Hi, Doug, and list,

On Jan 1, 10:10 am, wrote:
Skip Gundlach wrote:

As our travels and travails are pretty well documented....
..... That there were terrifying times, angry times, frustrating
times, chaotic times, and many other less-than-"perfect" times doesn't
change the fact that in the end, it was joyful, blissful,
exhilarating, fun, and above all, a great adventure.

Things never work out as planned, but it's nice when things work out
about as well or better than you planned, in the end. Glad to hear
that you've recovered from the wrecks and are moving onward. Right now
we're hunkered down for this freeze + nor'easter just a ways south of
you all.

One thing I'm curious about and haven't seen you mention- you had a
molded lapstrake pulling boat (a 12-footer IIRC), are you using that
for a dinghy?

If, by "pulling" boat you mean rower, I don't have one of those.
Memory fails me if it was you who was building a 20 pound carbon fiber
rowing dink, but at that time I'd been considering a Little River
Marine 12' Heritage for a dink. I never owned one...

That it's strictly displacement, and 2HP max, has ruled that out for
our purposes. We have a new 10' PortaBote which I've modified to take
rowing sculls (10' carbon fiber oars, and appropriate rowlocks, but
still floppy sides to the PB) and which uses a 6HP very effectively.
Our day-to-day, davits-slung, dink is a Walker Bay "rib" (same basic
material as their "hard bottom" boats, but with tubes around) with an
ancient 15HP 2-stroke. The oars and its rowing characteristics are
strictly from hunger, but otherwise we're very pleased with it.

All that said, LRM now makes all of their Heritage line (also) in
single hull models, making them very much lighter. For those
preferring a rowing environment, only, they are stellar boats to that
purpose, and the 15 and 18 models are available as doubles (convert to
either one or two people rowing), fixed or sliding seat (cost is an
issue for us; if we were to go to that cost, we'd get the sliding
seat, as it's orders of magnitude more efficient for propulsion and
overall workout; only someone with leg problems wouldn't benefit from
that sort of exercise). I grumble when I row the PB but dealing with
a sliding seat aboard (which didn't live in the - in the case of the
PB - opened boat) wasn't an option.


I've seen the hookah style underwater breathing apparatus in use a few
times by fellow cruisers, that seems like a great tool for working
under the boat. We plan to get one in the near future.

We bought the one which is electric, because it takes up very little
room. It, the two hoses and all the associated hardware, and our dive
gear all fit in a standard dive bag. The power for it is a Honda
EU2000i which we have for "emergency" charging (such as today, when I
discovered I'd left the charger on overnight after taking advantage of
"shore power" to run 110V items in the boat as well as the hookah pump
and the recursive loop in the inverter pulled us down to 65%
overnight) and power tools ashore.

Folks chatted up about them, before my purchase, were usually negative
about any hookah, saying they didn't get used, usually, and therefore
sold. However, those who have and use them are very glad to have
them. That said, there are usually some available on various used
gear forums, craigslist, SSCA and the like



I'll post again after we reach Miami. The weather forecasts (well, you
know how we feel about the accuracy of those available to us, but
they've been saying essentially the same thing for more than a week,
so it seems reasonable to expect some congruence between the forecast
and the reality)

Hate to disagree, but usually we get a pretty good forecast... I'd say
that over the past year of daily tallying forecasts with short term
(24 hour) results, the forecasters are pretty close 80% of the time
and right on about 50% of the time. Kind of like the tide
predictions.... they're not perfectly congruent to the real world but
they're close enough to provide a workable tool for day-to-day cruise
planning.

Heh. We are just very skilled at finding the 20 and 50 percent,
apparently. The downside (not enough in the forecast) got us on the
rocks the first time, and henceforth, it was either way lighter than
forecast, or way stronger in an entirely different direction. Our
frustrations usually lay with the forecasted stronger winds which in
RL were nearly nonexistent...


... have it as a marvelous, rollicking run from here to
Miami. We'll leave before dark, to get outside the entrance in
daylight, and pull into the Port of Miami, likely, while it's still
dark. From there we'll go to our mooring and commence local sailing!

Stay tuned for the reality of the trip...

I can understand your wanting to get south away from a hard freeze,
but setting off in front of a predicted 30 knot nor'easter.... which
will be blowing against the Gulf Stream to boot... may be on the hairy
side. We're staying put until probably Thursday or maybe even Friday,
and we're going all the way "inside".

Hope you have a good safe run down the coast!

Thanks. We're not going near the Stream. It will truly be a mess in
that time - forecasts in the stream call for 15-18 feet after
midnight, with gale gusts. We'll hug the coast where it's forecast for
20K, 3-5', and by late dark-morning/midnight+, potential 40 gusts.

As of this minute, we're considering sailing down the ICW, which will
take longer, of course, but if the wind holds, could be done. I have
less than no enthusiasm for driving this boat to Miami! :{)) - but if
we have consistent 15+ winds in any of the directions forecast, it's
do-able, bridges being a serious nuisance, but not a problem...


Fresh Breezes- Doug King


L8R

Skip

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