Norfolk, VA
To see as much of the world as we can,
Using the smallest carbon footprint we can,
Spending the least amount of money we can,
Making as many friends we can.
There were issues with Red Ranger. Kind of awkward when you have guests. But sailing conditions were ideal. Ideal.
Meet Fatjon and Blerta. From the 14th floor. Fatjon was a captain in the Albanian Navy. And an ordinance diver. He knows ships and the sea. Blerta is a …
That's my sister, Elizabeth. One of many sisters. This was her first chance to actually go sailing. We showed her many — but not all -- of the boaty things on Red Ranger: we hoisted most of the sails, we had a pleasant drift, we dropped the anchor, had some lunch …
Things happen. We wound up testing the bilge pumps heavily. And one of them wasn't keeping up and needed to be replaced.
CA cleaned the nav station. This leads to something you don't see every day.
The Nav station.
With no stuff.
The stuff was all on the …
When we lived aboard, we kept Red Ranger clean. It was easy. We were there. And we were otherwise unemployed. Except for sight-seeing. And writing.
The amount of small mildewy areas is legion. It's actually kind of insane.
We're starting from this ☞
The part is a vent fitting …
How do you introduce someone to the sea?
CA's Venerable Great Aunt Diane (vGAD) came to visit for a long weekend. She's been on Red Ranger many times. She brought more of CA's family: Maddy and Philip. Maddy has been to Red Ranger before, but Philip's never been here before …
Step 1: Clean everything. This means everything must come out of the locker it was in.
The locker must be scrubbed.
In some cases, the things from the lockers must be scrubbed.
And then aired out for a week before going back into the locker.
When we moved …
Some time in 2015-ish era, CA was closing the aft port light and the clamp that screws it down hard against the gasket failed catastrophically. I can't find the picture, put the metal failed, leaving the hatch not fully closed and — consequently — dripping onto the aft berth.
Here's the link …
Two winters of sitting — and a summer with only a few trips — has left Red Ranger awfully dirty. Also, some mission-critical things had failed.
Here's CA washing the galley fan. She's scrubbing the power cord with a toothbrush. (Mine, I think.)
If the galley fan is dirty, what …
What's important is that nothing seriously failed. Stuff broke. We worked around it. Here's the overview. Details follow.
1600 - Move to fuel dock. Take on 54 gallons.
1710 - Anchored in Piakatank River at 37°32.132N 076°19.318W
This is a move of about a mile …
Years and years ago — when we first started taking sailing lessons — one of the old salts who helped us out had some simple daily procedures.
Check the engine oil.
Check the weather.
Check the winds and tides.
He had a piece of paper where we wrote down the …
Winter is over. If we're going to move Red Ranger, she's got to be ready to go.
There's the weather issue, of course. Sunday midnight-ish the wind hit us with a vengeance. Like a tornado. But that's getting ahead of things.
Also. This is handy:
The problem with being weekenders is access. When we lived in Norfolk, Red Ranger was in Deltaville, just an hour and change away. It was a relaxing drive after work every week. When we moved to Richmond, Red Ranger was back in Deltaville, about two hours away.
Now that we're …
Why buy a boat and do this live-aboard cruising?
Once upon a time, this was a common question. Finally, I may have found an answer.
I've noticed that when hanging around with boaters and cruisers, they don't ask this question very often. They might ask it rhetorically as …
If we hadn't dropped the hook ashore to make some bank, we'd be planning our migration. However, since we're not going anywhere, what we have as an alternative is armchair sailing. Here's our armchair trip to Florida.
October is when we have the Whitby Rendezvous. The rendezvous is …
Long, long ago, from a city far, far away…
CA and I enjoyed looking at boats and marinas. In the years BC (Before a Craft), we'd make excuses to visit marinas just because boats were so cool.
There's a basic aesthetic of shape to the hull and topsides. There's the …
We've moved our ground base again. After about 16 months in Richmond, we're off to Tyson's Corner, Virginia.
CA bought about 16 boxes from U-Haul: a mixture of medium and small. She bought some tape, too: the brown paper tape is better than the clear.
We don't have too much …
In no particular order.
The Foldaway. The idea is to replace the transom ladder with a foldaway that hangs from the toe rail between the lifeline gates.
ECH2O Tec Watermaker. We're looking specifically at the belt-driven, modular unit. We can put the pressure vessel in the hanging lockers. The control …
When we're sailing, the prop is left spinning — freewheeling. It appears that either some transmissions say "never let this happen" or sailors have determined through the rumor mill that this is bad. The idea is that the transmission has no pressure to circulate fluid and this causes wear …
CA did it again. Another wonderful rendezvous. Food. Friends. Fellowship. Fascinating Stories.
We had only two Whitby's at the docks. The nor'easter and Hurricane Joaquin intimidated many of us, keeping folks away from the West River Sail Club docks.
Here's a summary of what we did:
Useful resources. Everyone should have them. We would describe them as indispensable. Mandatory. Don't leave home without it.
BTW. Check out the sample page: http://www.onthewaterchartguides.org/icw-anchorguides/#tab-id-11
Yes, that's us in Hampton, Virginia. And yes, it's a truly great anchorage.
We were at the Hampton …