August 25 to September 10 Getting Ready to Cruise

Well the Labor Day weekend was spent in the Berkshires, welcoming Liannes new puppy, Finn,  who I call "two pounds of cute fluff"

and visiting her new grandson, Jude.

Ilene climbed with me to the top of Monument Mountain, just north of Great Barrington so we know that her recovery from the removal of the tumor from her lung is making great progress. And I spent at least a day trying to get her medical insurance restored after a foul up of monumental proportions. But this is a sailing blog so lets get to it.

Well actually I did more working on the boat than sailing during this period: 24 hours of work spread over five days, two of them with helpers: Peter, who sailed with me from Virginia to Tortola in November 2010, at the outset of this blog, and our nephew Mendy, who washed the black streaks from the freeboard with salt water while

standing in the dink, and got a sunburn  (and my gratitude and a steak dinner) for his efforts. This working time compared to only 11 hours underway on four days. Such a sailing ratio, once per four days, is below average, but an unfortunate necessity when preparing to go cruising

We got the dink fully inflated after obtaining its parts and accessories from several places, and got it hoisted and secured to its davit bar after Mendys work. I did a lot more sanding and varnishing of the teak cockpit table, the 13 new brass switch plates and the 21 old brass trim rings for the overhead lights after the green corrosion was sanded off. The single biggest task involved the handles used to protect against accidental turning on of the cabin sole lights by brushing against that switch at the companionway, for which new holes had to be drilled.

Another major project was the installation of a "T" valve to be able to divert fresh water from the water maker to the starboard water tank. Peter helped me on this which required removal of the cabin sole to run the pencil thin low pressure black hose from port to starboard, tie it to larger hoses with wire wraps, figure out how the valve worked and attach it to a much bigger and more solid hose so it wont bounce around, and removal of  the aluminum viewing port from the top of the starboard water tank, drilling holes in it, and using blue liquid gasket material to seal the fitting to it and it back onto the tank. Peter also winched me to the top of the mast to inspect and adjust the genoa halyard and this time I got in a photo op of the Club from about 62 feet above sea level, but at low tide.
I also refilled the propane tank and re-installed it in its newly waterproofed locker and took the life raft off the boat to Westmarine to be sent to the repacking company which should be done every three years -- but we have "used" it for four. And while in such a mindset I checked out the inflatable life vests. Ive learned his should be done annually but had never done this before! A decade! The CO2 cartridges are corroded beyond repair and one needs to be replaced. But even worse, the other vest, when inflated by blowing through the tube, failed to hold air -- it was down to 1/3 of its air after an hour. So a new one has been ordered plus a two million candlepower flashlight for finding ones mooring at night.

Getting the dink hung aft and the propane filled really reminded me that cruising is right around the corner.

Oh yeah, some sailing days were fun too.
First with Lene, Cynthia, who sailed with us earlier this summer and has moved to Israel, and Rhonda,

a friend of Lenes since third grade, shown here at dinner at the Black Whale after sailing. The three ladies chatted the entire time, moving gracefully out of my way from time to time as needed for my sail handling. In modest winds we hit a tide assisted 8.1 knots under main and small jib enroute to the far side of Manhasset Bay.
Next, Lene came with me and Peter, who later spent a day working with me and Debbie,

our Rabbi, during which we got to Matinecock and back, with Peter at the helm most of the way.










The excitement on this trip was a "hat overboard" drill during which we successfully retrieved Peters expensive Tilley hat. This picture was taken before it went swimming.

The ever lovely Lene on the leeward side, with Debbie and Peter

I also sailed for a couple of hours aboard Bennetts Beneteau, to Great Neck on the east side of Stepping Stones, and back, in about four knots of wind. Upon returning I joined Morty and Clara, Mike and Sandy and Richie and his friend Charley, a survivor of the attack on Pearl Harbor, for refreshments aboard "Easy Living." The Wednesday afternoon ritual.
Finally, on one of the work days, after completion of the chores, Rhoda came out and we had the best sailing, due to stronger winds from just a bit east of south. After close reaching it out of Eastchester Bay on port tack, we got on starboard and made it to green can "1", NE of Stepping Stones before returning via Hart Island Sound.

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December 10 St Augustine to Daytona Beach 45 Miles

The storm surge having receded from the day before, we got underway at 6:30a.m. motoring the inside passage starting shortly after low tide. We held our breath a few times passing under 65 foot bridges as the tide rose during the day. There were about ten bridges in all but the low ones all opened on request, causing no delays. It began cold but clear and the winds were light. Bundled up, we were warm enough. The ICW here was mostly southerly and deep and wide enough to not be a cause of worry. With the winds mostly easterly, we were able to fly the small jib and later I was emboldened to fly the genoa, which gave us half a knot.

We arrived at the Halifax River Yacht Club  at two. What a club it is. View with Lene from ILENE.

It is easily approached directly from the ICW through a straight, well- marked channel -- a 90 degree right turn west from the ICW just after passing a particular low bridge. You can see the day markers to the sides of ILENEs forestays and part of the bridge to the left.

 The Club is a mile from the beach, using that bridge to cross the ICW.
First built on this site in 1898, it was recently rebuilt. The dockmaster, Peter, formerly a teacher, after directing us to our dock and helping us with our lines and electric cord and brewing a pot of coffee for us, gave us a thorough tour of the place, of which he is justly proud. Im a big booster of the Harlem and could have done no better by the HYC than Peter did for the HRYC. He stubbornly refused our proffered tip. The tides are normally less than a foot here so the docks are fixed, not floating. HRYC has a large and elegant clubhouse and a large membership.  Some of the boats here have been extensively done up in Christmas lights.

The restaurant had only its Tiki menu due to a membership meeting our night there so Peter pointed out several restaurants in easy walking distance, of which we chose McKs Irish Pub. He also pointed out the Clubs health club. He offered to take us to stores in his car and a free bag of ice cubes. The showers are clean and offer a copious flow of hot water. This club has many more members than it has room for boats in its marina. It has three hotel quality meeting rooms and had three outside organizations booked for meetings the day we were there. It has three full time office staff. It offers a free nights dockage for members of any other YC that is part of a council of 30 clubs in Florida. As members of the Harlem we paid only $1.25 per foot. It has an active ocean racing program and a youth program.
The only drawback in my view is that in order to actually sail one has to go fourteen miles south in the narrow ICW and then through the somewhat tricky Ponce de Leon Inlet near New Smyrna to the sea with freedom to select the course you wish. Figuring at least five hours for going out and coming back in, this leaves few hours for a day of sailing.
In the morning we declined the free coffee but Peter took me to the sea for a walk there and I walked back and then took Lene to the Supermarket, waited for her and brought her back.
The beach is quite long and clean. Paddle boarders and surfers were out in wetsuits and the paddleboarders surfed the big waves. I noticed the communities of various species of sea birds standing on the beach, common gulls, those with long orange beaks, with the same beaks but black tipped and sandpipers, all in what appeared to be harmony. I talked with the fishermen on the pier built out into the sea. On my way back, taking the closest street paralleling the beach, I saw the usual suspects: tattoo parlors, salt water taffy, piercing shops, head shops, pizza parlors, fried fish joints surfing shops and those selling towels and tee shirts for women with sexually suggestive double entendres blazoned on the front.
On my way back, from the low bridge next to the Club I shot a view to the north of two high bridges with a low one in between them, under which we had passed.

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March 5 10 Six Lay Days in Fort Lauderdale Zero Miles

Dinner at the Downtowner, across the river, under the Andrews Avenue Bridge, outdoors, ten feet from the River, after dark, with great atmosphere, twice. Here from the other side of the river, by day.

Once, just the two of us, and the second time with Craig and Kathy. Their 45 Amel Santorin ketch, "Sangaris", is now back in Florida after they have spent the last fifteen years living aboard, as far away as the Galapagos in the Pacific, and throughout the western Med. Craig is a Past Commodore of the Harlem, now an honorary member. They have more miles under their keel than all the rest of us Harlemites put together. I was pleased to tell him that ILENE is the second most sailed boat in the Club. I raced a few times with Craig and Kathy on their old boat "C-Jack" and learned a lot about how to do this thing. Yelling never helps when things go wrong, as they invariably will. Quick, calm instructions on how to fix the problem is what is needed. We enjoyed some wine etc. aboard before the Downtowner.

We also enjoyed mango-sweet potato pancakes with Lenes HS classmate, Elissa and her husband Len, This was the advance guard of Lenes Lincoln HS class of 67 reunion in Boca Raton next week.

Since we left New York I have been meaning to shorten the length of the strap at the tack of the Genoa, to pull that sail down

about an inch in order to be able to stretch out its luff (front edge) more fully. I think that the sail has simply gotten stretched out a bit during the many years of heavy use so that unless I lowered the bottom, the top would get stuck and interfere with furling. I took advantage of access to the tack of the sail from the dock on a windless morning to do this job, doubling the bottom of the strap back upon itself to create a new loop to shorten it. It was too difficult to force the needle through the tough doubled multi-layered strap, even with the palm. So I used fewer stitches than I had planned and other methods to attempt to achieve this job. Time will tell whether the sewing will be strong enough.

We contacted canvas shops to try to get what Lene has sought since those cold days on the way south -- a cockpit, fully enclosed by clear plastic, which will warm up without the cold wind blowing freely through it. The boat came with five panels of mosquito screening to keep out the prevalent pests in the hot summery months in the Chesapeake, where the original owner kept this boat, then called "La Vie." I put these panels up once, on a rainy day, about eight years ago. So I knew they fit. But they did not keep the rain out, nor the wind. The plan is to use the existing Sunbrella canvas "frames" or "hems" around the outside of the panels, but cut out the screen material and sew in sheets of clear strong plastic. I put the panels up and took measurements and photographs. We sent what we have back to Doyle Sails on City Island who will do the work and send them back to us. Best price plus friendly knowledgeable local work at home.

"La Vie" is a lovely name for a boat, by the way, "The Life". But it was not as good for us as ILENE. It is said to be bad luck to change a boats name, but I have changed the name of each of the three boats I have had. The Pearson 28 went from "Y Knot" to "Just Cause".  The Tartan 34 went from "Alsterwasser" (the favorite beer of the late husband from whose widow we bought her) to "ILENE", as did "La Vie."

Carlos walked the dock, gave me his card and offered to clean and wax the exterior of the boat including the stainless, from the waterline up.  Cleaning is work that I can do, though in hindsight, not as well as Clarence. And though I can do it, I seem to not get around to doing it and  I have never gotten ILENE as clean and shining bright white as Carlos has. She had not been done since last spring. Carlos worked, with power polishers,  the better part of three days, and the money was well spent.

I learned a lot at the New River Hotel, now the history museum, located in the former small modest cinder block hotel beside the former Florida East Coast Railroad depot. The FEC still screams past, many times per day, over that RR bridge, right outside the hotel, but they are freight trains and do not stop at the former passenger depot. There are plans to run passenger trains from Miami to Disneyworld over these same tracks. But there is some opposition to the plan because it would require the RR bridge  to open an additional 30 times per day with the loud train whistle reverberating at one second intervals while the trains pass through the heart of the city.

The train runs near Cooleys Landing, because Flagler couldnt persuade the Brickell family, who owned Broward County, to sell him a right of way closer to the coast. And that is why Flagler did not build his typical Flagler pleasure palace hotel here and this one was built by others. There was indeed a fort here, three of them in fact, one after the other, named after the commander of the first fort, one a Mr. Lauderdale. Most of us think of this place as a beach town, which it certainly is ("Where The Boys Are"), but the town grew up by the New River, where we are, several miles west of the beach. The river got its name, according two two competing legends, either (A) because an earthquake caused an underground stream to rise to the surface, i.e., a new river, or (B) because the mouth of the river kept shifting, causing it appear as a new river each time it was charted. Neither story sounds true to me. Cooley, after whose landing our Marina is named, was a local merchant and Justice of the Peace. He also operated a large facility extracting arrowroot from the roots of a plant he grew. When some drunken settlers killed an Indian, he had the culprits arrested and brought to trial. But he lost the prosecution because his only witnesses were Indians, and they could not testify in 1835. The witnesses were upset and blamed Cooley. Some time later they killed Cooley and his family. Class dismissed.

We prayed on the sabbath with Lenes cousin, Jeff, at Temple Beth Am (house of the people) in Margate.. Jeff is an officer there. The service was in the Conservative tradition, in which I grew up and belonged for the first 30 years of my life. Many of the melodies were familiar to me. The Rabbis sermon was timely and excellent, drawn from an essay whose author he credited.
The current spat between the Prime Minister of Israel and President Obama and Senator Boehner who invited Netanyahu to address Congress without asking Obama, was nothing but a bunch of politicians ALL behaving badly. They all agree that Iran cannot be permitted to get a bomb and that Israels security must be assured.  He traced the history of the U.S. - Israel relationship and showed that it was not a warm one until the 1967 war; that the chief suppliers of arms to Israel until then were first the French and then The Soviets via Chechoslovakia.  But, having failed to pacify Afghanistan or Iran after almost 15 years of trying, the U.S., under Obama, has moved to a policy of requiring the four major powers of the region to buffer each other and balance each other out, with U.S. air strikes providing a bit of assistance, to assist ground troops of the local rivals. The four powers in this regional analysis are Turkey, Israel, Iran and the Saudis, none of which like each other, and all of which have cause to hate ISIS.  The spat between Israel and the U.S. comes from Israels feeling of loss that that they were the favorite of the US.  Yet there are many hawkish right wing Jews in the US who hate our President for many reasons. Jeffs Rabbi is to be commended for not joining them.

 After services we had lunch with Jeff, his brother Alan and their Mom, Naomi, at a Chinese Buffet that Naomi craved. This was her first outing since our December visit, when she was in rehab for a broken pelvis. After eating too much we were driven back to Naomis house to pick up about six packages which we had shipped there and then back home to ILENE, for the rest of the rainy day.

I walked to and on the beach one day, via Las Olas Boulevard. Well, a quarter of the round trip was a ride, from the Post office, where I had walked to send off the screens. to the beach. I passed the art gallery district including Pococks, whose owner, though British, like George Pocock, was not related to that famous builder of cedar rowing shells featured in "The Boys In the Boat." I told him that he would enjoy the book.  On the beach I walked north, past the most crowded spot, called "Beach Place," covered with young bikini clad women and men who desired them, then past a gay section of the beach and finally a much more sparsely blanketed section by the Westin Hotel, featuring older people and families. On the way back, along Las Olas ("The Waves"), I noticed the towns logo: a boat with a spinaker on the bow and a phoenix or rising sun as the main.

I walked past the ends of the many canals that were dredged to Las Olas Blvd. and visited an open house in this almost completed new 7488 square foot home. It can be yours for less than $7M. Nice spot to dock ILENE comes with it. But not for us.

We had wine and then dinner aboard with my only nephew, David, who this lousy under-lit photo does not do justice, sorry Dave. He lives with his lovely wife and two kids in Atlanta where he has a business, but is also a partner in a business in Boca Raton and works here three days (two night) per week. He had a weekend with his father aboard "Just Cause" back in 1996, from City Island to Northport and back, but had never seen ILENE. 
We have several more days here in Fort Lauderdale.

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November 10 12 Three Lay Days in Charleston Zero miles

A municipal manhole cover. Carol is Greek (or Latin?) for Charles and Polis, as in Annapolis or Metropolis, is city or town, hence Charleston, founded in 1670.

There are only three requirements if you want to cruise like we do, the other things are subsidiary. One is time. You need to be retired or independently wealthy or on a sabbatical or unemployed.  Second is money. Not a lot, but you need to buy a boat and maintain and provision it. And third, but no less important than the other two, is good health. On arrival here I thought we had run out of good luck with the third requirement. Lene was bent over with excruciating pain in her left knee. Every few steps was an attack of acute pain. We cant go on like this I thought. She cant climb over life lines and take big steps down from deck level to dock level or transfer between boat and dink.

I told her that we could haul the boat in a yard here in Charleston for the winter, fly home, get the medical problem fixed and come back here next spring and sail ILENE back to New York. The end of the adventure. But then I thought, before such a drastic decision lets get some medical advice. We consulted with our friend Bill, in Oriental, who is a retired Orthopedist. We took a cab to Roper Hospital where x-rays were taken by the ER doctor who gave us a referral for an ASAP visit with an orthopedist on their staff. The ER physician also gave Lene a soft splint, held in place by foam rubber and velcro, which essentially immobilized the knee, causing a very wobbly gait but the absence of the pain, and a prescription for anti inflammatory/pain killers. And these really helped a lot and Lene was walking, slowly but without pain, up to 3/4 of a mile each way. The orthopedist told her to "sail on," resting the knee when possible and using the pills and splint as needed. Her condition has a fancy name and is exacerbated by cold weather. Surgery, replacement and even cortisone can wait. Here is our sick bay, notice the flowers, and the gekko, to the right, below the clock, with short bits of weatherstripping hidden behind it so as not to mar the cherry wood. He will be a reminder of both our Carribean adventure and this trip.

Fortunately,we had spent a week here in the Spring of 2012 and seen most of the major sights, and can stop here again on the way home, because we did no sightseeing on this trip. We did laundry (it is free for boaters in this municipal marina, The Charleston Maritime Center, purchased a new Ipad to replace the one I ruined with salt water in the Chesapeake, and grocery shopped in Harris Teeters, a pretty good supermarket. We took a walk among the historic homes here

(notice my shorts; a warm day at last!) to

 a memorable lunch at Jestines with great inexpensive southern cooking and named after a domestic servant who died in 1997 at age 112, the daughter of an ex slave and a Native American. Jestine worked for a southern family for many years and the restaurant is owned by a descendant of that family. The Reverend Brown of the nearby Methodist Church and the financial secretary of the church recommended the fried chicken which Lene enjoyed and I had, among other things, fried chicken livers, fried okra, corn bread with butter and honey and southern pecan pie.

And of course there is always boat work: ILENE had a bath, her water tanks filled, her fuel tanks poisoned to prevent the growth of microorganisms that clog the fuel lines, gluing back one of the buttons that hold plexiglass panels in place against the screens of the cafe doors with gorilla glue and the top of the percolator lid with JB Weld, a metal to metal glue that is remarkably strong.

But the two biggest problems required the help of Dr. Bill, who, I told him, enjoys fixing boats almost as much as fixing peoples bones. As to the auto pilot, the most expensive component is the motor with linear drive -- the thinner rod to the left goes in and out of the thicker rod to the right, and pulls the rudder to steer the boat. The squeaking and beeping is a $ign of old age and thiS drive will have to be replaced $oon. Its kind of amazing that a guy who is 6 3" could contort his body to reach this place to copy down the serial numbers. Replacing the unit will be harder, but once replaced this one will be rebuilt and used as a spare.

The other problem was the lack of charge into the starting battery. Its sole purpose is to power the starter motor which turns on  the engine. So it discharges only for less than a second each time, but it uses a huge amount of power when it does. And the problem was that it was not being charged by any of the solar panels, the engine or shore power. So the voltage had gradually reached the very low level of only 12 volts. Bill talked me through a series of tests, via phone, which showed that either ILENE does not have a needed "combiner" or that component is not working.  The short answer is that periodically, when we are (A) on shore power with the built in battery charger turned on, or (B) running the engine, we have to combine the starting battery with the "house bank" (which consists of 6 six volt golf cart batteries), so that the starting battery can get charged. This is easily done using a small red plastic key.  Last winter the old starting battery died because I did not know this and erroneously assumed that when I hooked the boat to shore power with the battery charger on, it was charging both batteries. So many lessons to be learned. Thanks again Bill.

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More Aluminum Sailing Dinghies

In response to my post about the aluminum Gouget Moth, several readers sent in some aluminum sailing dinghies they have come across.

Australian "R.L". sent two photos of a welded aluminum version of the Australian 11 Aquanaut Dinghy, masterfully crafted.

Mike Scott owned a prototype De Havilland 12 aluminum dinghy during his time in Australia. His story:

"Im not sure who designed that alum dinghy I had, could well have been built as a prototype for the Vagabond, and therefore designed by Alan Payne. They maybe figured that alum was not the best way to go and so built the 3 class boats in glass. The 16ft Corsair is still going strong all over Oz, but the 12ft Vagabond and 10ft Gipsy seem to have faded. When I worked at Miller and Whitworth (Bob Miller and Craig Whitworth, sailmakers, Flying Dutchmen champs, and of course the legendary Bob Miller (aka Ben Lexcen). They became the agents for the 3 classes, and we would place an advertisement in the local paper for Free Sailboat rides, and we would take out prospective customers and then try to sell them a boat....was a fun job, but didnt get to see my kids much....that was 1966. Check out De Havilland Marine. I also worked there - that was where this boat came from. I bought it for scrap value, one of the perks of the job, I guess. In those days I was an accountant - ha...!

In the U.S, Grumman remains the most famous firm for their line of aluminum small boats and canoes but their most enduring aluminum sailboat is their dink, much sought after by the cruising crowd.

Tom Price pointed out that Grumman, in the late 1960s, built a 15 racing dinghy, called the "Flyer." Tom came across it at a Baltimore Boat Show. It doesnt appear many were made as this is the only image I could dig up about this dinghy on the InterWebs.

And finally, the aluminum sailboat I came across at Bobby Mullers yard? After digging around it appears it was the Pelican class, a 12 footer design by Philip Rhodes, of which over a thousand were built by the Aluminum Company of Canada - Alcan. More info about the Pelican can be found at this blog post here.

A nice roomy 12 footer.

A video walk-around of a Pelican.

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We Are OFF! NY to Annapolis October 8 10 268 Miles

Our first problem was discovered when we had to use the dinghy to go to dinner on City Island because the Clubs launch service ends at 6 pm in the waning days of the season: it started right up but stopped in five seconds. So we paddled.  And the night of the seventh was unpleasantly rocky on the mooring due to strong SW winds kicking up big chop in Eastchester Bay, impeding sleep.

The passage was from 9:45 am on the eighth until 7:30 am on the tenth, 45.75 hours with a two hour "stop" to be discussed later, so 43.75 hours underway. The first of the two days (NYC and the Atlantic coast of New Jersey) was warmer than expected for the season, both day and night, with sunny clear skies and a big full moon; the second of the days (Delaware Bay, the C and D Canal and Chesapeake Bay) was raw and cloudy but not frigid and not rainy. This chart, created by Jims Spot device shows our route, except that it connects the dots every four hours or so and hence cuts off the corners and shows us crossing land. [Image to be added.]
We actually left, after mango pancakes, about an hour too early due to my impatience so we did not experience the favorable tide while we fought strong headwinds until near Hellsgate when the tide started flushing us out of NY Harbor. A tug with four barges (2 x 2) came up behind us near Hellsgate and called ILENE by name to advise that we would apparently be going through Hellsgate together and that his four barges would be swinging to port. I did a short 360 degree loop to let him pass and observed that his tow did indeed sweep far to his port side and "crab" through the most problematic tidal strait of the passage on a diagonal. We passed parallel to the FDR Drive with its snarled traffic on which I drive so often to get to the Club.

Here is the Freedom Tower to the left, currently New Yorks tallest structure, and a tower of the Brooklyn Bridge to the right, which held that title in the 1880s.

We put up sails, starting with double reefed main and small jib, after we passed Governors Island and we were on starboard tack all the way to Cape May, though we gradually shook out the reefs and changed back and forth to the genoa when passing through periods of apparent winds of 20-25 knots and periods where they were in the mid teens. The Verranzano Bridge, our ninth of the passage, was emotionally my last point in New York until around May, 2015.

Unlike the similar passage on Pandora about two weeks before, on which the wind was never forward of the beam, on this trip it was almost never aft of the beam, though rarely close hauled and predominantly about 60 degrees off the bow. 

Jim, who made the trip on both boats is a great man to have aboard. He is a fellow Cornellian, an engineer and very knowledgeable as a sailor though he wears his experts mantle lightly, without a trace of the arrogance that some experts have -- laid back and a pleasure to sail with. He agreed to my request to sleep the earlier part of each night and stand the later night watch.  During our first night I was "racing" a green light that started off our port bow. At times he would get ahead and by changing sails, at times, I would get ahead. Our speed varied from 3.5 to 8.1 knots depending on the wind. When very close I hailed the "sailboat with another sailboat on your port quarter", identified ILENE and thanked him "for keeping me awake last night". He reciprocated the thanks and identified himself as "Momo" a Valiant 40, here shown off  Wildwood,

bound for Florida with a planned stop for a day in Cape May harbor. I told him I hoped we would meet up with them in Florida or along the way. He is a very good sailor because ILENE is a faster boat but he kept up.

Jim took the watch for most of the passage up Delaware Bay, in which we avoided the worst of the adverse tide. Having rounded Cape May at about 9 a.m., using the inside passage a hundred yards off the beach, with main and engine but no headsail, Jim suggested a diagonal course, away from but toward the shipping channel at Miah Maull light, after which we stayed just outside the channel on its right side almost all the way up. A tug with barges ran near adjacent to us most of the way and we put up the headsail when possible to gain speed and sailed without engine, close reaching on port. Unfortunately, when the tug got ahead of us during lighter winds, we got long doses of his diesel fumes. About 5-10 miles before the Canal, when we are slightly ahead of him, I called on VHF and told him our plan to cut across his bow to get to the other side of the channel in anticipation of our left turn into the Canal and he replied "OK".

As we entered the canal Jim came up with the good idea to stop for a couple of hours to avoid the worst of the adverse tidal flow. We would tie up for free at a dock in the Summit North Marina on the north side of the Canal to have dinner in their excellent Aqua Sol Restaurant. And we shared a bottle of red and a nice assortment of appetizers while motoring in the canal. This is the same marina where ILENE spent a night on our last trip in June 2012 and where Pandora went in for fuel two weeks ago. But on our way in, going slowly, of course, we went aground. We used the preventer to swing the boom, with Jim sitting on its end, out to port, in an effort to tilt the boat and break us free. No luck, we were stuck hard. And we created this lead line, the old fashioned depth meter, out of a green divers weight, a wire wrap, a length of light line and red tape to mark where the wet part old the line ended.

Yep, we were stuck alright and it was mud, which you can see,  dried on the bottom of the weight. What to do? Wait for the tide to come in and float us off. I took the watch and two hours later, at about ten, I saw us drift, turned on the engine and woke Jim.  We motored to the inner end of the cul de sac, turned in the deep turning basin and headed out of there.  Then I slept for four hours until 2 a.m. while Jim took us out of the Canal and into the Bay.  I took the watch from 2 until 7:10 a.m., when GPS put us ten minutes from the red daymark guarding Back Bay harbor of Annapolis, where Jim lives with Ann and where we docked at Bert Jabins Marina -- where ILENE had stood on the hard during the winter of 2005 in which we bought her.
Ann came over to take us to breakfast at Grumps, an Annapolis breakfast institution, where no two coffee mugs ever match. But the Captain ordered another batch of pancakes and put Jim to work peeling mangos for the three of us.
Then how to best utilize the time before Lenes arrival at about 4 pm. Well the most critical task was fixing the outboard, the engine of our car. And it being Friday, when mechanics are at work, I searched and found Steve of A and B Yachtsmen, who disassembled the carburetor, cleaned the rust from it, and emptied our fuel tank and line. She runs again! We are across the dock from a beautiful Tayana 55, "Karina"

owned by Dr. Miles (both M.D. and a boat doctor) and Ann, who are leaders in the Caribbean 1500. Ann gave Ilene a lot of good advice about sailing with cats in 2010 and unfortunately their cat has gone to heaven. I introduced myself as a graduate of the 2010 run and he pretended to remember me and invited us to an Alumni reunion we attended that night.

Before that I washed Ilenes salt crust and New York grime and freshened our water supply, cleaned up the interior a bit and took a shower and a nap. Lene and Witty look happy to be here and we got a good nights sleep.

The adventure has begun!

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October 10 21 ILENEs Floating Season Ends

All good things must end. Having lived aboard during the first 146 days of 2015, during last winters Florida adventure, 2015s boat days will be a good number. (See next post.) The twelve day period reported on in this post saw (A) ILENEs final three sails, (B) four work days and (C) GOC.
Lets start with the sails. One was with Rhoda and Lloyd, of the Harlem. We have sailed with many times in the past. We were underway about four hours, and I confess that due to poor note taking, the wind and our course regrettably escape me.
Next was with four residents of my apartment building. I started out planning to sail with Dorothy, who is a fellow client of our personal trainer. That morning he mentioned that another couple in our building who trained with him, Mort and Rollie, had said they would like to sail some time. "Call them right now and ask about today; we leave at noon!" He did and they are in! But Dorothy was not feeling up to it today and requested a rain check for next season. "Sure." And now, including me, we are down to three souls. But on my way back to our apartment I saw Max, who shares a wall with us; he is in the next apartment.  He had to check with Ellen and two minutes later, my bell rang and our party had grown to five. Max purchased a picnic lunch for us all and we ate aboard, before getting underway -- while waiting for wind. Then there was only a ghost of wind, but it built, out of the north, and we got almost to Execution Rocks before heading back. We enjoyed four hours underway and three of the four guests took a turn at the helm. Mort is a professional oenophile who praised the bottle I served aboard and brought another to my apartment to replace it. Rollie, Mort, Max and Ellen:

ILENEs final sail of the season was also the final gathering of the Old Salts, including several of the regulars, and two special guests. We were underway for 3.5 hours, and got about a mile past Ex. Rocks, peaking at 7.4 knots. This was rather amazing given how foul ILENEs bottom was. (See below.) Thanks, Larry, for the next two photos. Here are Dave, Marti and Marcia:

Next is Dave, doing what racers do: checking the sail trim, with Art at the helm

Readers of this blog will recall Marti, who I have named The Goat Lady of Grenada. She has a long history of animal care and is volunteering there to help raise goats to develop a chevre cheese industry. She showered us with such great hospitality there during 2011. I had known that she was coming to the Big Apple for a visit and saw that she had arrived via a Facebook posting. It turns our she was staying in a friends apartment only a block away. I did not have her phone number but instant messaged her at about 10 a.m., and picked her up an hour later. She fit right in and has the ability to do that wherever she is. Our other honored guest was Dave, an excellent racer and now in charge of qualifying members who want to use the boats that the Club owns. I have long desired that he sail on ILENE, figuring I would learn something, and I was not disappointed.

With Lene in Israel, I had no date for the Clubs annual end of season gala, and Marti was able to gin up a suitable outfit despite having left all her dressy clothes in "The G," as she calls Grenada. It was a cool Saturday evening, warmed by the camaraderie of our members. Memorial plaques were set in the flag pole base for Al, a loyal Old Salt who moved to Florida two years ago, Tom, whose death I had not heard about, and Vinny, who I sailed with up the Hudson at the end of the season, perhaps ten years ago. The cocktail hour was long and delicious with good quality wines, and the sit down dinner was also great except for the perennial problem we experience: our kitchen is just not adequate to serve that many people at the same time. Our servers brought eight plates at a time to serve all the people at one table at the same time, but the last table was not served until amore than an hour after the first. The trophies to the winners of the races were duly warded. As Fleet Captain, I described the highlights of the Clubs cruising activities, thanking Bruce and Diane for designing the Club Cruise itinerary. I regret that I forgot to summarize the Old Salts season and to thank Mark for his help in reinvigorating the group.

(The next day was chilly and I escorted Marti on a tour of lower Manhattan via rented CitiBikes, my first experience with this program. I got an appreciation for the problems of cyclists in the City, with the paint marking the bike lanes significantly worn away and motorists infringing them even when marked. The thirty minute time period causes tension - finding the docking stations, though they let you take another bike two minutes after you drop off the last. We used three bikes to get from Tenth St to the Brooklyn Bridge and Chinatown, to the Hudson and Freedom Tower and back, stopping for a warming lunch in Chinatown.)

The first of the work days was the Clubs annual fall work party. I got enlisted into a group of four who painted the yard car,

by which boats on cradles are transported around in the boat yard (parking lot). After about twenty years of service it looks like new. I love these work parties because you get to know people who you only vaguely recognized before. And a delicious free lunch is always served.
Having loaded the two pieces of ILENEs canvas winter cover from the locker to the cart to the launch and to the boat, I motored from the Harlem to the Huguenot, about five miles, in no wind to speak of, entering through the western passage, passing the NYACs club house. After docking I stripped and bundled up the two headsails and removed the battens from the mainsail.
Next day I stripped off the main and after tying it to itself, heaved each of the three huge sail bundles from the boat onto the dock. Then they are, one at a time, lifted into a dock cart, wheeled about 150 yards to the parking lot, lifted into my car and driven to the Doyle sail loft on City Island, for repairs, cleaning, proper folding and winter storage. That same afternoon ILENE was lifted from the water revealing the terrible condition of her bottom.

Keel is bearded! Too many sandy landings in the last 18 months.
But power washing by Orlando and scraping that I did cleaned it off and she sits blocked and steadied by jack stands. Some of the black bottom paint is completely gone, with the blue paint underneath showing through.

The fourth work day, five hours, began with an inspection of a blasting of the bottom paint using tiny glass particles (except for the aft portion that I barrier coated two winters ago). David, using a powerful air compressor, did the forward three quarters of the hull in two hours for a very well spent $1175. Based on how long it took me to do the back end two winters ago, I saved about 25 days of back breaking, dirty and dangerously unhealthy work. A bargain. A photo of the newly white bottom will be added to this post soon. That same day I tried to winterized the engine, air conditioner, heads and fresh water system, which was very frustrating, because I had done this in the past but kept getting stuck. I also removed the lifelines and stanchions and rigged the "ridge pole" for the canvas cover (whisker pole, boom and a board from the aft end of the boom to the radar arch) in preparation for installing the cover. The next post will describe a sail from Essex CT to Hampton, VA, which kept getting delayed by equipment problems and weather. Many work days are ahead.

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