Our new, fun, multi-color tender

Well, after a long long time of working on it, I can now say it runs nicely.
However let me start with this:

FREE CRUISING GEAR!!!!!

I was given an engine that does not run, with a good condition lower unit. This was issue number one with my outboard.

When I was sold this outboard I was given the nautical equivalent of the "old lady driving to church" story about this engine. That it had been on a sailboat, and shop maintained. I can slice up some fine German or beef baloney, but I cannot fill an order that big. First, they had not lubed the lower unit in who knows how long. When you turn the shaft by hand, its actually hard to turn. That explains why the engine was hard to start, didn't want to run, randomly shut off, would pop out of gear, ECT.

This may also be why I was never able to plane.

Once I changed it out for the free one, MAGIC!!!!! This thing runs pretty good now.
It is UGLY, but functional, just like the rest of the dinghy.

I tried it out, taking it the entire way out to the municipal mooring field. Where I had a job diving on the Chris Lea.

Success! Glad to have a great working tender!

Amazing oven

Well today we ran out of propane for the stove. Normally this in itself wouldn't be worth a blog post. Except for one detail: we've been using the same tank for 5 months! The last fill was when we left New York.

The oven we had before we moved onto our yacht ran on propane too. Propane also fueled our heat so the tanks never really lasted long. A month in the summer is how long we could count on it to last and a week or so in the winter. We didn't cook as much with that stove as we do with now so we figured this one would last about a month at the most.

After the first month we rethought that. The second month went by and we still didn't need to fill it. The third, fourth, and fifth month we didn't need to either. We were starting to wonder if it would ever run out. Apparently we have a very efficient stove. Other then not having enough room in/on it sometimes it's a great little stove. It's gimbled too so that came in handy when we were sailing.

Needless to say we still had complaints about it. Actually it wasn't until a few weeks ago that we figured out how to use the oven part correctly. It used to be that after we were done with the oven to turn it off we would have to turn the gas off. It turns out that the knob was stripped and wasn't turning like it was supposed to. Duh! Now the oven works perfectly. We can't fix the "too small" part of it though. All in all, still a great stove.

Joshua went out to change the propane tank. I had him get a new one before we left Charleston and it's been latched to the deck ever since. All shiny and new with readable stickers. The one he pulled out of the propane locker has seen better days. In fact, it looks like it's been through war! I commend it for holding up.

Bottoms clean, engines junk.

   Well after we earned our diving certification things have slowed down a bit. To be honest I, Joshua, have been a bit lazy. I say a bit because I have cleaned the bottoms of 3 boats now. Cleaning the bottoms of boats is about the hardest job imaginable, and by far the hardest job I have done.

Close your eyes and imagine not being able to see anything but dark brown. While you see this dark brown, you are swimming into a current, pushing yourself away from the bottom of a boat with your hand as you swim towards it. Inside your wetsuit are small shrimp, 1000's of them. All crawling, biting, squirming. In your hair, nasty little bugs. Yeah, its gross, hard work. When you have spent 2 hours, kicking like crazy you have a last effort to return to a boat. Only you weigh 400# now, with all of your gear. I enjoy punishing myself.

 

  

   Here I am cleaning our boat bottom. So far I have done 3 types of bottoms. The first one was ours. Its a fin keel. It has a very long waterline, but only a 12' keel in the center jutting down into the blackness. Our bottom paint is somehow still good after 5 years in the cold New york waters. We only had a layer of silt. It has not been cleaned in a year, so I have no idea how it only has silt on it.
   The second was a 26' sailboat with a wing keel. Not only did it have two keels, but it had bad bottom paint. I ended up scraping all of it with the 6" knife. In the end he lost a lot of paint because those hard shelled critters don't let go. I also think the paint was poorly applied, It seemed to not adhere to the bottom of the boat. After this I reserve the right to adjust the price according to how bad the bottom is. This was badly neglected.
   The third boat was a full keel 43' spindrift. The bottom was covered in small shrimp, like I told you earlier.
 Its not that it was bad growth, It was just living growth. No fun. I came out covered. The fun part was chasing Dana while covered in bugs.



   Engine. I found a great deal from a marine repair shop

Or so I thought. I got a 1970-80 johnson 9.9HP, for $375. It came with a 30 day warranty . So I was having an issue with it, so I took it back to the dealer. It is the boat repair place at riverside marina, St Augustine. This guy is unbelievable. He said it was the water pump, and the water pump is not part of the warranty. wait, WHAT? In some stretch of the imagination he thought I sucked up a plastic bag, or mud and it would not be covered. I said, you gave me 30 days, he says "It does not apply to this"

Oh, so that 30 days has some exclusions that are not mentioned until I have an issue? AVOID!!!!
I have spare time, and will take him to small claims. He has not heard the last from me.
   So after this discussion, with him becoming irate, he goes and now you owe me two days storage on the dinghy...... Really, he asked me to bring it in and leave it.... I said, oh yeah how much is that... he said take your (expletive) and get out. Class act. This guy is a serious looser, and is not knowledgeable in, well, anything except how to be a jerk. He speaks fluent jerk. I ordered the parts from west marine, hopefully this fixes the issue of it skipping out of gear when hot as well. Guess I am learning outboard repair...


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Dive! Dive! Dive!

We are so excited because we just got scuba certified! I (Dana) did it mainly for the enjoyment factor but we made sure to get Joshua certified for many reasons. One being: he needs to learn to be more comfortable in the water. We live on it! He doesn't enjoy swimming or getting wet. I am the complete opposite. Another reason was so that we could have the ability to clean the bottom of our boat. While you may be able to get some of it when you hold your breath you won't be able to get it all. Plus, what people charge for a cleaning is a lot. Within a few months our investment will pay for itself. Plus, Josh will be able to make a business cleaning bottoms, installing zincs, and doing emergency underwater repairs.

Our research also told us that in order to be able to get a tank filled you need a certification. So there we were, with many reasons to do it. Our next decision was where to get certified. You can Google search all you want but ultimately it comes down to word of mouth. We asked our friends at St. Augustine Cruisers Net to suggest somewhere and the answer was unanimously iDive.

His prices turned out to be one of the most reasonable when we did our research too. When Joshua called the owner, Ken, he was pleased with how he responded to his questions. They offer a mini class called "Try SCUBA". So we did! We don't have any pictures from that class but we immediately went after the class to sign up for certification.

 

See how happy and excited Josh was for the class? He made sure we were early. I was excited too but I was concentrating more on getting us there. ;-) 

Ken (left) and Josh demonstrating good buoyancy control

Dana!

 Here we were demonstrating skills. Josh did well on his buoyancy control here in the pool. I struggled a bit.

The second dive wasn't in a heated pool :-( but in a spring. DeLeon Springs actually. Here it was quite smaller then what I thought it would be. We got to practice our "giant stride" getting in though. It was fun! I struggled a bit this day but it turns out I didn't have enough weight. Once the instructor gave me more I was fine.

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We didn't get many pictures this day because the visibility wasn't great. What is weird is that some of the pictures came out with a blue tint while most of them were green (see above-ick).

Here is another diver harassing a turtle. It didn't much like the attention! Later she went on to try and pick it up but the turtle escaped her grasp.

The last day, our check out dive, was at Devil's Den. It was supposed to be at another location but they had what is called "brown out conditions". I think you all can guess what that meant. So our instructor had us go here. Unfortunately it cost us more money to dive here then the other spot but Ken promised us we would love it. Let's hope so.

Here's the view looking down. It is impressive to look at, very pretty. It's quite a ways down so I had a little bit of trouble getting down the stairs (fear of heights). Ken, ever the patient guy, talked to me the whole way as he had been the first down. I was fine once down. The water was a bit chilly but not bad.

These last two photos aren't as great. The light was poor and GoPros don't fare as well in low lighting. This one above is a still taken from the bottom of the stairs.

Here's the other side. Hi guys! This is Ken on the right and another instructor (I'm sorry, I forgot his name!) on the left. The other instructor ended up being my dive buddy at the end because Josh got too low on air and I hadn't been able to explore the whole way around. I wanted my moneys worth! Haha...again, we were shocked at the price but I enjoyed it.

When we came up we were officially certified, we passed!! So exciting! Ken cooked for us and we hung out until the woman threatened to lock us in ;-)

Certified!!!

Waiting for food

Grill master Ken

I'm going to post a video on Facebook so make sure to hop over to this link and check it out. While you're there please give us a "Like"! In case you want to know Ken is on FB too at this link> iDive.

Thanks for the great dives Ken, hopefully we can do more with you!

New but old-Dana's view

I have a few things to say about our old dinghy. More then a few actually but in addition to being old, small, and a bit of an eye sore it was reliable. It got us out of a jam when we were in NYC and Joshua had many fun adventures with it but it wasn't really meant to be a dinghy like we were using it for. In fact, it was actually a child's sailing dinghy. I never stepped foot into it. It was too tippy and wasn't meant to hold much weight. It also leaked a little. As I said...many things to say about it.

We have been looking for a new one ever since it was obvious we would need a bigger one. When you are on anchor not only will a dinghy get you to the shore from the boat while holding you but also any laundry, groceries, and water. We knew we wanted it to still fit on the foredeck when we made any passages and it also needed to be durable. Inflatables are nice but made of plastic and tend to deteriorate quickly.

So we needed strength, longevity, a good size, and most of all-a decent price. You would not believe how hard it is to find each one of those things without having to sacrifice another. But we did it! It kind of just happened. Joshua was skimming the local Craigslist and came across an ad for the dinghy that was docked on other side of our slip. Imagine that, it was right under our noses.

Joshua said he looked at the ad before but for whatever reason skipped it. He showed me and I told him to just shoot the guy a quick email. The guy mentioned he was actually going to be stopping by the marina that day-perfect!


I wasn't present for the whole conversation but Joshua has a way of dickering with people so I knew he didn't need my help. By the time I had gotten out there he worked it out so that not only were we going to get it for less then listing price but he was also going to take our old dinghy. This was a big weight off of our shoulders as we weren't sure how to get rid of it. Who would want such an old boat?

Apparently there is always a person who has a need for old boats as the day after our deal some people were there picking it up. They said they were very happy because they had been looking for one. When asked what they were going to do with it they said it will be their new couch. Ok, to each their own! It was finally off the foredeck from when we lashed it down to go offshore and would actually have a purpose again.
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I'm sure that Joshua will have an interesting story to tell regarding my issue with small boats but I finally conquered my fear and got in. I'm proud of myself!

Out with the old....

...In with the new(ish). 

I want to thank everyone for reading and following our adventures. We have many more in store so stay tuned! Also, we have a Facebook page now so please give us a "like" and share with your friends!
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We were blown away

   Who has not been to West Marine? I do not think you can own a boat without a trip here. Not because the prices are good, but because its like being 8, and going to Toys-r-us. My parents never bought anything from Toys-r-us, the prices were better elsewhere. That's the same thing for us. Its a great place to visit to look, and maybe buy a hose clamp, a few feet of wire for a project, or a fender. Otherwise most things are overpriced by 20-40%, and the draconian price match policy makes me not buy as much there. Don't get me wrong, we drop $1500 a quarter in the store, but we would probably spend more like $4000 if they matched the occasional internet price. This brings us to our trip to Jacksonville 2 weeks ago.

   Jacksonville, FL has the second biggest West Marine in the country. They even have a tuna tower in he store... They also have a huge selection. 30 Day FREE amazon prime membership!!! Sign up now for this special trial. Cancel anytime.
Me and Dana both like to play with things, and touch thins we ought not to. So in my playing I played with the fans. We had been looking for some new fans to replace our aging units that are quite noisy. All was going well until I played with a fan called Taku. It has a 5 min burst mode that nearly blew our faces off. It was blowing things on the shelf across the isle. We were instantly sold. We didn't even know the price yet. $200!!!!!! For a fan? They must be insane. Alas, they were not.




   With a 5 min search online i had found it $50 cheaper. $150 is a ton of dosh for a fan of plastic. However we were already sold. Life on anchor requires some items we may otherwise dismiss, but on a 100 degree day this fan will be a gem.

   Installation is so easy, that it is too easy. In fact I would prefer a permanent mount.
Four suction cups hold it to the hatch, and a 20' cord plugs into a cig lighter. Instead of a 2 hour installation I plugged it in all lazily. I convinced myself it may be nice to move someday when needed. My plan is to install a cig lighter plug by the forward hatch, then zip tie the wire so it looks decent.

   So that's it. Our swanky fan. In the background is the old fan. One upgrade at a time we are bringing this old yacht up to today's standards. Until next time!

Small upgrades

What can i say, minor projects get procrastinated. Some of them so long, it is scarry. The faucet was one of those projects. The old faucet was leaking. not just a little leak, a major one. It leaked every time it was used. I even had a rebuild kit for it. I just never got to that project. So now it is finished. Here is the new faucet.

   Its made by an Italian company called Scandvik. Its a nice heavy unit. Dana, the cook, loves it.

   The next project,was a macerator. The old one died long before i bought the boat. I removed it the first week. There is a big tip here. I shopped around, sure i could find a price better then $125-150 everyone charges. They sell them on ebay for $72. Shipping was very fast. No photos on this one, as they are quite gross.

   Next up was the genoa. It tattered on my trip home, and when i tried to use it again, the sun cover came off a bit. I found a shop in town called something like Sails ECT?  The owner was very nice, he gets a lot of points for this, he knew his stuff. His price started out good...
  
   The sail shop was about 3/4 of a mile away.

   One thing I have promised myself is that I would work out more. This is exactly what I meant. Dana helped a bit by holding the bottom now and then, but it was mostly me. This sucker is heavy. 80-110#.
We got it there, by free foot transport.

   The sail came back yesterday. The quote was 1-2 hours labor. The bill came back as 4 hours, plus materials. When I called him on it, he said he will put half of it toward the next project he did for me. A bit odd I think on this one. He said he had been doing it for over 20 years. To stop in for a free quote. I stopped in for a quote, he was not there and would call me when he returned. About an hour later I walked back because he had not called. There on the sail loft was my sail, opened and being worked on. :Roll eyes: I asked the price and that was when he said 1-2 hours. He did not demand instant payment. That too is odd to me. Unless this is some ploy to get more business from me by keeping a 50% off tab.... Its just weird....

   More drama to come.