Showing posts with label Cruising. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cruising. Show all posts

Tuesday, July 27, 2021

Upgrading our Autopilot

Upgrading our Raymarine Wheel Pilot to a Raymarine Evolution EV-100 Auto pilot.

Our Autopilot has Alzheimer's - keeps losing it's memory and not sure where it's going. Time to upgrade.

After lots of research, despite wanting to have a Garmin Autopilot to match the rest of our Garmin Electronics, they just don't have one that is suitable for our size boat that would fit within our electrical power budget. So the Raymarine Evolution EV-100 it is.

The model I selected is the EV-100 Sail Wheel Pilot. From everything I have read on the subject, it's best to have a RPS (Rudder Position Sensor) attached (link here). Also, the Evolution system should be able to use the data and some commands from our NEMA 2000 network and Garmin 741xs Chartplotter.

Here's our current Helm Electronics setup. The Garmin GMI instrument on the Starboard Side of the 'Navigation Electronics Shelf' is mounted in a DIY holder. It's made from a piece of PVC piping and a piece of Starboard material.

The new Raymarine kit includes a p70s Pilot Controller. I specifically chose the p70s rather than the p70. The format of the p70s is more closely aligned to the Garmin GMI instrument, so if I match the housing of the GMI and mount the p70s where the existing Garmin Echo Depth instrument display is (on the port side of the Navigation Electronics Shelf' ) it will add a degree of order to the shelf. 

We'll have to figure out where to mount the Garmin Echo, probably below the shelf.



The new Autopilot has similar modules to the old system just a more updated / improved feature set.

Just a quick note here. The manuals suck! They don't even clearly identify all of the components of the system because they include the components of several other systems. It takes a lot of reading to figure out which parts of the manual are applicable to the system I purchased.

The Evolution system has:

  • ACU 100 (The Brain)
  • p70s Controller
  • EV-100 Attitude Heading Reference Sensor
  • Evolution Wheel Drive
Optional equipment:
  • RPS - Rudder Position Sensor.
The Kit includes a SeaTalkng Backbone, 2 SeaTalkng T Connectors, 2 End terminators and cables for each of the devices.

Not included are the SeaTalkng to Device net Male connector (connects NEMA 2000 to SeaTalkng) Note: That cable has to connect to a NEMA 2000 T Connector which requires a NEMA 2000 Male Connector. The cable is available in both Male and Female versions.

 I did need to order a few things to go with the kit. The RPS as mentioned, the SeaTalkng to Device Net cable, a spare NEMA 2000 T connector and a 3m SeaTalkng to SeaTalkng cable to connect from the SeaTalkng backbone to the p70s instrument.  Those should all arrive by August 6th. But as Covid is having another surge, it may impede delivery so I'm expecting they will arrive mid August. Fingers are crossed.

Location of the system parts is the first step in Installation. The Raymarine manuals repeat that the p70s should not be adjacent to the Compass and other magnetic equipment. However, every installation that I've seen on YouTube has shown the instrument being installed almost as close to the compass as it could be. At least our location of that instrument should be slightly further from the Compass.

The old Autopilot ACU is located on the Aft bulkhead of the Aft Berth just to port of the Helm wheel cables. The new ACU could be there.

The SeaTalkng Backbone could be close to the ACU but I would prefer that it was not on display and subject to being accidently knocked.

The EV-1 Sensor location is a little more problematic. Away from the engine, magnetic devices or large chunks of metal (like the spare anchor in the Lazarette) or Electrical wiring runs. We've decided that the best option is to go down to the boat and determine where to place it. The existing 'Magnetic Fluxgate Compass' unit is mounted outside of the Aft Berth access door but the new EV-1 will not fit in that location. We'll figure it out.

Lastly, the Wheel Drive is a direct replacement for our existing Wheel Drive, we're only changing it for the new one because I'm sure that Raymarine has made some improvements in the design, mechanical as it is. The new Wheel Drive also has the new Drive Motor - and though I could change the motor out to the old wheel drive, might as well just go ahead and use the new one. I'll keep the old unit until it's considered 'Hording' and then give it to the sailing club's flea market.

The new system does seem to need two power supply points, one to the SeaTalkng backbone and the other to the ACU. I'm contacting Raymarine to confirm that, shouldn't be a problem as we already have a dedicated Auto Pilot Circuit Breaker on the main Electrical Control Panel.

Ok, that describes the system, components and the plan to locate them.


From my previous experience working on Autopilots, the wiring has been an issue, particularly when the wiring was not via a Plug and Socket, such as the Power Supply, motor connection and the SeaTalkng connection to the ACU. The wires are typically far to small to fit properly inside of a screwed connection. 

This Ferrule Crimping Kit should take care of that issue. 
Oh! it has 2000 Ferrules! that should suffice for, well, ForEver!

It was only $30 on Amazon.




There's quite a few projects lining up for Eximius, as the last few bits for this one don't arrive till mid August, it's dropping down the priority list (see the To Do List - Projects tab at the top of this page)

Friday, June 4, 2021

Memorial Day Weekend Cruise to West Palm Beach Pt. 4

West Palm Beach to Fort Lauderdale

Returning from West Palm Beach.

We had pulled the dink onto the deck on Sunday night after having dinner ashore with a dozen other club members. I had also planned our departure and release from the raftup with Jeff & Hector. Alarm was set for 06:00 and we had a good night's sleep excepting for a 20 minute rain shower. Once that was past we reopened the V-berth hatch and slept well.

Monday morning while we had Cereal and Toast for breakfast, I explained the Peggy the process for parting from the raftup: Because of the tide at that time and because Jeff had a Stern Anchor out, we could reduce the lines between the two boats and pretty much stay in position. I would then start to haul in the 275feet of anchor rode. The first 175' was triple stranded 1" rope which was then shackled to 100' of 5/16" chain. 

When hauling in Chain, it just falls down into the anchor locker, but when hauling in triple stranded rope, it's quite stiff and so does not just fall into the locker, but has to be pushed down. So, I anticipated it would take a little longer to haul in the rope so we would have to be ready to put the boat in reverse in order to prevent us over-riding the anchor rode and risk having line in the area of the prop.

07:00 we started releasing the lines by the time Jeff was up and ready to let go of the stern line. Once the lines were free, I started hauling in the anchor line, had to work pretty quick as I was worried that our stern would catch the bow of Affection, that would not be a happy event. Once clear of the rafted boats, I worked at pulling the rest of the 3 strand line and treading it down into the anchor locker. Once the line was in, it was then easy to haul in the Chain and to snug the anchor up to the anchor roller.

As soon as the anchor was clear of the water, I gave the signal to Peggy that we could head out to the channel that crossed from the East side of the ICW to the West side. The bridges in WPB are on the West side of the ICW.

Once we were through the short channel we turned North towards the Flagler Memorial Bridge. We made much better time that expected and had 15 minutes to spare for the bridge's 7:45 opening. Mike & Brenda on Imagine were also heading North to the Lake Worth Inlet and was also in a holding pattern just South of us. As soon as the bridge spans were open, I pushed ahead at 2,000 rpm making over 7 knots over the water, but the tide was already turning and we were only doing just over 6 knots GPS speed. Anticipating that the tide would get stronger the longer we were in the ICW, so we motored on. Imagine likes to get their sails up when chance occurs. The wind was light and we communicated that we would probably be under motor for the first couple of hours when we turned South from the Lake Worth Inlet.

We could not make it to our dock before the falling tide later that day, so we planned to anchor overnight in Sunrise Bay, we motored most of the morning and hoisted the main around 10am. Life was good until about 12am when it got cloudy, we saw a storm cloud in the North East on our Radar, at first it didn't seem a threat, we also saw Imaging closing up on our stern rapidly under sail.

Shortly after Imagine passed us on our Stbd Side, we put in a reef just in case the weather worsened. 

Within minutes, Mike called on VHF suggesting the storm was approaching, it was. So we put in a 2nd reef then decided to pull the sail down. Just in time, winds picked up and the seas got very lumpy, nothing we haven't dealt with before, but safety first. we were only about 2/3 of a mile from the shore, didn't want to be under canvas on a lee shore just then. Imagine turned to windward and doused their sails too.

Now we're motoring all sails stowed, it's lumpy, frequent rolls dipping the rails. Then, all of a sudden, the fuel gauge read nearly empty! What !! We're about an half hour or more from our entry into Hillsboro Inlet, on a Lee shore, sails down and the engine fuel gauge is touching zero. 

This is not a good place to be ! If the engine stops, there's barely time to drop anchor and stop the boat getting into shallow water - not a pleasant scenario.

We carry 10 gallons of Diesel in 2 tanks on deck - secured to the Port side just forwards of midships. Now, I was pretty sure that we had not used all of the fuel in the 23 gallon tank, but we had been pushing the engine since 7:45 this morning. Typically we use about 1/2 to 3/4 gallons an hour. I should have somewhere between 5 and 10 gallons in the tank calculated by usage, so the gauge should have been reading at least 1/4 full, so it was probably a gauge error.

The Gauge is powered by the resistance in the fuel gauge sending unit, there's a float with a magnet that can move up and down a central tube which makes/breaks reed switches, those reed switches change the resistance of the circuit to the gauge and thus the gauge is basically a volt meter but just displays the tank level in 1/8 segments as there are 8 reed switches in the sender.

So, pretty confident that we had plenty of fuel, now was not the time to gamble. I asked Peggy to take the helm in order that I could go outside of the cockpit to get the tank of diesel and add it to the fuel tank. Peggy was not certain that she could handle the boat in the rough conditions, the Auto Pilot certainly could not, but the risk of running out of fuel and heading to the shore in the storm was just not an option. 

Peggy took the wheel - I was pretty confident she could handle it, and I was right. I hooked my tether onto the Port Side Jack line (a nylon webbing strap that runs from the stern to the bow acting as a safety line when needed) an climbed out of the cockpit. The three principles of a good knot is that it has to do it's job, has to be easy to undo and look pretty. I had tied the fuel tanks to the stanchions with a couple of clove hitches, so easy to undo with one hand while I used the other to keep hold of the boat. 

Once back in the cockpit with the diesel can, I secured it to the rail on the Port quarter just aft of the Diesel Fuel Filler point. Then I pulled our 'Fuel Kit' out of the cockpit locker. That kit contains a fuel filler syphon, fuel filler cap key and fuel additives. I didn't worry about the additives and just used the syphon to empty the can into the fuel tank. Once complete I took over at the helm and congratulated Peggy on doing a great job of keeping us on course while worked on the fuel issue. 

Knowing there were now at least 4 gallons of fuel in the tank the tension eased and we focused on dealing with the rough water. As always, the storm began to pass and shortly Mike and Brenda on Imagine were back on our tail under sail.

We continued together in tandem as we turned into the Hillsboro Inlet channel. Called the bridge for their next opening (13:45) and we held station waiting the 10 minutes before it rose.  Both of us turned South once inside the inlet bridge and eased back on the throttle as we would arrive at 14th street bridge too early, neither of us wanted to deal with the bundle of boats that would be waiting just North of the bridge.

Tom Garvey on Ohana was already waiting with the crowd at the bridge, so all three of us passed under the bridge, once open, we headed South. Imagine didn't have far to go and Ohana not much more, while we headed down to Sunrise Bay which meant passing Atlantic Blvd Bridge, Commercial Blvd Bridge and Oakland Park Blvd Bridge.

Expecting a large, Memorial Day Weekend, crowd at the Bay, we were surprised to see less than twenty boats at anchor or rafted. We anchored easily but a bit too close to a nearby boat, so we (I) pulled it up and we repositioned a hundred feat further back from the ICW. 

Both tired, we had dinner, a glass of wine and a tot of Rum, and prepared for our early night. Breakfast on Tuesday Morning was Salmon and Guacamole, mini tomatoes and some fried bread (skillet toast) and, of course, some Hot Coffee.

We motored easily back to the dock. There was a train crossing at the FEC Bridge but we slowed down so we would not get to 3rd Avenue bridge before the FEC Bridge opened. 

Back at the dock, we unloaded, washed the boat down, checked everything was set for us to leave the boat and head home.

This was a great weekend, not only did we enjoy the sail up to Lake Boca and then the sail up to Lake Worth, but a great time spent in the West Palm Beach Anchorage. The trip home was just another lesson on how to handle the boat in slightly adverse conditions. Every time we experience a bit of difficulty we learn a lot and this weekend was no exception. 

I would give this weekend a full 5 Stars.


See you on the water.




Sunday, May 30, 2021

Memorial Day Weekend Cruise to West Palm Beach Pt. 3

 Fun day at West Palm Beach Anchorage.

Dawn broke long before we awoke this morning, a good nights sleep makes a world of difference.

So we started the day with a real breakfast, none of that healthy stuff, no grapes, no fiber cereal, but a good cooked breakfast. A big slice of Breakfast Ham, some mini tomatoes (ok, I guess  they are healthy), Fried Egg over easy and the last of the Bagels with Cream Cheese and Strawberry Jam and Honey. Of course, a piping hot mug of Coffee and some OJ. Sorry health nuts, it was really good! And a second apology: No pics.

Did stuff around the boat and then took a dink ride with Jeff to deliver cruising gifts to the other boats. 
Here's the boat list:
  1. Alebrije
  2. Affection
  3. Eximius
  4. Ohana
  5. Dalecarlia
  6. Deli Mali
  7. Imagine
  8. Cookie Monster
  9. Pegasus
A couple of other boats nearly made it, the nearest was Aireze was in the area but we had all gone ashore when Bruce got here. 

Hey! I'm happy that we had Nine Boats turn out. This should give a push to others to come join us on the next cruise. 

Saturday 13 of us met up at Lorenz on Clematis just 5 mins from the dinghy dock. The staff made us welcome and moved tables to accomdate all of us, the chin wagging began.

From my position,  Jeff Keiser earned the food swoone award for his body language reply when asked how good was the lasagna. THE BEST.

Peggy  and I returned to the boat as we wanted to put the dink on deck before dark, nearly made it, the deck light helped. We were ready for the 7am breakaway from the 3 boat raft up.


Sleep safe everyone. 


 

Saturday, May 29, 2021

Memorial Day Weekend Cruise to West Palm Beach Pt. 2

West Palm Beach Anchoring

As mentioned in the last post (click here) We're anchored at West Palm Beach Florida.




The current is vicious here! We've seen 4 knots in the direction of the tide, right now it's flowing southerly, We're anchored with two bow anchors and one stern anchor and they are holding well. The good news is that we're in 9' of water. The Stream does give concern when taking the dinghy out into that stream, we have to be able to do at least 4 knots, "Special's Dink" should be fine, we have a 4hp outboard and it's only an 8.5' Mercury dinghy, doesn't get up on the the plane but clips along nicely if only 2 people on board. So sorry folks dinghy trips in Special's Dink doesn't look like an option. 

Ohana arrived at nearly dark last night and after dinner at Bradley's they anchored between the two city docks with several other boats. Meanwhile, as the tide changes we just hung about secure on our anchors. The only other downside of being on the East side of the Waterway is the frequent crazies on their power boats churning up the waters and making Peggy wish she had taken a dramamine. Lumpy.

lt rained briefly around 4:30 this morning and I had a mad dash about the boat to close the ports and hatches which were open to keep the boat cool. It only lasted about 10 minutes and we opened up the main v-berth hatch for the welcome breeze. FYI, I attach a spare halyard to the bow of the dinghy when it's on deck and we're at anchor so that I can raise it enough to open the v-berth hatch which is below the dink.

The Bow line that we set between Affection's Stbd side and Eximius' Port side was stretchy, so when the wind picked up a bit last night the two bows were able to wander apart a few inches and the stretch caused a shriek from the line each time it tightened. Jeff & I were both on deck and we changed it out for a larger non-stretch dock line and ran it through a Chock on Eximius to reduce the load on the cleat.  Worked great, the rest of the night was peaceful.

During breakfast, Peggy & I discussed our plans for the day - not many - I need to work on the club's Newsletter, I have a couple of projects that I could get done. Hope to be able to discuss some details of upcoming club events with the Cruise Committee (they're captive audiences :) ) and send out some emails to family and friends. Peggy is going to get in some practice and I'll do some chin wagging. Later today several other boats are going to arrive. Dalecarlia, Imagine, Cookie Monster, Aireze and a couple are arriving by car. So maybe a bit more chin wagging.

See you on the water. Oh! Today's pics:

Neighbors - Affection and Alebrije 

Looking North. City Docks are on the left (West) side.






Memorial Day Weekend Cruise to West Palm Beach Pt. 1

 HISC Memorial Day Weekend Cruise to West Palm Beach.


After spending Thursday night on Lake Boca tied up with Affection (Jeff's Boat ! ) we pulled anchor at 07:30 in order to get the 07:40 Camino Real Bridge opening while Affection motored out of Boca Inlet, his draft is just 3' ours is nearly 6' and Boca Inlet is too stressful for us.

07:43 we passed Camino Real Bridge and motored the 20 minutes to Hillsboro Blvd Bridge, then it was a long slog of 60 minutes against the current down to the Hillsboro Inlet Bridge, by the time we were ready to pass the bridge, Eximius was pretty well dressed for the Day, Sails & Sheets ready, fenders all inboard, Lines secured, ready to hoist the sails. 

Just as expected, the wind was very light as we navigated carefully out of the inlet and avoided the shallow area on the North side of the Inlet and 'gonna get you' shoals on the South side of the inlet.

We turned to 045ยบ with the intent of trying to reach the Gulf Stream under motor while the wind was so light. We did raise the sails but they pretty much just hung there. By the time we were a mile and a half off of the shore, we were feeling the Stream pushing un north. Engine given a rest and we trimmed the sails. With less than 5 knots of wind, we were barely moving through the water, just 2knots. But the Gulf Stream was dragging us North an additional 4 knots! Expecting the wind to pick up before lunch time, we stayed on course.

Soon the wind picked up to around 7 knots, and our GPS speed was 9.5knots WooHoo! The Sea was very steady and it was an easy sail. The Autopilot managed just fine once we had some speed through the water.

The only issue was that the course that I imported from Fastseas.com had some issues. Last night I had reviewed the route on fastseas.com and switched the Start and Finish over so that we could see what the return trip would be like on Monday. Totally forgot that I had switched the Start an Finished and proceeded to export the route. Once it was on a chip, we imported it on our chartplotter then set the GPS to follow the route. 

Sounds ok, except that I had not remembered the switch over. So initally the chartplotter reported that we would reach our destination by noon. That was great, a bit unrealistic, but great. As we proceeded, the arrival time got later and later.


Duh! 


Once I realized the problem, I simply deleted the route and set a route to arrive at Lake Worth Inlet. 

All of a sudden, our late night arrival was now around 2pm.




By 13:15, the wind had dropped back to less than 5 Knots after spending a hour or so above 8 knots. It also veered to 180ยบ and was no fun. So time to wake up the engine and motor for the next few hours to get to our destination.

We arrived in time to get the 3:15 Flagler Memorial Bridge opening and followed a big barge through the turbid waters at the bridge. Once through, we could see Alebrije and Affection anchored on the East side of the ICW almost directly East of the new Public City Dock. A quick call to Hector and we had an agreed plan to join them in a 3 boat raft up.

Plan was to motor ahead of their anchored location leaving them to Port. Drop our anchor about 100' South of them, dig it in and then back down with the current till we were due west of them both, and finally, Toss a line to them to close the gap and tie up alongside Affection.

We were a bit more than 100' ahead of them when I dropped the anchor. Of  course, it dug in right away. I eased out the 100' of chain and another 80' of 1" rode line. Once we had a line over to Affection, we, the crews of Alebrije and Affection, were able to close the gap, setup a bunch of fenders and take a well earned break.

All of us agreed on a 5:30 happy hour. Peggy & I took a bottle of wine and a bag of Chocolate Pretzels, of course we also took a bottle of Black Magic Rum and our own wine/rum glasses.

It's a beautiful view across the waterway this evening.






Tuesday, May 25, 2021

Routing around the Crunchy bits

 Using Fastseas.com to plan a route Pt II


A buddy asked if fastseas.com routing considered the position of shallow water when planning a route.

Looks like the answer is yes! But check it out for yourselves.

Here's an image of a quick a couple of routes I setup from starting points in the Bahamas.

Obviously, it's important to review the route zoomed in when on the Chart Plotter to make sure the Route is staying clear of the 'Crunchy' bits.



The two routes in Red and Orange were auto calculated by Fastseas.com and were both set to start off shore in the Bahamas.

By importing the route data to our Garmin, we can see that we need to modify the route to suit our preference along the way.

I'm still impressed, will report back after this weekend's trip.

See you on the Water.

Monday, November 16, 2020

Thanksgiving Cruise 2020

Socially Distant Thanksgiving Cruise 2020

Sometimes planning works out, and others it just doesn't! 

Plan: Race with the Hillsboro Inlet Sailing Club's 'Mary Wells Coastal Race' from the start just North of Hillsboro Inlet down to Port Everglades (PE 1 Buoy). Race Start: 11:00. 

We departed the dock 20 minutes late at 8:20am. A couple of hundred yards down the canal, someone had left a line between their power boat and the dock on the opposite side of the canal - preparations for the anticipated arrival of Hurricane (it wasn't) ETA - LAST MONDAY! Argggg! Sorry for all of the expletives, but Come On! It wasn't even that much of a storm, just some high water as far as most of Fort Lauderdale was concerned - OK, so some places had flooding, but it goes with the territory during King Tides, not nice especially if you happen to live where it floods - but not here!  We were delayed by about another 15 minutes while I prepared to cut the line and then Peggy notices that there is a resident sitting on the patio beyond the boat. After a number of quite loud requests that they come and release the line or suffer it's demise by knife, the resident unties the line from the boat and I pull it in then toss it to the opposite shore. The way is clear.

As we left the New River and turned South towards 17th Street Causeway bridge, it was evident that the Spring High Tides were ebbing. At the 17th st. Bridge, the Fender Markers indicated that there was between 52 to 54' clearance close to the fenders. That's plenty for us if we're in the middle. There were several sailboats with much bigger sticks than ours holding position North of the bridge but they had left plenty of room for smaller traffic to pass. So we did. Peggy turned the helm over to me being a little reluctant to test the bridge height.

As we motored under the bridge Peggy noted that there was a very large ship leaving the Port directly ahead of us - we know better than to claim that we had right of way - we didn't - and it was a really big ship. So we just turned to Starboard and let it pass after which we followed it out of the Port. Then the rain came down, really heavy. - Peggy was not so keen on staying the course but I persevered, and we turned North setting a course for the Start North of HI.
With the course laid in, the GPS indicated that we would get there at 6 knots around 12:06--- 12:06 when the race started at 11:00 Grrrrr.

This plan was in the Failed Column.

With no chance of making the start time, I decided that we might as well just head back into Port and see if we could arrive early at The Bahia Mar Marina. 

We motored under 17th Street Causeway bridge, now about 10:30am, the clearance was up to 56' but the bridge was opening for a much larger sailboat outbound.  For some reason, she turned to port which meant that we needed to turn to port also rather than the normal passing Port Side to Port Side, but an early change of direction is the correct thing to do and we passed Starboard to Starboard without incident. Sure was a pretty vessel.

Once past the bridge we slowed down to delay our arrival at Bahia Mar, the confirmed on the radio that we were welcome to arrive early and that a dock hand would be waiting. 

We have docked at the Bahia Mar many times, some were near perfect and others were best forgotten. But one thing we have learned is that if the docking does not work out first try, there's no shame in pulling away and setting up for a 2nd or even 3rd attempt. Better safe than sorry. And the sorry would be if we hit any of the other boats in the marina.

Our first attempt seemed to be perfect, We stopped the boat with the stern about 10' into the slip and past the lines to the dock hands. Then the current took hold of the bow and forced us to pull away in order to keep clear of the other boats. The dock hands passed the lines back - nice, preventing them from getting caught in our prop, that would have been a sorry situation. We maneuvered away from the dock and headed out of the marina in order to turn and try again. The second attempt worked just fine. Accounting for the strong current we easily docked and had the boat tied up in quick order.

While we were getting ourselves sorted out with Shore Power and the extra lines that just makes things feel better, our buddy from Affection stopped by to let us know they were already in their slip. That made two of the club boats were tied up.

I set about cleaning our boat. The recent heavy rains due to ETA and that morning had left the boat a natural green color, it should be white! Out came the Simple Green and the Boat brushes. I was able to get the Port side of the top deck scrubbed down in about 2 hours. Peggy and I had a lunch break of Crackers and Humus and some Salt and Vinegar chips - Comfort food!

Sometime around 12pm ish, Michael and Brenda arrived with their crew of half a dozen or so aboard Imagine. Happy to help, I assisted in taking their lines. Now, with a crew that big, there are enough hands to have every fender and every line manned and a few crew able to sit around doing not a lot, but they do and Michael and Brenda are supervising from the helm.. Whereas, Peggy and I have to work the lines, prep the fenders and navigate the boat alongside. But then, their boat is much bigger than Eximius.

One of the club members had stopped at my house to collect one of the Tables we would need for our social. It was really out of Ethel's way to get the table, but club members tend to go out of their way to make things work. Ethel saved the day. So a big Thank You to Ethel. (Ethel is the Commodore of the Single Sailors Sailing club.) 

The plan was to hold the social on the large hard standing outside of the Captains Quarters, however, there was a really big wedding that occupied all of the area and the dock where the wedding was taking place. So we figured we would hold the social on B-Dock where there were now 3 of our club boats.

While this was going on, the other boats that took part in the Mary Wells Coastal Race were heading home back towards Hillsboro. It had been a really good race day, not too heavy wind and seas were pretty calm.

Gradually, club members started to arrive, socializing began while we were doing our best to keep socially distant. As hosts, we had brought a box of spare face masks, hand sanitizer and a tub of chlorox wipes (still in short supply) Our instructions to the guests were 'Bring your own Beverages, Bring your Own Food, Bring your own Desserts and Bring your own chairs' We really wanted to make this a safe event.

As cruising gifts, I had purchased several of these folding tables, figuring that they would be suitable for carrying on boats. 

They fold up to a neat and easily stowed package.

As the boats arrived, I passed out the gifts. That included one for our Commodore and Rear Commodore. 

With a couple left over I gave them to the members that came to the event by car.




By 17:30, the club members had arrived and setup their foods to share. Now, just a reminder, the instructions were BYOB, BYOF, BYOD and BYO Chair. And if anyone was bringing something to share, then it should be individual servings - not requiring utensils that would be handled by many and not require filling or stuffing - like Tortillas, or Salad bar.  So most, like myself, brought Desserts that were individually wrapped. More on that later.

The co-host  -  Jeff Keiser, had prepared a Thanksgiving Trivia, he had enough questions to match the number of mini-Whiskey bottles that I had left over from previous cruises. Many of the questions were about the Mayflower - I should have known the answers but only got one What is a Tun - It's a Barrel.

Jeff did a great job of entertaining us and helping us get the right answers, well, near enough answers.

We gave out all of the Whiskey.

It was soon time to have the Bake Contest. I had to laugh! I had spoken with Mirsa a week earlier suggesting that she not wrap here Chocolate cake in single use plastic but consider using Parchment paper instead. Well Mirsa went above and beyond. She had found a supply of bio degradable mini tubs to hold the Blueberry Reduction Cream Cheese Frosting and then wrapped each piece of delicious chocolate cake in a piece of Parchment paper secured with a neat piece of bio-degradable garden twine. The packages look terrific which matched the flavours. 

Jeff Keiser brought Bags of home made Cookie to the table - yes, bags each with one cookie. That will bring a smile to anyone that peaked inside of the bags to see what lay within. They were really good.

Bob had brought peeled shrimp on cocktail sticks, very tasty too. 

I had brought individual apple pies (think apple empanadas) but I had - oh the shame - wrapped them individually in sandwich zip lock baggies.   Quite correctly, Mirsa reminded me of our conversation about not using single use plastic. Oh the humility ๐Ÿ˜Ž

Suzi and Moon had not brought anything to share, so they were both selected as impartial judges.

After they had tasted each of the delights, they announced the winners.

4th Shrimp

3rd Bags of Cookie

2nd Chocolate cake with Blueberry Reduction Cream cheese frosting

1st - I'm really not humble about this - YES - My Individual Apple Pies Won 1st place.

There weren't any prizes, but it was fun.


After the bake contest, we had a line toss contest. Several members took a turn at tossing a line. I had a 50' 1/2" double braided line and they had to see who could toss the line the furthest. That was a simulation of passing a line ashore to the dock from your boat. 

1st I showed how the Royal Navy taught me, at age 15, to coil a rope for throwing then gave an example of how to throw the rope. After the demonstration, brazen members came forward to try their hand. Brenda beat everybody before her, the Judy threw and was even with Brenda, but Judy put a lot more energy into tossing the line, so much that Judy almost did a pirouette and landed quite painfully on the hard dock. Sore but still smiling, Judy limped back to her chair aided by Jeff and soon had a large bag of ice to help ease a very painful foot. 

Last to toss the line was Astrid. Astrid casts a longer shadow than Judy and consequently tossed the line at least a foot beyond Judy's attempt. Astrid earned the last bottle of Whiskey, Judy earned a piggy back ride thanks to Jeff, back to their boat for a Ibuprofen and some hubby care time.

After some armchair socializing, the party ended and folks picked up the remains of their foods, their chairs and cruising gifts. Commodore Dale and I discussed this year so far and plans for next year. It's not been an easy year. Normally the major work for the Commodore is done as Vice Commodore in preparation for their Commodore Year, then it pretty much happens like clockwork, but this has not been a normal year for anyone. The Covid Pandemic has clamped down upon many of the club features that we have taken for granted over the years. No raftups, not socials, limited cruising, and social distancing is the rule. Simply put, even if you feel safe in participating in club events, we must all practice healthy behaviour, social distancing, small groups and if you don't feel comfortable attending any of our events, that's just fine, better be safe than sorry. It's not just the senior generation either! Although the youngest of the population are mostly spared, if they get infected and carry the virus to their parents and then onto their senior friends and family, each would be heartbroken if someone were to succumb from the consequences.  So we totally respect the reluctance to participate, but oh we really do miss the love.

Sunday morning, Judy was feeling a bit better, foot wrapped in an Ace Bandage, Jeff & Judy were the first to leave the marina. Imagine's crew headed up the marina's swimming pool. I spent the afternoon scrubbing the other half of Eximus, it was really looking a whole lot better.

Monday morning we sorted out the boat, breakfasted on Cereal and Toast - frosted with some of Mirsa's Blueberry reductioncreame cheese and plenty of hot coffee. With everything tied down and provisions stowed for transport home, we were ready to depart. With perfect timing, Zack from the marina arrived and quickly completed a pump out, that would save us having to worry about using the pump out at Smokers Park.

Peggy did a great job of steering us away from the slip and turned us towards the exit from the Marina at 9:55am. We were along side our dock at 9:55, turned the boat around and unloaded everything we needed to the truck and headed home at 12:15. 

At home we quickly unloaded the truck, sorted through the mail, calmed the cat that had missed us, not really, and had a Yogurt and fruit dessert for lunch. 

Time for a shower!


See you on the water.



Tuesday, September 8, 2020

Labor Day Cruise 2020

 A Great Weekend with the HISC (Hillsboro Inlet Sailing Club)

The initial tally for attendees according to the RSVP's was 4 boats and 14 people, some arriving by car. Not so bad considering we're in the middle of the Pandemic. The final tally was 35 people and 6 boats (one was a dinghy). It looked like everyone brought something to share, the table was quickly covered with everything from chips and dips, tortillas and pulled meat, crackers, cheese, cookies and more cookies. The Ice creams were kept in our freezer until the crowd had made a dent on the table top food supply.

Each club member received a 'thanks for coming' gift: a wine bottle LED lamp kit, they just needed an empty wine bottle to complete the project. Of course there was more Beer than Wine, but after seeing Gettin' Nauti's wine rack, it won't be a problem for everyone.


One of the best parts of these club cruises, is the opportunity to visit the other boats and find out what things that have done to personalize their boat. Rob and Nicole's "Gettin' Nauti" has undergone a lot of projects that make it a one of a kind - I got some great ideas from what they have done.

Rob took the time out to work on his tansom, the newly applied name looks very cool. Suits the crew!




The dockside at the Bahia Mar was alive with club members doing their best to stay socially distant or wearing  a mask. Food, Drinks, Jokes, laughter and even some boat work kept us all engaged for the 3 day weekend.

It took some coaxing to get a few members to accept the mini ice creams, but at least we got a laugh out of them.


Sunday evening, we gathered on the dock astern of Gettin' Nauti for an ad hoc social, it just happened. More stories, more jokes, and more enjoyment of being out and with other club members.

Some people did not get the memo about bringing chairs, but we did ok.


(Notice that Gettin' Nauti's stern is naked in this shot.


A few ventured to the pool, some stayed, it was a bit crowded for others, but at least it was open. 

Monday the 5 boats were still there:- Eximius, Affection, Windpunk, Cookie Monster and Gettin' Nauti. Amanda came by dingy Sunday afternoon. Other's included:- Bob & Pat Schuldenfrei, Ross & Astrid Hunton, Paul & Regina Chasse, Pierre & Ava Holstein, and the Mckisick bunch plus a few more guests.

Cruising points for the club members will be applied for each night they attended. When a club member participates in a club cruising event, they earn a 'cruising point' for their boat, when they have 10 points they earn the year's Cruising Flag.

Member's earn an additional Cruising Point for writing an article for the Inlet Outlet Newsletter and for hosting a cruise.

Member's fly their collection of cruising flags with pride. 


Our next cruise is Octoberfest, that may be a surprise venue.  So stay tuned.

Thursday, June 25, 2020

Father's Day Weekend 2020

Celebrating Father's Day with the HISC

Father's Day fell on Sunday June 21st 2020 (last weekend) right in the middle of the Pandemic which has caused most of us to be in some form of quarantine since the middle of March.

We joined other club members at the Bahia Mar Marina in Fort Lauderdale, there were 6 boats in attendance from the club with a total of about 20+ crew.  The event was held after the Nederlanden Coastal Race from Hillsboro Inlet down to Port Everglades, but we (Eximius) did not race, we just went directly to the Bahia Mar from our Dock an hour away.

The Bahia Mar Crew were happy to see us, their business is picking up as Broward County Opens up, but they are still, correctly, practicing Social Distancing and every staff member that we interacted with were wearing Face Masks, both outside and inside their offices.

The Pool was open, and some of the HISC crew cooled off from the 90ยบ+F  Temperature and commented that it was not too crowded, compared to normally there being probably a hundred folks swimming and dining up there. Peggy & I did not go up to the Pool, we're being a bit more aggressive about maintaining Social Distancing - at least we're trying.

The Celebrations really consisted of the club members sharing Pizza, Fish, Water Melon, Klondike Bars while staying, mostly 6' apart and wearing Face masks when getting any closer. It sure was nice being able to chat and share stories with our friends after being away from club activities for so long. True, we've had Virtual meetings and Happy Hours online, but there's really nothing better than meeting with good people.

We stayed at Bahia Mar Saturday & Sunday, departing on Monday, Affection was there on Friday & Saturday nights, everyone else arrived on Saturday and departed on Sunday. Weather was glorious except for the storms on Friday Evening, the rest of the weekend we barely got wet - well, except for the results of the very high temperatures. Luckily, our AC on the boat worked just fine, we do need to consider a Sun Shade over part of the hull, the underside, in the cabin, gets surprisingly hot.

Sunday morning there was a huge boat parade on the ICW, we saw at least 50 boats dressed up and celebrating Gay Pride, they were certainly having fun. 

We departed Bahia Mar on Monday at about 10:30am just as the tide was reaching slack and had an easy motor up the New River, no crazies around, I guess most folks are getting back to work. A couple of big yachts were heading up river under their own power, in fact we didn't see a single boat under tow, a rarity. 

Because of the time we planned to leave Bahia Mar, we had plenty of time to prep the boat for unloading, it's surprising how much we take on the boat considering how much we keep onboard at all times. But preparing for the unload that way really reduces the time from arrival at the dock to being on the road for the drive home. We called the local Thai Restaurant and ordered take out so that we didn't have to prepare lunch. By 13:40 we were settled in at home eating Thai Chicken Red Curry and Chicken Lo Mein. 

Great weekend with some great people. 

Hope to see them again on the Independence Day.

See you on the water!

Monday, March 16, 2020

St.Patrick's Day Cruise

St. Patrick's Day HISC Cruise 2020


Despite the current pandemic, the St. Patrick's Cruise turned out great!

Here's my review, it covers the details of our short journey to the venue and the return as well as some of the highlights during the stay at Sunrise Bay

We have the process of loading the boat down to an art form. I have a spreadsheet on Google Drive that we use for the daily meal planning. It also has our perishable and non-perishable lists which we use to load coolers / vitals bins.

This trip we didn't have to leave the dock until nearly mid-day, so no need to preload the boat, we just took all that we needed down to the boat on Friday Morning for an 11:30am departure.

The journey down the New River was another day of wonderment! No traffic from the Dock until we got to the Fork, and then it started! There were two sizable motor yachts holding near the Fork for a Cape Ann Towing with a Barge and huge Crane coming from the South Fork. We passed ahead and towards 7th Avenue Bridge, several smaller boats passed us because they could get under the bridge without it opening, others just joined the line.

While waiting for the bridge to open, we heard on VHF that the FEC Railroad bridge was down. That meant that all of the boats, big and small, had to wait upstream from the Railroad bridge! Including the Towed Barge! it quickly packed up, we decided to head back towards 7th Ave Bridge as all of the others were congregating closer to the rail bridge. We cannot hold position very well when there is a current running and a wind coming and going. So we just do a few doughnuts in our corner of the river.

Once the Rail bridge opened, everyone plied their way past it. Of course, Andrew's Avenue Bridge was also slow to open due to road traffic and pedestrians, so now all of that traffic is stuck between Andrew's Ave Bridge and the Rail bridge, it got a bit tricky, but it's almost normal now.

Once past Andrews, 3rd Ave bridge opened and everyone moved forwards. The barge did not have a lot of lateral clearance though that bridge.

Once past 3rd, it was out intent to turn by Smokers Park for a Pump out. We tried to communicate to the vessels close to our stern, on VHF #9, but no response - no big surprise, it seems that most power boat owners don't monitor #9 despite all of the signs along the river to do just that! So I had to resort to shouting to the skipper of the boat that was about to hit us from astern if we slowed and turned. It was only when he was along side of us that he got the message and turned on his radio. Have you ever tried to shout nicely?

We easily docked at Smokers park and completed a pump out in about 25 minutes. Then back out to the river.

The rest of the trip to Sunrise Bay was uneventful, we passed under Sunrise Bridge during the 14:00 opening. Peggy took the helm and turned us into Sunrise Bay. I picked out an anchor spot on the southern side of the bay well eastward of the other boats that were already there. Diversion (Bob & Joyce) were the only HISC boat in the bay.  We anchored, digging in really well, I would not have to worry about dragging this weekend. My new Snubber was quickly deployed and my Anchor Day Signal was hoisted.. Winds were pretty light. 

As it drew near to 5 o-clock somewhere, several other boats arrived. Sully & Loraine aboard Pegasus arrived and rafted up on our Port side, then Peder & Marie aboard Dalecarlia arrived and rafted on our Stbd Side. I dinked Dalecarlia's anchor out and dropped it forward and starboard of Eximius' anchor. Two anchors are better than one, especially when 3 boats are rafted together, and we were expecting one more for the Raft - A big Catamaran. 

During the afternoon, I got a voicemail from Paul on the Catamaran which said they were not coming due to possible exposure to the pandemic earlier that day.

Our club Commodore turned up in his Boston Whaler to chat, he would bring his boat down on Saturday.

We had drinks aboard Eximius and were joined by all those club members that were in the Bay. As always, it was a great time to chat and tell stories.

Dinner was Tuna Salad and Crackers, simple, easy, prepared at home, very little cleanup.

Saturday morning, after a couple of cups of Coffee, we tidied up the boat and started prep for the Party that evening. WindPunk arrived with Commodore Dale and Mirsa, they rafted up along side Dalecarlia Port side too. So now we were 4 boats on two anchors, but they were very well set and despite just a couple of anchor alarms (due to short alarm setting) during the night, we had kept a short arc around our two anchors.

Abu Rayah, Michael Tayah's Catalina 30 arrived and anchored to the north and west of us. Dale dinked over for a chat and to bring Micheal over to the party.

As 4:30pm was the party time, I started heating the Corned Beef and the Smashed Potatoe that we had cooked at home on Thursday. The Beef was heated with it's cooking liquid in a pan on the stove, the potatoes were heated in the oven (a 12.75" x 9" foil pan fits easily) and were ready by 5pm.
Sully had set up a Table on his Pullpit aboard Pegasus, Dale had brought an additional table that I setup on the Bow of Eximius. I setup the serving pans and cutlery holders by using sticky tape to hold them to the table. It worked well. I tied a roll of paper towel to the Anchor Day Signal line above the table. Napkins would just blow away.

At five, I announced that dinner was ready. No body moved! Then I helped myself, and the smell got everyone off of their butts and the food was going quickly. 10lb of uncooked Beef turned into 5.5lb of cooked beef! That's enough for the crew of 6 boats, taking seconds! 5lbs of Smashed Spuds were nearly gone too.

Kokomo and Alebrije arrived and rafted together nearer to the Coral Ridge Yacht Club and dinked over to the Host Boats, I'm not sure if they had any of the Beef and Smash. Next St. Patrick's day cruise we'll cook more beef, the pandemic should be over by then and we would expect more boats to attend.

The 'Game' was 'No Body Knows'. The idea was that members would visit each of the other boats and find out something that nobody knows' about the crew or boat. And then at the Party each of us would ask the rest who knows that (what ever). I started the ball rolling (what's the nautical equivalent?) and asked everyone:- So, one of our club members likes to sunbathe nude on their boat at Maul Lake, nobody knew (except the guilty) but everyone one thought it was them! and they wondered where Maul Lake was located. Bob Tiger gave us the lowdown on Maul Lake - I can see a cruise there in our future (not to see the nude sunbathing!)

We learnt a lot about each of the members, turned out a great game. It would expand greatly with more participants, there's always next year.

Desserts for the Party turned out Brownies, some ingredients included Guinness and Jameson's Whiskey.

Several took a dink ride over to Kokomo, we could hear them playing fiddles, Uke's and having great time. The host boat crews enjoyed a few more drinks and stories and some valuable boat lessons.

I showed Sully how to get route data to display on his Garmin 741xs (same as ours) and he explained how he had a list of his systems including their electrical power draws. That would help in identifying faulty equipment early if the power draw changed. He also explained how he treated his AC system for cleaning by pumping Barnacle Buster into the system and letting it soak for a day or two, rather than circulating the BB through the system for 1/2 hour. I'm updating my spreadsheet of equipment to include the power draw and modifying my AC cleaning process. Thanks Sully!

Sunday morning, lazy rise. Breakfast of Granola and Milk, Coffee, Toast (fried) and Brie (thanks whoever brought that for the Party) and more coffee. We tried the new Creamer from Chobani™ Coffee Creamer because it came in a Screw Top container. Last weekend, we spilt coffee creamer when it laid on it's side, it was a snap top creamer bottle - they leak!

After breakfast we cleaned up the inside of the boat and discussed plans with the others in the raft up. Sully would be the first to leave, they also had the furthest to their dock. WindPunk would be next, they had to get back before mid afternoon. Dalecarlia next, no hurry, we couldn't get back until between Noon:24 or 16:24 due to tide restrictions at our dock. Abu Rayah left after breakfast. Alebrija and Kokomo also left mid morning. Diversion was staying put, we left for the 12:30pm Sunrise bridge opening.

Well, it seems Sunday Noon is not the best time to head down the ICW, at least, not this Sunday!

Boats were piling up in line for the Noon:30 Sunrise Bridge opening, we were near the back with a couple of much bigger boats ahead of us, one coming out from the Marina on the North West side of the Bridge and other coming up astern from us on the ICW - it got crowded pretty quickly and a strong current coming north, that meant that we should all give way to boats coming up the waterway.

Finally the Sunrise Bridge opened and all of the bigger boats, us and those astern of us, let the boats heading North through the bridge. Then we all pushed against the current and headed towards Las Olas Blvd bridge. That was delayed only a minute or so, but the same issue - lots of boats lined up for passage and some coming North. We had to hold back and once passage was clear, we put the pedal down and pushed towards the bridge.

We slowed to let some of the bigger boats, astern of us, pass and then pushed ahead. Our goal was to be back at the dock by 14:00. We decided we had time for a Pump out at Smokers park - Mistake!

As we approached Smokers Park, we got clear of other boats and moved over to the South side of the river as we passed the Tunnel, then tried to come along side, Port Side to. Wasn't going to happen, there was 2 knots of current going around the corner and our back end was easily pushed away from the dock. I took over the helm and fought the current, unsuccessfully. Our Port side crunched the stern, big hunk of steel boat putting a ding just above the rub rail of Eximius, the steel boat wouldn't even know we touched it. Fortunately, an experienced guy was ashore and took our lines to help pull us towards the dock, we rubbed along the very mucky stern lines of the steel boat and have a nice black mark to prove it. Eventually we were secure on the dock close to the pumpout.

The good news is that the damage to Eximius is very minor, about an hour or two to clean up the 4" long area, application of some resin and top coat of gel coat. The rope marks should just buff out, it's just dirt.

Once we had the boat secure, it only took 20 minutes to complete the pumpout, then it was time to get back into the river. That current seemed to have gotten even stronger. I attempted to move the boat astern using the dock lines, it took a huge effort and didn't get far. We added a 3rd line, attached it to the port stern cleat, that made it possible to move the boat in order that we could get out into the river without being moved towards that big piece of steel ahead of us.

The move was successful and we easily got back into the stream, we called 3rd Ave bridge for an opening and just as we passed it, we heard on the VHF that Andrews Ave Bridge was unable to open due to a malfunction - this is not good! 4:24pm is our cut off for getting back into the canal where our dock is located.

With the news that it would be 10 minutes before a tech would be on site to fix the bridge, we hung around the area between the bridges with a 2 knot current flowing upstream - our direction. Not easy, especially when the Riverfront Cruise boat and many smaller boats are all in the same boat if you get what I mean. When the Bridge tender informed us via VHF that it would be longer, I decided we should go along side and tie up. We turned, moved over to Port and easily docked along side. There were pilings and cleats, I put out fenders and had lines ready. Peggy at the helm and we made a perfect docking. Of course, there was nobody around to applaud, unlike the small crowd of pedestrians that were on the opposite side of the river when I was struggling to move the boat aft at Smokers Park! Ain't always that way!

We ended up being tied up for nearly an hour when finally the Andrews Ave Brige tender announced that the bridge was going up. He cleared us for passage, we were ready, within a minute we had loosed the lines and were pulling off the dock to turn around towards Andrews, we could see it was open - Then the FEC Rail bridge informed everyone that that bridge would be down for the passage of two more trains. So now, all of those boats that we held up because the FEC bridge and Andrews, it got really crowded. There were no dock positions we could occupy, so we did about 10 long doughnuts between the two bridges, along with about 20 other boats. The power boats do not get moved around by the current or wind as much as a sail boat with a 5' 7" keel and a big mast up top. We could not stay in one place, so doughnuts were the only solution. Fortunately, Eximius almost turns on a dime, certainly within 40'

While we ran circles around the other boats between the bridges, boats were lining up on the up-stream side of the rail bridge, lots of them. The bridge clearance is only a couple of inches when it's down, so every boat and their dog were waiting.

Of course, the smaller boats don't have a clew! When the bridge opened, they decided they would get through first, meanwhile the bigger boats are dealing with a strong current. The current flow had started to shift, so now the downstream boats should pass through first. Those small boats are ignorant of the protocol and headed towards the bridge from both sides. That caused a problem as the bigger boats were trying to line up to pass the bridge and the smaller boats were going for the middle of a pretty narrow opening. We have a 50'+ mast, so we cannot go too close to the hinge side of the bridge. Passing was a very fraught situation. I was very happy when we passed that bridge - most of the other boats headed into the dock area for the Pirate Republic restaurant on the South West Side of the bridge.

The rest of the trip to the dock was easy - Phew! We got back just after 4pm, enough water under the keel at the entrance to our canal, life was good.

We left the boat facing West so that I could go back to the boat Wednesday to start fixing the ding.
Unloading the boat took about a half hour and we were on our way home.
HISC - Cruising 2020 Flag
We have 3 points towards our 10

The trip to and from the Bay was 'interesting' but well worth it to be part of a great club cruise.

See you on the water.

Paul






Friday, February 14, 2020

HISC - Chili Cookoff 2020

Hillsboro Inlet Sailing Club - Chili Cookoff 2020

We headed up to Lake Boca for the Chili Cookoff February 8th.

By Saturday morning we had loaded the boat except for the last few items (Coffee Pot which we use at home and Electronics - camera etc which we don't leave on the boat.

Easy transit from the Dock to SandBar Park, then I setup the Action camera and took this Video.

Hope you enjoy it. Let me know.


Part II will come later.

The Chili cookoff was a great event, plenty of chili, Margaritas and friendly conversations with some great club members.

See you for part II later.

Paul 

Thursday, April 25, 2019

Going Eastward - Crossing the Gulf to the Bahamas

Crossing the Gulf Stream from Port Everglades to West End


After all of the preparation, we actually left the dock around 18:30 on March 31st  2019 for our crossing the Gulf Stream from Port Everglades to West End Bahamas.

We expected the trip to take about 12-13 hours, and considered stopping for a few hours at Lake Sylvia, but re-considered with the prospect of a potential work out anchoring and hoisting the anchor within a few hours and then having to manage the boat for the 12+ hours transit to the Bahamas.

West End Customs and Immigration open at 9am, as does the Old Bahama Bay Marina. We expected to arrive early and anchor just to the North of West end or tie up at the Fuel Dock until the Marina Opened. Well, that didn't quite workout! The trip took 15 hours! (dock to West End). Our route planning was ok, but we strayed off the planned course by 6 miles as you can see in the dip in the track just over half way across. Lesson learnt there! Keep an eye on the Distance Off Course. 

Also of note is the pretty large drift North (as expected) where we hit the Gulf Stream. Most of the drift was in the 1st 1/3rd of the transit. We pretty much kept on our Course of 89ยบm until around 03:40 when we realized we were off track by 6nm yet probably out of the major influence of the Gulf Stream's Northward flow. At that point we changed course to 65ยบm. Looking at the track shows that we still did have some Northward drift as our track is more like 45ยบm.

We put the sails up when clear of the Port and comfortable about the sea state which was 1'-2' - nice!
By 23:00 the wind died down to about 5knots so we motor sailed from that point on. Despite my urging for Peggy to take a break, she was awake most of the trip even when off watch. Not me! I slept but awoke at the slightest call from Peggy at the helm.

The trip was pretty uneventful, not a lot of AIS traffic, slight cloud cover, an easy passage.

Moonrise April 1st 2019
Around 05:00 we could see a few boats in the distance, their lights showing under the broken cloud cover to the East. Then we saw MoonRise! Our first ever Moonrise on the ocean. It looked like an Alien ship coming down through the clouds. Sorry for the meager image, the Camera was just not up to catching the moment, but it was a image we will always remember. Just Beautiful!

With our Quarantine flag flying on the Stbd Speader, we arrived at the entrance to West End around 08:50, and found the channel easily in the daylight. We hailed the Marina on #16 and switched down to #12, confirmed our slip. There's a small lagoon between the inlet channel and the Marina, so we slowed while they dispatched  guy to help us tie up. Peggy did great at the helm and we easily tied up without incident. As we were tying up, another Catalina 34 was at the Fuel dock and tied up in the next slip as I was getting ready to head over to the Customs & Immigration office to check in to the Bahamas.

Checking in was easy, the efficient and cheery team quickly helped me complete the forms. I had done most of them on the boat, but was a little uncertain about some of the entries. I paid the $150 fee and they gave me the Receipt, Fishing Permit and Temporary Cruising permit. 

They very specifically asked about which items we had on the boat, ie. Bicycles, Kayaks, Paddle Boards, Dinghies, Out Board motors, etc. I was a bit surprised when they asked, and we had none of the items they mentioned. I wondered about it afterwards. Was it because those items are potential targets for theft - or - would they check to see what we checked in with if the Bahamian Defense Force ever stopped us on the water to see if we had more than we checked in with? Just a thought.

Customs asked about which stores we had brought in with us. I had a spreadsheet listing everything, but all they wanted to know was the types, eg. Wine, Beer, Food, Water, Drinks. So I expanded my list on the Form from 'Ships Stores' to Wine, Beer, Food, Water, Drinks.

At the end of the jetty where the Customs and Immigration office is located, is the Old Bahama Bay Marina Office. Caviar was bright and cheerful and quickly completed our registration. We were booked in for just one night, but the weather over the next couple of days was forecast to be rugly, so we bit the bullet and for two days with the option to stay an extra day if weather prediction was correct. The two nights cost $304 including a 5% discount, probably because the Marina only reopened on Saturday (3/30) The daily fee included a $15 Mandatory Water service fee - it's not metered - and the Electric fee, I think it was $23.80. 

Once cleared through Customs and Immigration as well as the OBBM registration, I returned to the boat and pulled down the Quarantine Flag and hoisted the Bahamian Courtesy Flag which stayed up until we were close to Lake Worth on our return.

We were tired from the trip, but our neighbors, the C34, were up and about and so I did the right thing and requested to come aboard with a bottle of Rum in my hand. I wish I had gotten a Boat Card from 'Bob' the skipper, Ricky & Phil were crew and they were doing some extensive cruising from their home port near Pensacola. Bob has made some very nice mods to his C34 Mk. 1.5 including a really nice Bimini & Dodger. They were headed out to dinner and I had hoped to take some pics in the morning, Sadly, they left the dock before dawn strayed into my eyes after a really good nights sleep.

I hope to be able to get in contact with 'Bob'. He also had a significant upgrade in his electrical system. Most obvious from the outside, besides the Dodger & Bimini, he had installed some really good Tank Rails on the lifeline stanchions on both sides of the boat. He also only used the tall slim tanks rather than the short and stubby cans easily available in Auto Stores for the Diesel. So they (the tanks and the tank rails) are both on my 'To Do' list.

Before getting turned in for the night, I started my written blog notes. There's no way I could recall most of what we experienced, so those notes are important, to me at least!



Next - Old Bahama Bay - And what did we forget?





Tuesday, April 23, 2019

Bahamas 2019 - My Navy

Heading to the Bahamas

The Beach at Old Bahama Bay Resort - Bahamas 2019
We had been planning our trip to the Abacos Bahamas ever since we purchased 'Eximius' from the Previous owner that hat cruised that area many times. I saw it as an opportunity to put all of the work over the past 3 years to good use, as well as some enjoyable sailing.

As this is our first 'big' boat - although we had pushed the limits with our previous Catalina 250 Water Ballast 'Joint Decision' or 'JD', we have had to, and enjoyed the learning of new systems and different sailing techniques. The past three years has included our retirement which gave us the opportunity for longer sailing trips. Our 2019 Bahamas Cruise set out with a Twenty One Day time frame, simply because Peggy did not want to be in my 'Navy'.

The planning began with reading as much as we could about the options for cruising the Bahamas and whittling them down to a realistic 21 day out and back cruise.

Step One: Where?

We selected the Abacos - there's lots of places to stop, Marinas, Moorings, Anchorages and each has it's own Bahamian Charm. Realistically, we could make it to Hope Town, and either turn back towards Florida or from Hope Town continue South across the Tongue of the Ocean and head Westward to the Berry's, Bimini and then back to Florida.

With only 21 days, the trip to the Berry's would demand no delays and pushing on in order to make a deadline - not a good option when trying to enjoy the trip. So we ditched that idea. Then we added a simple idiom to reduce any stress about making it to some distant location: If we like some place, then we might stay a day or two, and if that means we don't go as far towards Hope Town, that's just fine. Someone in our sailing club, of whom I have the greatest respect when it comes to sailing, has told me on more than one occasion: "When we are cruising, we don't have any plans, we're Cruising!"

Step Two: When?

Deciding when to go is not that easy. Asking any experienced cruiser is not particularly helpful. Someone that has done the same trip multiple times will have stories of how great it was one year and how awful it was another even during the same season. Rolling the dice, we picked Late March and Early - Late April. It really does seem to be down to luck.

Step Three: Preparation

What did we need to do to prep the boat for a three week trip, how about taking care of the house while we're away, what would the trip cost and a multitude of other things. We decided to just do it!

Anyone that knows me, knows that I'm far from OCD, but during my 25 year Navy Career, I did learn the value of a good List, if you make them and use them!

I started by making a spreadsheet on Google Sheets in the cloud listing everything I thought of for the trip: Provisions, Equipment, Supplies, Spares, House Prep, Communication Information.

Peggy took on the House Prep: She setup auto payments for all of our anticipated bills during our trip and figured how we would finance the cruise. Despite me being the one that does the cooking, Peggy also took on the Provisioning part of the list. In the weeks leading up to our departure, we cooked extra meals and used our Freeze-a-Meal kit to vacuum pack them and freeze them. We even shaped them so that they would fit efficiently in our boat's freezer.

We included things in the House Prep list such as having someone check on the house regularly, that was easy, our Son In Law is a Police Officer and drives past our house on his way to work, plus our neighbors are a very close bunch and we watch out for each other all the time. 

For years I've known about the value of a Ships Log but never had one. Also, in the past we have always given a float plan to our family so that they know where and when we're going and when we should check in. Wouldn't it be great of the two things - Ships Log and Float plan were combined. Among other things, it would reduce the need to keep re-entering the same info.

I asked my FB friends what they used for their log book and received an Excel spreadsheet, suggestions for various Brand log books. I also spent hours following Goggle clues. In the end I decided to design my own. I've posted about that design here.

As a result of this trip, I'll be making several changes to the log book design.

Once we had a date and a list (ok, many lists) of things to do in prep for the trip, we worked  a bit each day to get our act together. The plan was to be ready by March 22nd and to leave on the first good weather window on or after that date.

A group of other club members left for the Abacos on the 25th but we held out for better weather. We finally loaded the perishable foods and our clothing on March 30th for a 6pm departure from the dock in Fort Lauderdale.

Next: Crossing the Gulf

See you on the Water.



Wednesday, January 30, 2019

Pre New Years Eve Cruise

This year's New Year's Eve Cruise is at Lake Boca

Because of the tide times, we decided to spend the night at Lake Sylvia after an easy motor from the Dock.

The following morning, we left the lake early, it was low tide and we nudged the bottom despite hugging the East side of the canal. As we headed out of the lake, there was a Forty something sailboat listing heavily, they had an 8' draft and were way to close to the canal center line even at high tide. They acknowledged that they had about a 5 hour wait. Hope they got off easily without any damage.

We motored up the ICW, making all of the bridges, we did cut it too close to the inside bend before the Hillsboro Inlet Bridge and came to a smooth, sandy bottom, stop. It was a none event, we had turned towards the deeper part and easily motored off. Gotta pay attention

Diversion was already at Lake Boca when we arrived, not many other boats, so we had the pic of anchoring spots. We backed down hard knowing the weather might kickup over the weekend.

As the afternoon wore on, more of the club boats arrived and we prepared for the Champagne Party that evening aboard Into the Blue and Chesshire.

We took a dish of appetizers made at the last minute from what we had onboard. Cocktail sticks, Cheese, Grapes, Slice of Ham on  a piece of Cucumber. Worked out great, they disappeared.

We took a dink ride over to the park and Peggy practiced her Dinghy exit plan - success, her workouts are having a very positive effect, we even went for a 20 minute walk to the bridge and around the park. We also dumped our trash. There's Water at the park if we had water containers to fill.

Sunday We had the chance to chat with Halabaloo and some friends of  Jeff Miskin's but everyone else abandoned the lake by Sunday afternoon. By Monday we were one of the few boats left on the lake despite it being New Year's Eve and the promise of a great fireworks display close to the lake.

So we left the lake Monday morning and took the inside route back to the slip. We were home with time to prep dinner of Crab Cakes (Thanks Shawn!)


A fun weekend, even if we didn't get to sail. But I'd rather be on the boat under motor than mowing the lawn!

Looking forward to getting out there, hope to see you on the water.

Next Club trip is the Chili Cookoff on Feb 9th.

Meanwhile, we're still prepping for our trip to the Abacos in March/April.
Shopping list includes:
  • AIS Transponder (replacing our AIS recever)
  • New Fishing Gear: Rod, Gaff, Lures, Fillet Knife.
  • New Cabin lighting to replace those that have failed in the past few months. (Galley lamp, Reading lamp, Aft Berth lamp).
  • Holding tank Beckson access plate (I know, never want to use it but need to clean the tank)
  • Add rail tubes Port and Stbd sides for Fuel & Water tanks.
  • Purchase 4 x 6 Gallon Water tanks
  • Make Covers for new Water tanks and remaining Fuel Tanks.
  • Top up Propane tanks (1 is already full)
  • Clear up the Tool storage area to enable Non-perishable food storage.
  • Gearbox Oil Change
  • Clean out Water tanks & replace all water filters (3 on the boat 1 on the boat refill assembly)
  • A few other things that might get done - crack the list above first.
Sailing - It's fun even when it's just time preparing.

See you on the water.

Tuesday, October 23, 2018

HISC Sailing Social 2018

Each year the HISC holds a Sailing Social, basically a bunch of members go out on their boats following a 'leader' and navigate in ever decreasing circles - ie. going nowhere.
But every boat has at least one person with a camera that takes pics of all the other boats, then we share them after the weekend.

For us, the weekend meant we had to leave the dock Friday at 5:30pm in order to miss the bridge lockdowns and get past the shallow end of our canal before low tide. So we spent the night at Lake Sylvia. We had Sausage and Veggies for dinner, we didn't run the generator, thinking that the cool breeze would last all night. It didn't!

Saturday morning, we pulled anchor, left the lake and headed out to the Ocean via the Port Everglades channel, it was a beautiful day for sailing! We headed casually North East to the 3 mile limit for a pump out, then turned towards Hillsboro Inlet's outer marker (the HI Buoy) to meet up with the other members, I think most of them came out of the Hillsboro Inlet.

Here's some pics.


After the 5pm end of the Sailing Social, we sailed towards the HI Buoy then into wind, dropped our sails and motored into the Inlet for the 5:15pm bridge opening then headed North up the ICW

We arrived at the Hillsboro Blvd Bridge just in time for an opening and then motored up to the Camino Real Bridge, but that bridge is being rebuilt and right now, it's open with both leaves of the Bascule Bridge up, so we were able to just motor through.

We met up with Paul & Leanne McKissick in Lake Boca and could smell their dinner cooking in the BarBQue on the back of Margarita.

That night we ran the Generator until 1am, I could have let it run as it ran out of gas 20 minutes after restarting it in the morning to charge batteries.

By 10 am we were heading down the ICW towards the Hillsboro Inlet, saying bye to Paul & Leanne although I don't know if they heard us.

Out on the Ocean it was another gorgeous day on the water, ideal for sailing. We had a great reach all the way down to Port Everglades, sails down, motor in and back to Lake Sylvia where we just hung out until 5:30pm. Hauling the anchor we took an easy motor up the New River, back to our slip and the quickest unload ever, thanks to taking the time while sitting in Lake Sylvia to unload the Fridge/Freezer, bedding, and all the usual stuff we bring home, including the broken flag pole for repair.

Awesome sailing weekend, we'll definitely be doing that again in 2019.

See you on the water.

Octoberfest 2018

Ok, let's make this one quick.

The HISC's Octoberfest was held on Sunrise Bay, just North of Sunrise Blvd Bridge on the West side of the Intracoastal Water Way. (ICW)
We had at least 15 boats attend and several more club members arrived by water taxi (Dink Rides), some of us arrived Friday (extra Cruising Point) but most arrived Saturday in time for the EXCELLENT cruise dinner of Brats, Red Cabbage and Roasted Potatoes followed by some awesome deserts and, of course, beers for the sailors.

Hosts were Intermission, Imagine and Wind Punk. 
On the bay that night were: 
Eximius, Diversion, Intermission, Wind Punk, Cheshire, Alebjie, Dalcarlia, Affection, Pegasus, Imagine, Lady Gray, Fandango, Haven (Cookie Monster - Eduardo's new boat), Po Poki II and Duet

Many of the club cruises include a 'best dressed' competition, resulting in prize for the best Gals Costume, Best Guys and Best Couples costumes.

Here's the winner:

Costume from Amazon, Hair by Peggy, Dinner by Cheryl, Fun by HISC.

See you on the Water.