It's not all fun and games
Sometimes you have to do some work.
Like chase down the Blue Heron ("George") as the sunset and clouds align.
This was almost like work.
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.
Sometimes you have to do some work.
Like chase down the Blue Heron ("George") as the sunset and clouds align.
This was almost like work.
CA has a shiny, new Canon EOS.
The ducks living in the marina.
We're checking on Red Ranger every other weekend (more-or-less.)
We top off the battery water. Make sure nothing's leaking or broken or falling apart. Adjust the dock lines. Sigh a lot. Talk about trips we want …
There's a Great Blue Heron at Herrington Harbour. We're told its name is George.
It's not clear, but the creek has a thin skin of ice.
This is a set of chores we take on with joy.
This is the WRSC dock.
A long, long string of wood and plumbing and electrical.
The idea is to rip out pieces each year.
Since becoming members, I've helped with a …
She's been on the hard for about a year.
We had emptied every battery container (except one.) We had opened every locker and drawer.
We'd even disconnected the vent fan for the Air Head composting toilet. The only thing left on was the bilge pump. On the hard, she takes …
Red Ranger is wintering in the water. It's cold.
But. The ice is thin, so, it's not damaging in any way.
Last winter, the port-side deck drain hose filled with water, and then froze, and dropped off the "T" fitting under the …
Snow on the decks of Red Ranger.
The footprints are a technician from one of the service companies at Herrington Harbour.
There's a strike rail around the edge of Red Ranger. It's a wooden offset, between one a two inches deep, about a foot …
Sigh.
Seasons come and seasons go. As we get on toward winter, we need to strike Red Ranger's sails, winterize Mr. Lehman, take the food out of the galley, upend all the cushions to let air circulate.
We replaced the T-shirts keeping …
CA and I (and a handful of others) chose the "Cleanup Sticks from the Rip-Rap" job for the fall cleanup at West River Sailing Club. We have a large checklist of things that need doing. In previous years I helped rebuild the dock. This year after something went wrong with …
We're lucky. As of Thursday (when Florence made landfall) the projected course was well away from the Chesapeake bay. There will be Tropical Depression wind and rain, but not a direct hit, and — hopefully — minimal storm surge.
Here's Red Ranger's hurricane preparation list:
Remove foresails. The furling line can break …
May as well clean.
And fix things.
This thing is the pump assembly on our Marine Sanitation Device (MSD). You might know it as a toilet.
CA's picking the paint out of the inlet valve packing nut.
The forward cylinder (with the …
The hull paint was chipped in some places. Down to a thin layer in others.
We touched it up.
The bulk of the bottom paint is in good shape. We hope this little touch-up will reduce barnacle and algae damage for another …
The Whitby design has a fairly large number of through-hull fittings. They let water in (and out) of the boat in a controlled fashion. For fittings below the waterline, we have huge bronze valves — sea cocks — to be sure we can close off the hole in case a hose fails …
We've moved the deck drain hoses. The Whitby has wonderful bulwarks that trap water running over the decks. The original Whitby design had hoses that ran from deck drains to through-hulls below the waterline. It's an elegant idea that keeps the cockpit dry and makes sure dropped tools don't always …
Red Ranger uses "raw" water for a number of things: flushing the forward head, rinsing in the galley sink, cooling the engine, washing down the anchor. Once upon a time, it also had air conditioners, a fridge, and an aft head that used raw water also.
All of the raw …
House batteries were nearly dead. See House Batteries for their last days.
I have a theory that ice in the bilge may have frozen the switch in the on position, and the motor's overheat protector kicked on and off over a period of weeks, running the batteries down in the …
The house batteries date from September 2011. We've gotten a hair over six years of service from batteries that are normally replaced every five years. They're not stone dead. See Sudden Death—Joys and Concerns for details of the last time they died.
They're not dead. But. They're barely …
When we lived aboard, we didn't winterize. Winterizing is a potentially big job. But we think we're getting a grip on it. Except for one thing. And this year, it was a problem. So we had to do some diagnostic work.
Here's the …
Two things are essential for racing on sailboats.
I have some ideas about this. Years ago I did a little racing in our first boat, a Buccaneer. It's an 18' dinghy, designed for comfy, reasonably safe two-person racing. I crewed a bit. I did really badly. I had a vague …
This is different.
It looks a bit like a church event. Multiple generations. Folks congregating, socializing, forming and strengthening their connections. There's a strong sense of thanksgiving. Not so much worship and praise.
This is West River Sailing Club.
Worship and praise was …
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