Monthly Archives: December 2014

Working 9 to 5

What a way to make a vacation.

After lengthy plane delays in Miami we finally arrived about midnight. Everything closed at the hotel so we just sat in the swing on the veranda at the room to unwind.

Figured out how to work the air conditioning. Set if on arctic blast. That whole Celsius vs Fahrenheit thing. 17 Celsius is pretty cold, but slept through it.

Anxious or anticipation of a new place in the day light we got up and went exploring at 7am and found that everyone was a sleep.

The place comes with a friendly guard dog. Just pet Henry once and he’ll protect you. Not even the staff can approach us without Henry barking at em.

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Found Justin and he took care of our ride to the boat yard. Just had to wait till the staff showed up. We finally got to the Grenada Marine around 9am and sugar shack was right where we left her. Looked good. Little dusty. But inside was pretty clean. So ’twas time to put the pieces back together.

New chain was installed. All 100 meters of it. So we promptly removed it so that we could mark the chain ever 10 meters do we know how deep the water is. Kidding. We need to make sure we set the scope or ratio of depth to length of chain deployed. Then put it all back away. The windless is acting up, seems to be over heating. Another project fig tomorrow.

With Christine’s help the mainsail is installed. Reefing lines yet to be run but at least it looks like a sailboat.

They were going to splash us today but since they hadn’t finished the wax Job. It got pushed. That and the 60 foot swan was itching to go.

We washed off the dirt on 1/2 the boat. Some days you wish for smaller things. Should be in the water tomorrow.

Off to dinner to celebrate all the hard work with some cold beverages.

6 months has past yet again

Always seems like hurricane season lasts a lot longer, or at least waiting for the Christmas break. I guess, if I did the math, it actually is. The usual questions: What did we forget? Will everything that used to work still work? Did the yard complete the work? Will they splash us in the water, and of COURSE, will she float. Only 24 hours and well know most of those answers and see what new projects will be on the agenda this year.

One crew short this year to help with the commissioning. Going to take some extra work bending on that mainsail and all the preflight checking. On the list is exercising the through hulls, marking the new chain, checking out the bottom job, removing insect barriers, a quick wash (this is when you wish for a shorter waterline), countless trips up and down the yard to the bar / restaurant and shops. Pick up the jib, and updated cushions from Martin at turbulence whom always is friendly and completes projects well before our return. And of course the freezer. The darned freezer.

It’s a frigoboat with a keel cooler. That means you can’t run it when not in the water as the ocean water provides the cooling of the hot gasses. So we have to coordinate that work after we get splashed. Hopefully, since we haven’t heard back via email, we are late enough in the season that Herve has us on his schedule or time to recharge the system.

It’s vacation, its work, it’s fun. We will be on the water soon.

That is if we ever leave Dallas. Something about the backup power dealio not being enough to start the engines. They asked if anyone onboard had jumper cables, I offered my iPod charge cable but this is when they brought in the big guns.

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That didn’t seem to do the trick so they brought in more support. I sure hope they know what they are doing. Sitting in first class means we are also the first to spill a drink when they don’t.

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All clear for take off. Fingers crossed here we go. Miami bound.

2 hours later. We are in Miami waiting on the last flight of the day.