be able to be added to our course computer.  I'll keep ya posted on that one.
Wednesday is the day so I'll make a real effort to document highs and lows of this years trip.  We have a new camera for underwater so there should be some tropical pictures on the way.

The guy on the no fishing sign above was sitting there when Traci and I went for a walk to throw the garbage in the bin and stayed there while we went and got the camera.  He wasn't afraid at all unlike myself, I've had previous experience with owls........
Regards!
Dave and Traci

Mutiny on Daruma

Nope, Traci never took over the ship, she's the admiral, it was this guy.......

John and Sara Hamrick, a couple we met at the marina, went on vacation to the US Virigin islands and we gladly offered to watch their cat named Crew. Crew is not a suitable name, nothing Crew about him, he's the captain, owns the whole ship, don't forget it.

During the storm, Isaac, he was a little nervous due to the noise of chop on the water slapping the sides of the boat but after the storm he settled right into letting us know who the boss is. This morning I'm at the table reading up on another new toilet we just aquired and enjoying my last coffee of the day when Crew leaped up on the table, walked over my coffee and stuck his right hind foot right into the cup. It was still a little bit warm, hot even so he jumped clear of the cup and ran across the table and went to Traci's fruit basket, pictured above, that he claimed days ago as his own, and proceeded to clean the coffee off his foot. John and Sara are picking him up today and tonite they'll be wondering why he's so full of it and won't sleep. I hope he has a caffeine withdrawal headache tomorrow, that'll learn him. We had to clean up the spatter and little coffee foot prints while he just lay there and look at us so innocent like.

He is a little cutie. You can pick him up and flip him over and rub his belly or when he reaches out to get your attention he never has his claws out or when he chews on you it's always gentle. There is a resident little lizard who lives in the mast and jumps down and crosses the windows every night at sundown going out to roam and feast on bugs. Once and while he hesitates on a window and Crew saw him just above the chart table on the outside. He jumped up on the table and cocked his head side to side and gingerly reached up and softly touched the window where the outline of the lizard was. Cute moment but otherwise the hurricane was inside.

When we travelled from Grenada on our maiden voyage I kept a blog on some site with lots of pictures and a timeline of events from start to finish. Every new entry prompted the site to send emails to everyone on your list to tell them to check the blog. It was all good until the moderator shut it down and discontinued the site. I wrote and asked him if I could get all the stuff I uploaded but was unable to so it is pretty much lost forever. On this journey, I asked Paul and Shannon Baynham if they wanted to join us and learn (or suffer) right along with us as we brought the boat back to Florida. Paul and I used to talk of this sort of thing years earlier when Traci and I ran a little marina on the St Lawrence River and Paul and Shannon kept their house boat with us. We'd sit around a fire in the evening, might have had a beer or two, and discussed retirement and sailing the southern waters as I always thought this is what I'd like to do. One year we sat around the fire talking the same old dream and Paul said "I think we'd like to join you." I thought something along the lines of "long ways away" or "we'll see" or "I'll be lucky to live long enough" or some such thing. Low and behold, Paul and Shannon helped us make our (or my) dreams come true and after our journey they purchased a motor catamaran and we finally met them on anchor in the Bahamas last January. During our journey they kept a blog of the trip and after their cat purchase started another blog which is linked on this blog. I was trying to find their blog recently in a search engine by searching Coyaba, the name of their boat and came across a book called Coyaba by Shannon Baynham. I thought "She's turned their blog into book form." They are currently in St Augustine working on Coyaba and I emailed to tell them we wouldn't be able to make it up to see them and Shannon asked for our mailing address. I thought "She's going to send us a copy of the book Coyaba I'll bet." Below is what we got.

Look out Clive Cussler!

We are blessed with the best of friends.

Dave & Traci

Tropical Storm Isaac

Hi Everyone: I haven't been updating as of late cause I think it may be a little boring to some people to read a sailing blog about a sailing vessel being upgraded or repaired but on the other hand when I do tell of things I've done I get some reasonable questions from a few readers like David's question about hooking the water system into the marina water which I ashamedly have never answered, so sorry David. Also I think it's a pretty fair record of what has been done to the boat should we ever have to sell it. I've done so many things to the boat and not documented them in any way and my age I'll never remember until it breaks again but once I start something I seem to forget about taking pictures of before and after, shame really.
To answer your question David. I cut what I recall to be about a 2 7/8 hole in the stern and caulked with Dow 5200 and mounted with stainless screws a pressure limiting water connection. Before this I mounted a carbon filter available in the RV section of Walmart on the spigot. Inside the boat I changed a few of the original water lines which were metric to new 1/2" line and tee'd this into the cold water line that runs to the shower mounted on the transom. I turned the water on and watched my water tanks to make sure that my 2 12 volt water pumps had check valves in them and didn't feed any water back to the tanks. They don't and now I'm thinking I will put a by-pass around the pumps with a valve in it so I can open this and fill my tanks while still hooked to supplied water through the carbon filter and maybe never have to open the deck fill fittings again. The whole operation was pretty easy and painless and so worth doing. The 35 psi that the marina water is regulated to is nice in that it doesn't create any leaks or faucet drips in the on board plumbing unlike the 65 psi that the onboard pumps provide.
With Isaac being hyped up so much on the news as being possibly a cat 2 hurricane and smashing it's way up the center of the state I thought I should have engines ready to run, water tanks full, freezer full, all the canvas off etc etc but as it was I was in California until Saturday evening with Isaac supposedly hitting us on Sunday evening or Monday by noon. Then I started thinking what if they cancelled flights into southern Florida and Traci was on the boat alone then I started to panic. I thought "the news likes to hype things up to keep you watching so calm down and check NOAA and Wind Guru and see what they say." As suspected, we were due to catch the edges and remain on tropical storm watch but I have to say that working on Friday in California took some concentration to keep my mind from wondering and thinking the worst and Saturday nothing flew fast enough to get me back there. Saturday evening I removed the solar panels on the Bimini top and the top and Traci pretty much had everything else lashed down or removed and the offers of help and calls of concern where above and beyond and I thank you Grady Chance and Paul Baynham, someday when you need me I'll make sure I'm there. I was more nervous than I'd ever let on but all for not. Wind got up to around 40 mph and probably gusted to 60 or so and it rained cats and dogs but when we thought about it, we've been caught sailing in similar weather and faired well so we missed the bulk of it and are thankfull.

Above are pics of the heat exchanger on one of the engines as I removed the end cover. I noticed 2 black fingers off of a raw water pump impeller and I cursed a wee bit as I just changed the raw water pump last year. The next one shows the exchanger plugged about 50% and the last one shows the cap and the left side or intake side plugged with the 2 rubber fingers and mussels. I cleaned the exchanger in a few minutes with 50% muiriatic acid and water and it looks like new again, shoulda took a picture. Got it back together and then hooked the engine cooling to the heat exchanger in the hot water tank so that when we run this engine it will circulate hot antifreeze through a radiator in the hot water tank and heat some water for showering and dishes without electicity. Filled it all back up with antifreeze and started to mount another new alternator and smart regulator. Not done yet as I have to take the alternator apart and by-pass the regulator.
On a great note, the marina bought a brand new house boat for live aboard folks to do laundry in. It has 2 brand new washers and dryers, a shower and bath room. They also gave us an efficiency to use during the storm as the short back and forth motion was making Traci a little motion sick. I offered to pay but they said no as I help him around here now and then and it was appreciated. Turns out we didn't need it but we did do some laundry in it and watched some tv.
Sorry for the boring update, promise lots of underwater pictures when we hit the Bahamas in January.
Dave

Com'on December

Bonjour and similar greetings to all:

I haven't alot to add as we are still sitting in the relative safety of SW Florida and the Faka Union Canal, working on the boat when I get the energy and flying around the country from the Fort Myers airport to try and earn money I'm paid every 2 weeks.

There are a few pictures and a couple thoughts I wanted to share while I'm inspired (this really means I'd rather do this as opposed to some of the chores I should be doing). Great word, inspired.

Traci, the love of my life, the conqueror, looking like she just taught this aligator a "who's the boss" lesson and wants my Dad to know that this could easily be him if he doesn't tread lightly around her. This is how they get along and love each other.

It would appear that this big fellow is cruising around the boat waiting for revenge upon Traci but the truth is that it is now mating season and step on the deck at any given time and you'll see at least 3 of them.

Work progresses slowly on Daruma. It's hard to cut a precise angle on a piece of aluminum step trim with a hacksaw and one has to keep in mind the method and lengths of various attaching means or one will have a variety of screws hanging out of the bottom of the tunnel under the boat.

We broke down and purchased a new camera that is supposed to be good to 33ft of water depth, shoot video and add gps info to your pictures so I imagine they could be added to a program like Google Earth showing the exact location the picture was taken.
I've often thought and tried to put into words why we choose to live this lifestyle so it could be explained to those who look at you like your from another planet or have a deathwish or something and the best explaination I could find was written by someone else in a copy of a magazine. It's sorta long but is a great summary.
"In half and hour we'll be anchored in the cove and I'll fix dinner without a microwave, food processor, blender or hand mixer. I'll knead bread sans Kitchen Aid dough hook, I'll wash the dishes with a non-electric foot pump, and we'll spend the evening reading by oil lamp rather than the blue flicker of a TV. (or I'll beat Traci at a game of crazy eights) Our weekend is a far cry from the work week in our condo in the central west end of St Louis, (our floating house on the river in the suburbs of the big city of Cardinal, Ontario) but it's one we hope to adopt full time soon. Our family thinks we're crazy, and aquaintances look askance at us whenever they hear of our plans to sell everything and sail away on our 42' Tartan. (our 40' cat) "Why would you do that?" they ask. So why indeed? It's a multi-faceted answer not easily understood by someone who doesn't sail. There is the need to be rid of the noise of the city, the confines of the cubicle and the hectic pace of living today, but to claim that as the whole answer cheapens the reality. How can I adequately describe the feeling of accomplishment to someone that sailing on and off an anchor gives me, or prop walking the boat to a perfect landing on the dock (few and far between) or weathering a nasty blow and having the old girl deliver us safely through it? How can I describe the caress of the breeze flowing over my face from the V-birth hatch as I rock to sleep gently in the anchorage, or the smell of baking bread wafting out into the cockpit as I read the piece of literature that I always told myself I'd get to some day when I had time? Oh yeah. Time. To read. I guess the best answer is a simple word. Freedom. Everywhere there are efforts to control my life, to fill it with an ever-escalating volume of input. Working in a windowless cubicle for a living, hammering out design jobs for a marketing firm, (not me), my day is handed to me in minutiae ad nauseam. The relentless deadline pressure to complete projects with which I have absolutely no meaningful connection drains me emotionally, spiritually, and even physically. The television programmers attempt to feed me a list of things they feel necessary for my happiness, providing a parade of fashionable role models to that end. The news networks fill my mind with fear and leave me looking over my shoulder every time I exit my car in a parking garage. There is the illusion of freedom to choose the way I want to live, but it occured to me recently that my life had changed course somewhere along the way, choreographed to some score written by the author of The American Dream - someone elses dream. Then through a bit of serendipity, I was introduced to sailing. It was an epiphany. As a weekend live-aboard, I'm untangling myself from the maze of competition for my attention, opening myself to new things. Would I have seen the flock of white pelicans soaring above me this morning if I had been stressing on the commute? Not likely. Would I take the time to feel the elasticity of a perfectly kneaded ball of bread dough yield under my hands? More than likely, I would buy a highly preserved loaf from the store on my way home, late from work. Being free doesn't mean living without responsibility. Every choice I make is balanced with an equal measure of it. Is it risky? Sure. There's no one to blame if I fail, but neither can anyone else claim responsiblity for my success. I could sit in an armchair watching my life pass me by in Technicolor, but I've decided to live it by sailing. It's not for everyone, for sure. It's demanding, it's difficult, it's challenging, it's sometimes scary, it's peaceful, it's amazing, it's infinitely rewarding.
Kinda sums it all for me 'cept I haven't kneaded dough on Daruma as yet, I don't work in the cubicle, we don't sleep in a V-birth and we do a little more than weekends but the rest is spot on. Our clock runs a little different speed........

One more picture it wouldn't let me upload on the last entry, guess I had too many pics.
Umm, well.......I got the Moosic in me.  Ha ha

It's been some time, apologies but HELLO!  We have been spending time, about the last 6 weeks, on our floating house in Canada as I had to renew a work visa and other things but most of all, got to see friends and family and enjoy the great weather while we slaved on the yard and driveway. 
Currently, we've returned to the catamaran in Naples on the edge of and feeling the effects of Debby, a tropical storm located in the Gulf to the north of us.  Not stopping Traci though, she's out cleaning the deck off.
I want to share another video that I compiled of our journey last year.  It is effective, makes tears to eyes every time it's watched by us, enjoy.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/zidftfc0qiuq0tf/BAHAMAS%202011.wmv?dl=0
Had an interesting time getting ready to return over the past week.  I went out to the Galop Canal Rd. from the house last Monday to bring the little car closer to the house so I could pack it up for the journey to Florida and low and behold it wouldn't try to turn over.  I checked all the safety crap, nope, checked all the fuses, nope.  We gave it a pull with the truck and got it going, took it to the garage and I got under it and had a look around.  The wires are on with some sort of clip and since I didn't have a screw driver in my hand to release it, I never bothered and I noticed nothing else out of place or odd and the thing had been faithful with no strange noises or actions all along.  We figured a safety switch or something had failed and postponed our trip for a day and took it to the dealer, Star Motors, in Ottawa as he said he'd try and look at it throughout the next day.  He called the next day and said it needed a new starter, they had to pound on it to get it to work which to me indicates worn out bushings at either end of the starter.  I thought "thats funny, there was no indication of that being a problem." so I asked how much a new starter was, $881.00, GULP.  I then asked if it was starting now to which he replied "yes, but you have to fiddle with it."  I'm a good fiddler so I said I was coming to pick it up and he then said "Well you can't drive this car, both front coil springs are broken."  What?  I'm on my way in, how much do I owe so far?  It was around $120.00 for one hours labor for troubleshooting.  When I got there he said that the wires on the starter were corroded which made a lot more sense to me as it sits near the ocean an awful lot but now I'm wondering which it was, worn out starter or corrosion and whats up with the springs?  He said the coils were both "right down" and if we hit a fair bump that it might drive one through a tire, scare tactics!  The car started right up like normal and has all the way to Florida and continues to.  Just the act of pulling off the wires and putting them back on removed enough corrosion to make it work.  The springs?  Well I looked briefly underneath and I can see at least 2/3 of them at which point they disappear up into the body and they look fine, make no noise turning the wheels left or right and nothing is different.  If broken in two within the exposed part then maybe a bump would send one of the broken ends out into a tire but funny thing is, we got HIT BY A TRANSPORT on the way down here at over 70 miles an hour and forced over to the guard rails on the passing lane side.  We had to chase the truck down as he never stopped as he didn't feel anything.  While I was chasing him and pointing to the side of the road, Traci was calling 911 and giving them a mile marker and they treated it as a hit and run but we had the guy stopped by the end of the call.  The guy was large with a bald head and sun glasses on but I didn't care, I was pissed, and then he made the mistake of appealing to Traci and she wasn't long tuning him in!  She was a little excited.  She apologized after as did he.  Now we have to chase down the trucking company for restitution or their insurance company as they please.  I am so tired of being ripped off and taken advantage of just cause you're trying to do the right thing and be a nice guy......watch out.
Pictures are of the little car with a smashed mirror, rubber on both fenders from his rear trailer tires and the marks on his tires from the black pearl, (our little car).  We were right up near the back of his cab in the passing lane and there was another transport pulled off the road with flashers on so he decided to come into the passing lane and didn't see us.  Lucky.
Dave

Hi All:  Finally got the picture upload to work, not sure how, it just worked today.  The fellow in the top photo was cruising around the boat a few minutes ago and Traci spotted him.  A couple fellows tried fishing for him but he wasn't interested.  The bottom photo is the water regulator / back flow preventer that makes marina life so much nicer.  I have it and the shower all isolated on valves with new hose as the old one kept blowing off deep in the bowels of the back of the boat once in awhile.  It's been raining like crazy the last few days and I'm wishing I hadn't said "I dare say that may have been the last leak."  Really proving me wrong.  Is it just me or is it anyone who requires not an inch less than a quarter mile of paper towel every time you have a caulking gun in your hands?  Well I best go and get some of the chores done so the engines are ready to go in case of a hurricane.  I'm off to Louisiana to work this week and leaving Traci with paint and brushes so we'll see what I recognize when I return.  Her birthday was yesterday, the 28th and I must say, she got a little spoiled this year.  I got her a new little laptop so we could Skype while I was traveling and kara painted her a picture that Traci fell for while we lived in California, first picture above.  Later,
Dave

Ongoing improvements

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/74105973/Cruisin%20with%20Terry%202010.wmv
Hi everyone.  A little video test on the link above, just click on it and it should take you to a video I constructed a couple years ago and gave to my bff Terry.  If it works well I'll put some more in the drop box. 
We added a water pressure regulator, back flow preventer that allows us to hook the reverse osmosis - desalinated water from the marina directly to the boat through an RV carbon filter so we don't have to keep filling the onboard tanks and running the pumps for water pressure.  I had to cut a 3" hole in the transom of the boat to mount it and I took the shower out of the transom for access.  Upon pressuring up to test the install, I noticed a leak on one of the fittings for the shower and after fixing this I realized this has been leaking all along and now there is no water collecting in the rear quarter and the pressure stays up in the plumbing system as it should have before.  The city water inlet won't do much for us on an anchor but it sure is sweet while in the marina.
Tomorrow the new mixing elbows, zincs, injector return line and the heat exchanger cleaning get started and hopefully completed as the week after next we are HEADING HOME!  Yup, I have to go home to renew a work permit and drivers license and close a land deal so we should be home for a few weeks. Yahoo!
Blogger has a new format and it is seeming to take forever to upload pictures so I will check it out farther tomorrow.
A torrential downpour the other day allowed me to finally find a nagging little leak we've had forever in one of the coach windows, I dare say it was the last one.
Bye for now, will figure out how to add pics over the weekend.
Dave

Pics from the past

Hi Folks: Since our last blog was shut down and all was lost I thought I'd put up some of the memories that were lost so these pics are from a couple years ago and I'll post more in the near future.

The first is of the active volcano at the island of Monserrat where the capital city of the island has been deserted and buried under a pile of lava, ash and mud. We passed under the plume, perhaps closer than we should have been, and got gritty, volcanic dust in our eyes, hair and all over the boat but wouldn't have missed for anything. Anchored on the north side of the island that night we almost got plowed over by a huge barge and tug that was docked and being loaded when we anchored but must have thought he could use us as a bumper when leaving.

The next is a picture of what we refer to our kids as our only chart for the trip which is on the back of playing cards. Why would anyone worry about us?

Next was a full moon while we were docked at Rum Cay. We were anchored on the east side of Long Island and the wind wasn't right to go around the northwest end so we went to Rum Cay instead and it turned out to be one of those life changing moments that would have been easily missed. How much it changes our lives will be decided in the future as we've been asked back to help out around the marina and told that when there's nothing to repair I'd get paid to take people fishing, sweet! I looked at his water maker that he had all ready put over a thousand dollars into without results and we fueled up, ate, drank beer, showered, did laundry, filled with water, got ice and docked for 3 nights and he wouldn't take a cent and he's the best cook in the Caribbean I'm sure.

Next one is where we anchored off Cockburn Harbour on South Caicos and where the water is so turquois. We went ashore there to sign in with a young fellow named Dirk we met from Germany who crossed the Atlantic alone and came over to introduce himself. That night he came over and played cards and drank some rum and we travelled together for a couple days. We ran into him again in the Exumas a week or 2 later and we keep in touch with the odd email. On this island there were dirt roads, hardly a vehicle, friendly people and the dogs laid around too lazy to bite. Terry, my BFF, said it was his speed and he was going to look for property there.

Last one is of Terry on his first real day of sailing, January 16th, 2010, just four days after the earthquake that devasted the capital of Haiti and we happened to be on the north side of the same island in the Dominican during the quake. We were waiting for some weather that was suitable but after the quake things got a little crazy as it seems Dominicans and Haitians don't like each other due to the Haitians ruling the Dominicans by force a few hundred years ago and I guess they still haven't gotten over it. I decided we were leaving the next morning, come what may, and it turns out the swells were around 14' high coming at us from the starbord beam an indication of which can been seen behind Terry in the picture.

Talk again soon,

Dave

Sea Dreaming

Hi everyone: We've only been back for a month and I'm not even sure if the Baynham's are back as yet and I'm all ready thinking about next year and how it can be made even better and stress free. Example, our daughter, like her mother, gets extreme motion sickness at even a thought of sailing, although, I haven't given her mother much of a choice and she has gotten much better. She went and layed down outside numerous times but never hugged a bucket once this trip. What we're thinking is that for around $100. or so we could fly our daughter from Nassau on a charter to Norman's Cay or Staniel Cay and reduce the bucket hugging for her by a day, IF her and her beau even get holidays and IF we return to the Bahamas which seems likely. Everything that goes on the boat new or gets upgraded is going to be tested with weekend ventures out to Panther Key so we know everything works before we get to the super expensive shopping grounds and if the motion sickness isn't an issue then maybe next year may be the year we carry on farther to Rum Cay and perhaps on to the Turks for a visit.

Last week we watched some folks fishing at one of the condo's here and he tossed a few fish on the lawn and within a few minutes you could hear a Bald Eagle scream and see it approaching so the guy picks up one of the fish and throws it in the water, the eagle swoops down and grabs it and disappears. This happened several times and then on one trip the eagle takes the fish and drops into a yard on the opposite bank and eats the fish himself. The guy later hooked into some giant fish and he another guy jumped into a boat and travelled around and round for a couple hours until he finally lost it.

Pictures are the eagle enjoying his lunch on the opposite bank, the guy who was feeding him, a shot of the live-aboard dock with a big space available for Baynham's boat :) and a shot of more of the docks which are mostly empty with the roof of the motel in the backround where the gym and pool are located. The last one is a giant ssb antenna that I have to find a place to install, a new mixing elbow, some zincs for the raw water only engine and the much coveted kit needed to hook the hot water tank to the engine heat exchanger so we can have hot water while anchored out for extended periods. Just need someone to get it all installed!

Work on Daruma continues

Back for 3 weeks and it seems as though we never left except for the memories and the new round of pictures.

I've been driving 20 hours a week to work in the panhandle since we returned and next week is another fair drive to Jacksonville to be onsite for 3 days, it'll give us a chance to look around at the marinas on the St John River as we seem to be up there all the time anyways and on the way home we can stop in Stuart to see if the Baynham's made it back yet.

Last weekend was spent hooking up the engines to and running them on fresh water until hot to flush out the salt water and this weekend I'll take a look at the engine zincs or anodes and probably have to replace them. I also went in West Marine and saw a Xantrec multi stage "smart" alternator regulator in the clearance bin. That night I checked it out online and saw it at another marine store, Jamestown Distributors, for somewhere around $260.00 so I went back and bought it for less than $200.00. I'm going to hook that to the new 80 amp alternator that we bought before our trip but found it didn't work and I've sent back for repair. The fake owl we put on the mast to scare dirty birds off only seemed to attract another owl and a hawk along with the dozens of birds so tomorrow I'm going to install some spike like things and red reflective tape on the top of the mast and on the top 2 spreaders to see if it works or not. They (the birds) are so messy and the boat has to be cleaned off daily so anything to deter them will be a blessing.

All I have for now. Pictures are Traci and I on the front deck, the proceedure to flush the engines and the new regulator.

This years Bahamas adventure is over but I have a feeling that other adventures are in store for this year, we'll see how it plays out.....

Back In Florida

We had a pretty good crossing of the Florida Straits and the Gulf Stream on Wednesday, not too rough, fair wind and dropped anchor at 4:30 p.m. in Biscayne Bay just outside No Name Harbor as it was full. Thursday we moved into the harbor then walked out of the park to the bus stop and rode the bus to the very last stop where we jumped on the Metromover to the Freedom Tower exit then walked across the Intracoastal bridge to Customs and Immigration. Friday we left and sailed the Hawk Channel to Long Key and and crossed under the Channel 5 bridge to Gulf side of the Keys and anchored for the night. Saturday we strictly sailed north till about 5 p.m when we pulled into a little bay we've anchored in a couple times at Cape Sable when I thought I had better listen to the weather again. It wasn't good. They were saying that the wind was going to increase to 15 to 25 knots from the SSE then switch to NE and increase to over 30 knots with seas 5 to 7 feet and rough with deteriorating conditions through Monday as a cold front passes through southern Florida. We decided to keep going and carried on until about 2 a.m. in continually worsening conditions and dropped the anchor on the north side of Panther Key as we couldn't see the channel markers to enter the marina and we have to wait for high tide anyway. As the wind swung through to NW and gusted to 36 knots plus, it got a little rough and you had to wonder what with the wind strength and change of direction along with the pounding waves if the little anchor that could was really going to and it did indeed. After daylight I turned the radio on again and heard some lady begging for help saying that they were in trouble and had 2 children on board just a few miles north of us. Later I heard the guy from the same boat tell the Coast Guard that he could smell gasoline and ask if they should jump in the water! Boat US responded and I heard him tell the CG that the boat was grounded and taking a beating and would have to stay in that position until better weather but the 4 occupants were safe. At the height of it, after the wind switched to NW, we pulled anchor and headed around the island and into the channel for the Marina and once inside the Mangroves it was a different world. A couple of fellows were camping on Panther Key and we could see their fire when we pulled in at 2 a.m. in the middle of the tempest. Come daylight we could see that they had no boat and we watched them pack everything up and stand in the wind and rain for a couple hours as the boat trying to pick them up abandoned them twice due to the weather. They didn't seem too distressed or ask us for help in any way and later as we were making our way up the canal to the marina they went past us finally in the boat but less all their gear. When we finally made it to the dock I could've got out and kissed this boat for being so tough and safe and not failing us when we needed her the most. I also gained a new-found respect for the expensive radar we installed in Grenada as during the night I noticed a few unmarked derilect steel posts in the Gulf which worried me till I found I was able to tune the radar and these and other markers showed up brilliantly as well as oncoming squalls from 12 miles which gave us time to avoid the worst of them. We're tied up and back in the real world with a few new items on the "wish list" for next year and work is calling..........

Cut and paste update

Monday, Feb. 27, 2012

I'm writing this in notepad so I can cut and paste first time we get internet.Traci and I are heading across the banks with a following wind and waves so the ride is pretty smooth, boring and way too quiet since the kids have all gone home. We said good-bye to them on Saturday :( and did the same with Paul and Shannon yesterday and then made our way to Chub Cay in some very rough water. Good thing about that is there is no other boat traffic. I'm going to try and touch on the cool stuff and then let some pictures tell the rest. When we get some decent internet, I'll throw a few videos on as well. It was a bad camera year as Brock bought this fancy underwater camera that could shoot in 3D and stuff like that and it took great pictures for about an hour then it conked out full of water. A couple years ago we gave Brandi a little camera in a housing and it also leaked water this year and went bust but I will post some underwater pics that turned out prior to the meltdowns. To summarize, Traci and I headed to Nassau and put in a month or so until Paul and Shannon arrived. We didn't get to spend much time with them due to some scheduling. Brandi and Brock arrived on the 9th of Feb. and we spend the night at the marina and took off the next day for Rose Island, Allens Cay then Norman's Cay followed over the next week then back to the marina to pick up Matt and Kara on the 16th. They jumped on the boat around 1:00 p.m. and we headed right to Norman's Cay, arriving in the dark. We spent a few days there so Kara could recover from motion sickness then carried on down to Staniel Cay and anchored beside the island that the wild pigs are on and they swim right out to meet your boat looking for scraps to eat. The next day we moved around to Staniel and saw Paul, Shannon and crew again and we anchored and went snorkelling in Thunderball Grotto which was in a James Bond movie some years ago. As soon as you enter the water you are surrounded by fish of all kinds, I assume they're fed regularily and they're not at all shy. The grotto itself is huge porous rock that is completely hollow and has entrances on all sides, some of them submerged, and is full of coral, fish of all kinds, thousands of colours and shafts of light that enter the chamber from different angles and is the most cool thing I've seen underwater that can't be plundered or pillaged. We anchored that night on the north side of Major Cay (one with the pigs) next to an opening to the deep water on the east side of the Banks and planned to take the deep route back to Norman's as Matt wanted to show us once again what a poor fisherman he is. Next morning brought a perfect wind and calm seas and for a couple hours we were thinking that we'd be back to Norman's in record time but Mother Nature noticed her error when we were just north of the land and sea park on Warderick wells and a little squall switched the wind around to the north, right on the nose, and kicked it up to 26 knots or so and there it remained. This took Kara from having an enjoyable day sailing to being sick and feeling rotten again so we headed back on the banks and sought shelter on the south side of Elbow Cay. That night after the kids had said goodnight I thought I'd just go down to the bottom step at the back and relieve myself and as stood there, in the light from the solar lights we have on each corner, I watched as a large fish came from under the boat tight to the hull I was on and turned around the step and went up the port side. I decided to go to the head instead and use the toilet. I called the kids to come out and watch as lots of 1 and 2 foot fish did this until we went to bed. I think the larger fish came in from the deep water to feed at night. The next few days were spent at Norman's and one evening I asked Matt and Brock if they wanted to try a night time snorkel to which they agreed. In the water were millions of little shrimp looking creatures and when you shut off the light and kicked your fins there was a column of light in front of you, also cool. Friday, the last day before the kids went home, we went to Atlantis, which is also cool, then that evening we headed to Domino's for pizza and since Dairy Queen is in the same building, well you know....That's about all I have for now until we get back to civilization and back to work.

Dave and Traci

Brandy is almost here! 1 more day!

Hi all: Finally got some internet while in Nassau at the marina as my daughter, Brandy, and her boyfriend, Brock, arrive tomorrow and 1 week later our daughter, Kara and her boyfriend, Matt, arrive and we have 9 or 10 days to catch some fish, lobster and a few rays before everyone heads back to work and snow and what not. Sorry I'm not using proper writing and installing paragraphs when I should be as it seems to put about 10 lines between each one but read on anyway. Pictures above are a great sunset from Rose Island, Paul and Shannon after they finally arrived and the first one is a great little O'Day sailboat against a ritzy looking property in Nassau harbour that sank one morning while the guy in the sailboat behind it just watched on and did nothing. It was a little rolly and the bow of the little boat was slamming back into the waves and must have knocked a hose off of a through hull fitting or something. As we made our way through the anchorage to the marina today I noticed it was afloat once again but probably a little smelly inside. Traci and I haven't been doing much, just hanging out at Rose Island enoying the sun while watching it rain in Nassau 7 miles away, a little snorkelling and some crazy eights and Paul and Shannon made it and anchored at Rose as well so we had dinner with them and their son Ben and his wife, Sam and a couple of their friends who are here visiting. We were having fun and chatting when it suddenly started to rain and we had to jump in the dingy and get to our own boat as the hatches and ports were all wide open. Our bed got soaked and had to be stripped and dried out and so for a few nights we had to use the sleeping bag as a bottom sheet. We've found that the 2 solar panels we added to the roof in combination with the other 6 that were all ready on the boat still don't give us enough power to run the fridge and freezer all day and we find that we have to run the little 2 stroke generator that we refer to as "old stinky" about 3 or 4 hours a day to run a charger and fill up the battery bank so it looks as though we're shopping for a wind generator when we return. I added a few more photos, the Coyaba crew in their dingy coming over for a visit, the fresh lobster tail Traci and i ate last night and the Liberty Clipper sailing vessel against a stormy backround. Bye for now and will update as soon as we can.

Dave and Traci