Month: February 2016

One of the things that we sorely missed while in Ft. Lauderdale was walking. The neighborhood there was not conducive to walks. Most of the homes in the area had steel bars over the Windows. The walking has been my main source of exercise since I have retired. The walking was a great help when I first stopped smoking the first of January. (I am still not smoking. The urges to twist off the heads of chickens has greatly subsided….I only occasionally want to kick them now…)

Today we venture out to see the downtown area of Delray Beach……the main strip is Atlantic Ave. the eastern end is the municipal beach. The west end is the commuter rail station. The town has a free trolley service that runs back and forth all day.

The weather was sunny and warm and we walk about a mile north of the Marina to Atlantic Ave. Specialty shops, restaurants, bars. We stroll the street looking for the trolley but find an interesting restaurant and sidewalk bar and order a bottle of the house Pinot Noir.

Susan meets a couple from New York here on holiday, Cindy and Dave, with them was JoAnn from Florida…..the bottle of wine disappears and we have new friends. I also got to taste an Old Fashion made with moonshine……it was way to early for that.

Got back to the boat, ate a sandwich, and floated in the pool all afternoon. Busy day.

Here are a couple pics of how tight this Marina is…..evidently our entrance the other day got a lot of reviews….it seems that most folks just back into marina…..not pull straight in, spin it, and back it into a slip….we have received several complements on our boat handling skills…they had no idea how much I sweated through the maneuver.

Ed and Miriam Inde came over for dinner last night and to celebrate Valentine’s Day and our wedding anniversaries. I made painkillers. Mostly sunny and I went to the pool (it is a heated pool) Susan and Miriam watched us in the pool….

Had a great dinner and Susan and I watched a few episodes of Greys Anatomy on Netflix…..

I have neglected the blog. The last two weeks have been frustrating and long and I have not felt like blogging. I am sorry.

Today we are in a better place in our journey. I will not go into detail now about the last two weeks, but sufficient to say we have had challenges. I will discuss these later.

Today we have left Ft. Lauderdale and the South Branch of the New River for the Delray Beach area. We are at the Delray Harbour Club Marina and will be here  for about a month and then we’ll spend a month in Stock Island in the Keys. Then we plan to cross to the Bahamas…….. We will relax and enjoy the time in warm weather. Almost like a vacation.

The trip this morning started about 7:00. Checking weather, engines, fluids, charts, etc. Susan and I pulled away from the dock just before 9:00am. The South Branch of the New River is extremely narrow and winds sharply. The banks of the branch are lined with boats and docks and at times are 50 feet wide at the most. Susan took some pics and I will post them later…..

After about an hour we made our way back to the Intercoastal and started north to Delray Beach. We had to clear 15 bridges today. We lost a lot of time waiting for bridges to open, in fact one was closed from 10:00 to 2:00 today for a parade or something….it was great to get back on the water again.

The Marina at Delray is tight. U shape docks with one way in and one way out. I had to drive into the mess and then back in to a slip. My palms were wet with sweat…..but we did it. There’s a pool, wifi, shopping and eaterys within walking distance….I’m going to the pool tomorrow and sleep…

Back on the water again, feeling good.

Two weeks ago, after we got the dingy engine started and running, fixed the steering we took it out to see how it worked. Water was coming into the dingy between the tubes and the hard bottom. Through investigation we determine the the glue holding the tubes in place is failing. The dingy is 20 years old. The tubes are a PVC material which has a limited life exposed to sunlight. That life is about 10 years. The bottom line is the 20 year old tubes are falling apart….and the worst part is that replacement tubes won’t be here until late April or early May. Island hopping requires a working dingy. We will anchor out each night, but will need a dingy to get ashore….

I take the old tubes in to the Zodiac dealer to see if they are salvageable short term. They are, will cost as much to fix as the replacement tubes and take two to three weeks to get fixed……sole searching time.

What are we doing… We left Virginia in a hurry. Not because everything was “fixed” but major stuff was done, we could work on things during the trip south, and we couldn’t get caught in freezing weather without risking frost damage to the boats systems that had already been replaced. We had been traveling three weeks and spent another three week in Ft. Lauderdale having things fixed and replaced, but we still had a long list of things we needed to do before we can charter this boat. Florida is the best place to get things done. We need to stay and get ready.

Brother Doug, Ida and her sister Ju (sp?) stop in for a visit today. Was glad he got to see the boat. Look forward to seeing him in Puerto Rico when we pass through.

The heads in the boat were installed in the late 90’s. They are all identical (thank goodness), full size, fresh water units. Before we left Virginia I had 2 of the 4 operating marginally. The plan was to overhaul the units once we got to warm weather. And here we are….I had found the Raritan Engineering warehouse on one of my outings in Fort Lauderdale and pick-up 3 service kits for the heads…all I have to do is take the heads apart one at a time, check the pieces and parts, replace worn items and put it back together.

I didn’t mention how discusting taking these things apart is….they stink and your touching things that have been covered in other people’s waste. Glove time.

One related issue was a y-valve that was frozen in place. The waste plumbing at each head will drain directly into the holding tank or overboard. In the islands there are no pump out facilities. It is requested that you use your holding tank when anchored in the harbors. Outside of the harbors, you pump your waste overboard.

I removed the valve, lubricated the ball and shaft and used a hair dryer to heat the valve. After an hour or so the valve became workable and it was reinstalled.