Caught in the washing machine....

...of heavy weather off Hatteras. I received an unexpected sat phone call from Ron at 1315 local, with their current position of 33.040N 77.152W, course of 321 degrees, and speed at 7.7 kts in confused, horrible seas. Waves of 15’ or more, wind gusts to 45 kts, they’ve made no headway south and are heading to Cape Fear. They've endured a few rolls of 40 degrees, which is rather exciting to say the least. (Ok, hearing that, I'm grateful I'm not along.)They've had an issue with some water getting in one of the forward portholes, and the water shorted out one of the outlets in our cabin (causing a lot of smoke and excitement aboard, apparently.) I can live without any more such excitement, personally.

Back on track, but weather looming

Well, in Beaufort, NC, thermostats were changed, plugs tightened and all repairs inspected by a mechanic, and thus, they were underway again by evening. They were aiming south once more, straight for the Bahamas, with a forecast of NE winds at 15-20 kts, and 6-8’ seas, but forecast to diminish to 2-4’ as winds died off. Not the best forecast right out of the gate, but if it followed true, conditions would improve. It was a restless night for me, imagining the seas and winds, and early this morning, much to my dismay, the forecasts had not improved. If anything, the conditions were worsening, and I feared for their comfort and safety. Pouring over the NOAA sites, seeing the blunt warnings of “GALE FORCE WINDS EXPECTED SAT” did nothing to ease my fears.

The 0830 sat phone call came, and Ron sounded tired. Indeed, the conditions were worse than they anticipated, and at 32.405’N, 76.491’W, but they were going forward. They are slogging along, having to slow down in the 10’ seas and not making good speed in the pounding conditions. Hearing that the weather was to turn even worse with the impending low-pressure system bearing down in 48 hours, Ron reported that they were altering course to head more westerly to hopefully find calmer waters. The next 24 hours are going to be ugly, no doubt about it.

Engine trouble off Hatteras

My heart sank this morning, for I awoke to a text message from Ron, saying they had an engine overheating, as well as one electronics issue with the port helm monitor. Currently they were limping back into Beaufort, NC. on one engine. While they think it is a thermostat issue, it could be much worse...but we will find out when they have a chance to get a mechanic to look at it.

November: Heading South!!

Equinox is heading south, and I'm not aboard. Ally's school schedule dictated our remaining behind, while Ron and another couple, Kerry and Karen Moser, took the boat south. I’ve got to admit, NOT going along on this trip was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. Ron and I are a team, so not going was excruciating -- we keep each other in balance, so without my (ahem) cautious voice of reason in his ear, how was this trip going to go? Yep, I'm worried!

Human vented pressure valve

Murphy's Law....just when you think you have things under control, there's always something that goes awry. Take, for example the dinghy davit. It was on the list of things to inspect prior to our leaving, We were on our way to Hartge's for all the inspection and punch list items, but during our last night in Annapolis, the davit hydraulic unit pump decided to bleed out. It just sounded different as we were about to put the dinghy up in its davit, so I went down in the engine room to find out what was happening, and found it was spewing hyrdaulic oil into the pan beneath it.

Of course, the location of said unit is outboard of the 20Kw genset and aft of the starboard engine, and the way to reach it was by slithering over the engine exhaust elbow, if you were small enough. That would be me. I checked where the oil was coming from, and lo and behold, part of the vented oil cap came off in my hand! Argh! How would we get the dinghy up now? (We could always tow it to the West River, but...not the remainder of the way south!) It definitely needed attention. Using the walkie-talkies, Ron and I discovered that if I pressed my hand over the broken cap in its hole, it would provide enough pressure to enable the davit to work. We used it in small spurts to bring the dinghy to its cradle.

Meedless to say, it's on the top of the list for Hartge's to inspect and fix when we get there. Can't go to the islands without a dinghy!

October: Preparation Month!

I was rather busy this month! Between getting Ally to school and back from the marina, I spent my days provisioning: buying engine spares, generator spares and numerous other mechanical systems spares, plus enough food to last 6 months and then some while Ron worked. I made lists, checked them twice, thrice and then revised them many times more, as items were purchased and stowed aboard, systems were inspected, suspect items rejected and replaced, experts called in for advice. The boat was hauled, zincs replaced, fresh bottom paint applied; I coordinated mechanics and cleaners. Throughout it all, I inventoried like a fiend, organizing the spares, food and last-minute tasks as best I could, and occasionally wondered where Murphy was going to play a hand in proving all these attempts at preparation to be in vain.

September again...

It's back to school for Allison, and coordinating preparations for the boat's trip south this autumn. We had a visitor during the second week of September, as Karyn's Dad came to visit for a week from Wisconsin. Ally graciously gave him her cabin for the week, and tucked up into the pilothouse for the duration. I made up the PH settee into a double bed, and made it as cozy as possible for her; she loved it and it all worked out quite nicely.

Dad fit right in, and we didn't alter our basic daily routine of getting Ally off to school, Ron off to work, then my doing boat maintenance & cleaning during the day. In the evenings, we either feasted aboard and followed dinner with a movie, or went out to eat. On Sept 10th, we showed him the town, via an evening dinghy cruise to the Inner Harbor for Ron's birthday dinner at Ruth's Chris' Steakhouse at Pier V. At 82, Dad is pretty agile, and got in and out of the dinghy with greater aplomb than I anticipated. We had our boat neighbors, the Medicos off Medici over for dinner on Friday night, another feast with friends!

The only drawback during Dad's stay was that the weather didn't really cooperate during most of the week, being rainy or cloudy. Plus, the entertainment system on the boat had developed some glitches (Ally's and our cabin TVs were stuck on different channels and would not reset.) that were annoying.

While all eyes were glued to the Weather Channel for news of Hurricane Ike, we were then took Equinox down the Bay for a cruise to Annapolis for the weekend. We had glorious weekend weather, with more dinghy cruising up Ego Alley, around the Naval Academy, then over to dinner at O'Leary's for another night out.