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.
Moving on.
Two masts means two sessions with the crane operator.
Rigging Phase 1 was done on the hard. They positioned the mast and mostly reset the stays and shrouds that secure the mast.
The inner forestay isn't correctly backed under the deck. The mast isn't yet blocked into position …
There's nothing that induces joy so completely as a job that's done right.
Case in point. Through Hulls and Bilge Pumps.
Through hulls are a serious issue. In Unbelievable and The Pace of Change, I described some through-hull upgrades. Plus I had to free up all the bronze through-hulls; see …
There's nothing that induces despair so completely as a job that cannot be done.
Case in point. The "Air Keel" in the Achilles Dinghy, Scout. This was a cause for despair.
To keep a boat tracking reasonably well, it needs a keel. Power boats have a keel that is degenerated …
There's nothing that induces despair so completely as a job that cannot be done.
Case in point. The windlass mounting. This was a cause for despair.
To handle the immense anchors (and attached chain), you need some mechanical advantage. This is what a windlass is for. We have a lovely …
One golden rule of boat safety is "never lift anything heavy". One version of this rule is "never lift what you can drag, never drag what you can roll, never roll what you can leave". See Jan Adkins' Moving Heavy Things for classical advice on avoiding heavy lifting.
On a …
Documentation is officious nonsense; there is a lot of documentation. What -- precisely -- is the point of a "Documented" vessel? Primarily, the USCG agrees to recognize our name. They agree so strongly that they assign a number as a surrogate for the name. That's right. The privilege of documenting your vessel's …
The "Five F's" include Flood, Falling Overboard, Fire, First Aid, Famine. Let's wring our hands over flooding. This is a subject which can make one very distraught. It takes some work to be optimistic.
Red Ranger has a number of holes in the hull. All of which are fairly serious …
Part of boat buying is The Survey. Part of the survey is to identify and disclose any "issues" with the boat. One of things our survey disclosed that "Foredeck exhibits excessive moisture and deterioration of core material from bow to aft of windlass and houser, repair and install better backing …
We've finished most of the "official" documentation process. Jimmy Cornell's book on World Cruising, and his Noonsite web site provide a specific list of documents that constitute the "Ship's Papers" for a small yacht. www.noonsite.com—DOCUMENTS YOU WILL NEED
The list looks like this.
USCG Documentation. No. 648197 …
For our 28th anniversary, we did something new and different: we went camping. Camping isn't all that new. But we spent our first night on the Ranger. No water. No heads. Limited electricity. Delightful.
[The Emily Post list of anniversary gifts: 1st paper, 5th wood, 10th tin, 15th crystal, 20th …
We grew up in houses, on land. We've lived in cities as well as the ‘burbs, and we felt pretty well acculturated.
But marina life is still very new to us. The standards and conventions are not what we're used to. It takes a bit of work to fit in …
Changes feel like they're coming at us in waves. Back in December, all we had was a marine survey with dozens of things that absolutely had to be done. The insurance company (of course) has to see all the known problems resolved. Some of these are objectively slow: weeks of …
"Stone Soup Today" -- a blanket invite to everyone hanging around the marina. "Stone at 5, Soup at 6" is the small print at the bottom of the sign. (Ishky Baha is Gaelic, "water of life", from which we get the English word Whiskey.)
CA was cruising the boatyard, looking at …
The waiting is hard.
Red Ranger is still in the shed. It's only been two weekends. For a while, we were really pushing hard to get jobs done. There's an exhilaration -- an adrenaline rush -- to diving into a list of jobs.
When the list is finite and within one's capabilities …
You need to know both things -- where you are right now, and where you're going. If you don't know where you are, the destination is just academic.
Sailors like to say they're "bound for" a destination. We're told not to over-commit to a particular place and time. My limited off-shore …
The waiting is hard.
FoGoBo says "Don't wish time away."
Rather than pacing around, beating a tattoo with our fingers, we should really be doing something. Sadly, the boat is layed up.
Since December, we've been "playing boat" just about every weekend. Partly, it's what we do to get out …
Red Ranger's "ground tackle" (anchor and rode) weighs over a hundred pounds. Our primary anchor is a 44 pound Plow. We have a few hundred feet of BBB chain, at about 1 3/4 pounds per foot. Our secondary anchor is a thirty-pound Danforth. We also have a little 10 …
The guys at the boatyard called it "muck". It's the rotten wood sandwiched inside the foredeck.
There's more than what's showing in the picture.
Okay, so there was some rot. We knew that going in to the deal. It's a bit more rot than we'd hoped. But, we had lowered …
Yes, that's the Ranger in the shed.
A boat on the hard -- up on stands -- still has a tremendous majesty. A dismasted boat on the hard, well, she looks like she's wearing the silly front-only hospital gown, prepped for surgery. Vulnerable.
A boat in the shed... well, she's stretched out …
People form communities -- mostly because the group is more successful than the individual. Sailors stick together because there's so much to know and learn; you can't boldly go where no person has gone before without running terrible risks.
The folks that own the same (or similar) boats naturally form communities …