[From Skip's sailmail post.]

Hello from the Atlantic Ocean, 29*15.85'N,
80*38.86'W

When we last saw you were pulling into St. Simons Island, GA. We
stayed
here for nearly 6 weeks, and took care of many shore and boatside
chores.

Louise, Lydia's 83 year old mother, was scheduled to come with us to
the
Keys, arriving from the North GA mountains, where she'd been visiting
her
granddaughter and great grandson, on October 29th, landing in
Miami.
However, the weather window didn't cooperate, so we went to pick her
up
instead. Visiting ensued instead of departures, so I came back to
the
boat to continue working on various chores, and to help our two
Angels
here, Saints Steven and
Michael.

After I went up to fetch Lydia and her mother last weekend, I
continued
to do minor chores while we waited for the next weather window.
Without
the gory details, Lydia asked, "What WOULD you do without all
your
tools?" Had I not had what most folks would consider overkill for
tools
and supplies, I'd have been stuck with either risking a very
noisy
spinnaker pole failure by letting it go, or hiring it out (the repair
was
occasioned by the LAST time I hired out the work on it, in Annapolis,
to
Atlantic Spar and Rigging, who mucked up both my rig tuning [the
mast
alignment process] and the mast-end replacement of the pole).
Instead, I
just went into the shelves and pulled out the necessary tools
and
supplies and went at it. The redo of the end is massively more
secure
than what was provided to me by ASR, and unlikely to loosen, let
alone
fail, in the boat's
lifetime.

Today (well, yesterday, as you read this), I pulled all three of
our
speed impellers and cleaned off the barnacles and other growth.
That
will teach me not to be lazy about pulling them and replacing with
plugs
when we pull into Miami, a process (take out the impellers as soon
as
you're going to be anchored for more than a night) most full
time
cruisers would normally do. It opens a serious hole in the boat when
you
pull them out, but with some practice, only a cup or two gets in
(each
time, both ways), and that is in the bilge, anyway, so of little
moment.
The two in the workshop area, however, spray onto the sole in
the
walkthrough, and require a bit of cleanup. Beats having to scrub
them
with acids, though, so that's what I'll do from now
on.

For those wondering why in the world we need 3 sensors, particularly
when
we have GPS speed, they came with the boat. One is for the
fishfinder,
one is for the chartplotter log, and the other is a racing- quality
unit.
All measure speeds through the water, not over the ground. When
there's
a current, which affects the speed over ground, it's useful to know
how
you're doing in absolute terms, as well as to be able to calculate
the
current based on the difference between water and ground speeds.
Knowing
the usual speed of the boat either under motor or sail, at
differing
conditions, would alert us to any anamolies. As noted in our trip
to
Maine, the Gulf Stream current had us "going" at unusually fast speeds
on
the GPS, but our speed through the water was the same as would
be
expected from the wind speed and direction. The racing unit
shows
hundredths of a knot, and also whether we're slowing or speeding up
from
a second ago. Being the geek I am, I appreciate that sort of
input.

It's also the reason we have three depth sensors :{)) The one at the
Nav
station and the one next to the racing speed indicator reflect
distance
under the keel. They are adjustable only in positive offset (reduce
the
depth by how far the sensor is from the keel), and only in
full
foot-change increments. As such, they are only approximations of
the
amount of water under the keel. However, the one for the fishfinder
has
both positive and negative offsets available, in tenths of a foot, so
we
use that for true depth, which is very accurate. Those following me
for
any length of time know I like redundancy, as well as demanding full
and
complete information about our condition in all regards :
{))

Life aboard any full-time cruising boat is "boat repair in
exotic
locations" - along with the ever present, and usually growing, "to-
do"
list. However, we're extremely pleased to note that our to-do list
is
nearly empty, and none of it has to do with mechanical effectiveness
or
safety any more. Rather, the very few items left are "this would
be
nice" sort of things, such as a flashlight holder, or replacing
the
remaining gaskets in the few ports which have not already been
replaced,
"just because" - not because they leaked (though some did; early on
in
our refit I ordered a complete set of gaskets and screens, and one
each
sized replacement "glass" [they're plastic]). We keep looking
around,
and finding nothing to do, and then, time and time again, commenting
to
each other about how happy we are with the condition of the boat.
Those
interested may like to see some current pix of her, taken by my
pro
photog brother, when we were in his neighborhood in Atlantic
Highlands
NJ, at http://tinyurl.com/FlyingPigPix

I've been horribly remiss about putting up any new pictures in
our
gallery, shown in the sig line; too busy cruising! However,
we're
working on trying to get familiarized with Picasa, by Google, in order
to
allow us more space at much more affordable rates. My inclination,
as
those who have visited the site know, is for great levels of
detail.
That leads to (in total) thousands of pictures, and gigabytes of
memory.
My current storage location isn't suited to that sort of use,
being
designed to offer web-novices a place to showcase their wares, such
as
real estate or other photo-sensitive
trades.

Before we left, we rafted up, briefly, to our benefactor's boat on
the
mooring while I attached the dinghy in a hip-tow position, as his
engine
is without critical components at the moment (and so, can't be run),
and
prepared to tow in. We had an outgoing tide, and a rip- snorter of
an
opposing wind, so I thought we'd be well balanced. However, the tide
was
considerably more effective on the boat than the wind, and I had to
go
around once before we got her comfortably and uneventfully settled
back
in her berth. I then pulled the dinghy out so that Lydia could clean
off
the forest which had attached itself under the dinghy in the weeks
we'd
been there, and went off to do some last minute
shopping.

Yesterday, we packed Louise off to dog-and-house-sit for Steve and
Vicki,
who were going to flotilla down with us. It's his mooring in Miami
we
used last year. Up with the dinghy and strapping down with the gear,
and
we're ready to go.
Oops...

Our departure was delayed by a few hours while our traveling
companions
made some last minute adjustments to their steering, but we got off
at
3PM. Weather on the way out was very nice. The howling winds abated
to
moderate, and we were on a beam reach for much of the day (what was
left
of it). Lydia went down for her sleep at 6:30, and I settled in for
the
night.

Unfortunately for us, the wind got very fluky, ranging from 10-20
and
back again in the space of a couple of minutes, save a few minutes at
a
time of 25 or so, and shifted more toward the expected NW instead of
the
nearly due W we had at the start. Those 25 knot short periods were
the
best, as we were with the wind nearly directly at our backs, with
the
waves causing the now-familiar rock and roll, accompanied by
explosive
filling of the genoa. The higher wind periods kept the boat more
stable,
but they were few and far between. Reluctantly, I jibed it enough
to
minimize the effect, but that put us more beam-to on the waves, and
made
the boat roll more, which had the effect, if there wasn't enough
wind
(apparent wind has to subtract our speed, which was in the mid-5 to
mid-6
range, so at the 10 knot periods, it looks like 4 - no pressure on
the
sails to keep it steady) of both sloshing around and banging
sails.
Still, we were making good progress, not too far off our rhumb
line.

Complicating that was the proximity of the Gulf Stream, which, in
any
event, due to its northward movement, we'd want to avoid, but
in
particular, with a heavy north wind, because of its high, short
waves
produced by the clash of wind and current opposed. That limited
our
movement somewhat, so SPOT watchers will see our zigzag course as we
made
sure to miss the
Stream.

The night was crystal clear, with a brilliant moon. It also allowed
me
to see traffic more readily, and aside from a couple of instances,
the
traffic wasn't notable. However, there was one instance of a very
large
boat/small ship (some sort of cargo vessel) which refused to answer
my
hails on 16 and 13. I expect he saw me, and, had I done nothing,
likely
would have cleared me. However, as I could not ascertain his intent,
and
it looked close, I turned right. Fortunately for me, that stiffened
up
the boat, a nice break from the rock-and-roll and, in fact, we
cleared
handily.

The other one, though, was a real head-scratcher. First, he's
crossing
my bow to starboard, at a leisurely pace. Ditto the no-response.
Then
he heads off at a high rate of speed in the same direction as
we're
going. Next, he's turned back across my bow, still no response.
No
sooner does he get a mile or so off, than he's headed back north.
Then
across my stern. Rinse,
repeat.

A little while later I heard a vessel hailing a commercial ship
which
said he was waiting for the port pilot. After their conversation,
which
I monitored, I hailed that boat, just to chat, and our
conversation
revealed that he was talking to the same ship, for the same
reasons.
He'd just moved camp to his neighborhood. The difference was that
my
contact had AIS, which provides not only the ship name, but
other
valuable data. If you call them by name they're more likely to
respond.
So, AIS is on our maybe-someday wishlist. One of the other even-
better
features of AIS is that they provide a specific, private, number.
We
have one, too, 367164840, and if you were to call us by number, we'd
get
a ring aboard, and we'd have a private conversation over either SSB
or
VHF, direct between two MMSI numbers. The difference, as told to me
by
our supplier, is that the MMSI will get a response from the Captain,
who
is required to speak English, while the helm may be manned by
some
Panamanian or other non- English speaker, who not only likely
doesn't
understand your hail, but couldn't respond to it if they wanted.
Another
reason for that
consideration.

The night passed pretty much like that, other than that the
forecasted
drop in winds appeared, and the daytime, of which I slept the
majority
after I woke Lydia for her 9AM shift, was more rock-and-roll. With
the
next-to-no wind (and, of course, no sun) last night, combined with
a
heavy load as we got ready to leave, our batteries were in need
of
serious charging, so before I went to bed, I hooked up our
Honda
generator to the shore power plug, and by the time I sent this,
despite
no wind, we were full
again.

However, a prior annoyance persists: our radar won't come on with
less
than over 13 volts, a condition present only with either full
batteries
or very light loads. As it's supposed to run happily on 10.5 volts,
our
installation, which I'm sure didn't include new power sources other
than
from the breaker panel (without a new breaker, either), both of
which
(breaker and wiring to the battery) were from the prior
radar
installation. As it was a package price, all materials and labor in
the
same price as quoted, this has been a thorn in my side ever since
we
bought it. When we're in Miami, as that's one of their offices, I'll
try
to raise that issue and see if they'll remedy it. If not, I'll have
to
run new cables myself, both a nuisance and unwarranted expense.
That
said, that's about the only mechanical annoyance we have at the
moment,
for which we are amply
blessed.

Meanwhile, our traveling companions' boat, a Tartan 30, had recently
been
out of the water for some tornado damage repairs, and had a clean
bottom.
Unfortunately for us, the bottom of Flying Pig, I suspect, looked
about
like the bottom of the dinghy, which is to say,
extremely
non-hydrodynamic. Thus, they got a bit of a head start on us. We
tried
to raise each other on the VHF this morning, but only got snatches
of
voice in either direction. However, we did learn that we'd made up
most
of the difference from when they sailed out of sight yesterday.
I'm
trusting that our ablative bottom paint, which is designed to
slough,
naturally, will have shed all that St. Simons Frederica River
grunge
before we get to Miami. However, I'll dive it, to confirm it, and
also
to scrub the presumed slime which will likely accrue in the Yacht
Club
basin.

Oh - I forgot. There's one more mechanical nuisance. None of the
three
speed sensors is sending information, despite my cleaning. I have
to
presume that's from the abovementioned forest blocking their having
water
run past them. I'll check that, too, when I dive the boat in
Miami.

So, having slept the sleep of the dead, pulling an all-nighter from
the
prior morning's 7AM wakeup call, I got up at 2:30 and set to
getting
ready for the night shift. I'll go down first, and Lydia will get
me
early in the morning (midnight to 2-ish). The staysail
proved
ineffective in our early beam-reaching, blanketing the genoa, so I
just
dropped it and lashed it. This afternoon I properly stowed it,
flaking,
strapping and covering it, because from here on out, things will
get
interesting, but all from astern. The usual rock-and-roll and
sail
banging nuisances present earlier, we put out the pole to stabilze
the
genoa. Right now we're in the middle of the forecasted 5- 10NW,
which
with our forward motion, means very little apparent wind, but it's
either
a beam or broad reach, and the seas have settled a bit due to the
lesser
wind, so it's a comfortable ride. Later tonight the wind is expected
to
pick up, and by Wednesday, be honking at 20-25 knots, all still
astern.
Once we get past Caneveral, likely about dawn tomorrow, we'll be
inside
reefs, with small waves. We're hopeful of conditions appropriate
for
spinnaker, but we won't fly it in 20 or more
knots.

Oh, yah, one other incident. As we were passing the St. Mary's
entrance,
I was reminded that this is home to the Kings Bay submarine base.
if
you've ever seen one arrive, you'll note all the crew standing at
parade
rest, seemingly unperturbed by either wind or rock- and-roll. I've
often
wondered how they do that, but Lydia said, no doubt, it was just a
very
controlled stance - not rigid, but very flexible. Just the thing for
a
sub. So, as we calmed down a bit this afternoon, I went out to the
patio
and practiced. Lydia noted I was doing very well in maintaining
my
position. She was very glad the Coast Guard didn't hear me say that
of
course I was weaving around, but still standing - I was getting good
at
using my controlled sub
stance...

I'm off to dinner - Stay
tuned...

L8R

Skip

--
Morgan 461
#2
SV Flying Pig
KI4MPC
See our galleries at www.justpickone.org/skip/gallery!
Follow us at
and


"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things
you
didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines.
Sail
away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails.
Explore.
Dream. Discover." - Mark
Twain