A sleepless night - susan

Dan and I have been marching through each day with direction and motivation. We are accomplishing what needs to be done. This night as my body lay down to sleep and replenish my energy flow, my mind raced…

Outside the bedroom window I watched as the bright half moon peeked between the tree branches from east to west across the sky… No matter how I tried to focus on my breathing, in unison with Dan’s, and the company of the man in the moon, my thoughts took charge of me.

We have decided to hold the Estate Sale next weekend. In preparation, I have, mentally, moved through each room of the house and made final decisions on what to keep and what to let go. Boxes are mentally packed and unpacked, making sure to honor each family member’s preferences.

The book Dan and I are reading is entitled High Endeavors and it tells the tales of a powerful couple, Miles and Beryl Smeeton, who embraced living with gusto. Dan and I usually have a joint book in process as we have long times driving/riding in the car and we enjoy being read to. Getting the story at the same time lends itself to lively conversations and joint reflections. The Smeeton’s latest adventure involves sailing. It doesn’t go so well for them but true to their nature, they survive not one but two rollover and dismastings when all odds are against them. And that is the point where my self- inventory becomes active. Beryl is a strong swimmer. She is washed out of the boat in a violent storm; her lifeline is broken off from the vessel with such force that she breaks several ribs and or a vertebrae and somehow swims to the boat in the turbulent seas! I am not a strong swimmer! I understand that sailing around the world in a relatively small vessel is a somewhat risky undertaking. Thinking of myself bobbing around in a stormy sea causes some fear to rise. I think of all the ways to relax in the water and to propel myself against the imagined wind and current. Sleep does not come… My mind seems so loud I wonder why I have not waked Dan… So, I get up! Downstairs in the dark kitchen I light a candle. The dog is quivering in her crate; I close the slider against the cold. Making my way to my computer I send an email to my son; and a response comes back! I am not the only person who is awake in the universe! I have distracted my self. I begin the list that has been churning in my brain. Putting my ideas on paper allows me to release these thoughts for now. I make my way back to bed. And I sleep…

The Cove – dan

I love sailing and many of my most joy filled memories involve sailing with dolphins on my bow wave, so it was with tears in my eyes that I watched the scenes of dolphin slaughter in the movie “The Cove”. Susan heard about the movie through an email form Patagonia. It sounded interesting, we searched for a local showing for weeks before one finally popped up in Mystic and we went. It’s a powerful story about natural beauty, extreme human injustice, dolphin exploitation and murder. The central character of the story, outside of the dolphins, is Ric O’Barry, the man who captured and trained Flipper (actually the five different bottle nosed dolphins who portrayed Flipper) for the TV series.

It’s poetically ironic that the man who was a major force in the inception of the dolphin exploitation industry is now a major force in saving them. The story of Ric’s inner transformation and is one of the gems of this movie.

Who could kill a dolphin, an idea that is so foreign and adherent to me that it’s hard to imagine. What kind of men could be so hard hearted to do such a thing? While The Cove shows us their faces and even their horrible actions, still I wonder. If such a thing is in the hearts of men, any men, can it be somewhere in mine?

The Cove documents live capture of wild dolphins for the worldwide entertainment industry as well as the accompanying slaughter and consumption. In the course of the movie two startling facts are reveled: 1) Most Japanese don’t realize that their fishing industry is killing dolphins and they are eating them packaged as whale meet. 2) The dolphin meat they are eating is loaded with mercury, up to 2,000 PPM (parts per million) when 0.4 PPM is supposedly the safe limit.

After the tragedy of Minamata I would have thought that the Japanese would have been the last people on earth who would mess with mercury in the food chain. For decades mercury was inadvertently introduced into the aquatic food chain of the fishing village of Minamata Japan resulting in horrible birth defects, sever neurological damage and death. It started out early on with crows falling from the sky and cats dancing strangely in the streets before falling dead. It ended with the poisoning of the entire village. In spite of the large number of deformed babies and sick adults the government and local industry hid evidence of mercury poisoning and continued to pollute.

In the early 1970s the American photographer William Eugene Smith traveled to Minamata and documented the tragedy that was on going. In the course of living with the people of Minamata Smith produced one of the most beautiful and moving photo books ever made. (the book is now out of print but you can click on this link to see some of Smith’s photos) That book awakened the world to the horror of marine mercury contamination. In the course of his work Smith was beaten blind by the Japanese industrialists; fortunately he later regained his sight.

Minamata is now public knowledge and a horrible part of Japan’s history so why are the Japanese feeding dolphin flesh contaminated with mercury to their children? The film does a good job of answering that question as well as showing how Japan has succufucly co-opted the IWC (International Whaling Commission) by buying the votes of a number of small and improvised countries.

The Japanese people are being stubborn in their persistence in killing dolphins but I can’t imagine that they’ll be able to continue peddling dolphin flesh as the truth about the mercury contamination spreads. That leads to another of the great ironies of this story; the one thing that may save the dolphins, mercury poisionng, must also be killing them too.

savejapandolphins.org

save the people too…

namaste

Sweet goodbyes – dan

I’ve never been a good one for goodbyes but with so many significant ones happening almost at once, I feel I’m getting better at it. It started last Thursday with my retirement lunch at work. It was a warm and comforting affair with about 20 of my colleagues and held at one of my favorite Italian restaurants. They’re a great crew, every one a survivor and a performer who has outlasted the many ups and downs in the aero-space-industry, some of whom I’ve known for 25 years or longer. There’s something comforting about the tradition of breaking bread with people that you’ve worked with for so many years as a gesture of parting. I’ve gone to many of these affairs over the years for the people who have retired before me and now it’s my turn. The others at the table know that their time will come and were probably idly thinking about their own retirement dates.

Then on Friday I had the closing of my house and had to say to goodbye to my house and the wonderful lady who did so much to help me sell it, Shari Fichman. Shari was amazing in putting together the deal and went well above-and-beyond; when a tornado hit Wethersfield, Shari stopped by my house to protect it from the torrential rains while Susan and I were on the boat, completely unaware of the disaster that had struck home. After the closing Shari hung outside the lawyers office recounting the highs and lows of the sale and then she presented me with a beautiful coffee table photo book; “Sailing around the world”.

On Sunday we had an open house on Gypsy for the people I work with. About a dozen people stopped by to check out the boat and share nibbles aboard Gypsy and that for me was truly special.

I think we say our best goodbyes in stages, at least I do. A little bit at a time, over time seems the best way to honor and let go of good friends and associates.

65 days...

getting closer to a new beginning - susan

The movement towards departure is palpable now. Dan is about to cease his paid employment. I hesitated as I wrote that sentence as he never stops “work”! Our activities now are mostly centered on preparing to move on to Gypsy. Dan’s house is nearly empty and the sifting continues at my house. An interesting perspective comes over you as you decide how little you need any specific object; you then decide no one needs it!
Today Dan and I went in search of a pack for me. (Mine seems to have made its way to Seattle with my daughter) How much will I need to carry; how much do I want to spend? Even into my adulthood I have primarily carried either a duffle or a backpack for travel. The ease of carrying my cargo on my back has always been natural for me. I won’t be wearing heals and anything fu-fu when I travel (or otherwise for that matter!_ We found a comfortable large load pack that was last year’s model that suits me just fine. The salesman questioned if we had an upcoming trip planned and he seemed a little excited for us with my response. As we left the store I realized that I am soo excited! I feel like a kid who got a new pair of school shoes. I want to pack up my clothes and set out! I wore the pack around the house for part of the afternoon. Dan thought I had lost it!

As we walked out into the parking lot at Lowe’s store where we had been looking for fence posts to repair my toppled fence, it was only 10 a m and Dan commented that we are now among the “retired”!

My daughter Chelsea has been traveling and is currently in Seattle WA. We had a great catch up conversation last night and she’s ecstatic about the community she’s living in. She is eager to find work so she can fully settle in. She has been a free spirit, traveling about in Central America and most recently she was drawn to the Pacific Northwest. Her descriptions of the people she has met inspire me to be bold and inventive with new ways to live, in union, within our planet. She told me about a couple she met on an island who, prior to living there, lived on their sailboat for 15 years. She helped them harvest seaweed which was used as chutney and also to fertilize the organic garden. Some of my preparation for our journey looks to modify and adjust current ways of doing things. I intend to challenge myself with seaweed soup, perhaps…

Attachment and more progress - dan

Susan and I were back to work moving me out of my place when one of my neighbors came over and asked; “Aren’t you sad about moving out of your house?”. I’ve been surprised by how many people have asked that same or a very similar question lately. It’s true that my 100-year-old bungalow is a wonderful little house that’s situated in the ever-so-quaint town of Old Wethersfield. At the same time I’m fully aware that I must let go of things, including my lovely house, in order to open the door for other, new and wonderful opportunities. It’s not like I’m moving into a cardboard box. I’m joining a gorgeous and vivacious woman on to beautiful and sweet sailing yacht with which we’ll commence a round the world tour of some of the coolest places on the planet. I don’t see a down side; sailing, adventure, travel and the whole ocean as our backyard. Must be a case of different folks enjoying different strokes. Anyway, the simple answer is; no, I’m not sad, I’m actually way excited and tickled pink about what we’re doing, that is when I’m not feeling a bit overwhelmed with all that we still have to do before our November 1^st departure date.

We got two big loads of stuff moved out of my place on Sunday. I was hoping to have reduced all my possessions down to such a level that I could move directly on to Gypsy. I fell short of that goal so I’m moving several vanloads of stuff to Susan’s place to sort and tag sale. She doesn’t close on her home till October 6^th, I’ll have to get my act together by then. A surprising thing has happened in and amongst all the activity of late, something so natural that I almost didn’t notice; we’ve moved in together. We’ve been so busy that we didn’t even celebrate and we hardly even noticed but here we are, cohabitating. We’ll have to have a special celebration when Susan’s house closes and we move onto Gypsy fulltime. In the mean time it’s work, work, work…

Speaking of work we had a productive day down on the boat today. I woke up this morning with my enthusiasm for moving waning and feeling the need to get back to Gypsy. The first thing we noticed when we arrived at the boat was that Jim Funk had installed the handles on the side of our dodger and they came out really well. We wanted something to hold on to when the weather gets rough and we have to go up on the fore deck.

Susan applied what we hope is the last coat of varnish, at least for now. I did the last fiberglassing in our cold box and then moved on to the issue of a security grate for our main hatch. For that I made a mock up of our main deck hatch out of rough lumber. I’ve been doing my carpentry on the finger pier, careful not to drop anything.

Here’s the completed project, which I then took over to Mystic Stainless to have them make a security grate for.

I was able to hook up with Charlie just before he left for the day and he seemed to think it would be no problem for him to come up with something. By then the fiberglass in the cold box had set and I was able to sand and paint that. All in all it was a very productive day.

71 days...

Stuff, more stuff and architecture - dan

I can’t believe how much time and energy it’s taking to move out of my house. I didn’t think I had that much stuff left but to box it all up and take it all to: friends, Goodwill or set aside for a tag sale seems like a never ending task. It’s also a huge bother & distraction when I really would rather be working on Gypsy and even more that that, I’d really love to be sailing her. The August heat has been intense and Susan has been an amazing help to me with my move; leading a hand and keeping me going under a blazing sun. The only conciliation is that with every load I get moved out, I feel freer and freer. It’s like we’re un-forging the chains that bind us one possession at a time.

Some of the things that are left are things that I’ve struggled in deciding what to do with; favorite pieces of furniture, tools that don’t belong on the boat, some large pieces of stained glass, my CD collection and thousands of photos. Fortunately time, or rather, lack of time, has a way of making those decisions for you. I’ve found that if you wait long enough, my options are reduced and clear necessity expediency takes over.

In the midst off all this we took the day off on Saturday to see the Frank Lloyd Wright exhibit in NYC. I had a long standing fascination with FLW and his work so when our friends on SV Rights of Man told us they were going to see the exhibit and that it ended the next day, we decided to join them. The show was held in the Guggenheim Museum that Frank had designed, making a very fitting venue for the retrospective.

I had taken an architecture class in college where I was exposed to Wright’s residential work but I wasn’t aware of his large-scale projects such as his mile high skyscraper or grandiose whole city designs. As an ex-draftsman it was a special treat for me to see hundreds of his original drawings and conceptual sketches. His sketches give insight as to how he visualized and developed his ideas. Wright’s amazing use of space, sensitivity to how that space shapes our lives and his ability to design structures that enhance our connection to nature make him one of the greatest architects of all time. All in all I must say it was well worth taking a break from our hectic schedule to take in this rare opportunity. Tomorrow is will be back to the grindstone for us.

73 days...

and I breathe.... susan

I have been silent for some time. Not for lack of thoughts; perhaps too many. My current assignment is to prepare the teak to its full beauty and durability. In some places the former varnish had raised up and I was able to carefully peel it off down to the bare wood. Other places have not been so easy. The most efficient method for removing the old varnish has been by using a knife to ease the bond between the old varnish and the wood. My incentive is to peel the largest piece of varnish possible! It is a painfully slow process... Once the old varnish has been removed I have sanded and taped the area, followed by 4 coats of Cetol Light and 2 coats of Cetol Gloss. All the areas where the teak comes in contact with the fiberglass will be caulked. Since I drafted this post I had an opportunity to talk with our dock neighbor about our restoration process (these are the people who have restored at least 24 boats) and the effect is powerful! Stop! Yes, it is true!

Teak is durable on its own. Though it will become gray

and dull, the wood will not rot. In the tropics we (I) will be varnishing at least every month to keep it maintained. I am not lazy, but let me tell you, I hope I have more meaningful activities than sanding and painting all the teak on Gypsy! I consider hand washing our laundry a more meaningful activity.

Revision: enjoy the shiny painted teak in the cockpit.

Continue to remove the old varnish on the toe rails and the handholds and sand with #80 sandpaper and breathe. Speaking of breathing: I have used this tedious process of varnish detail as part of my yoga practice.

The demands of the varnish application indicate not to paint if there is too much humidity, if the sun is bright,

if there is a threat of rain… well, that just about sums up the summer – and meanwhile I try to select times when we will not need to move over the tacky surfaces.

And I breathe… This varnishing is a HUGE job but it goes to the bottom of the list as other jobs seem to take priority. And I breathe…

It seems like getting ones thoughts on paper creates a framework in which to function. I need the grounding as there is a lot going on. Stocking the galley is a huge challenge for me. Over the years I recall families talking about shopping once a month for the staples and just picking up perishables every week or so. I was not that kind of cook. The pantry shelves would be stocked but dinner was formulated by random factors: the farm stand on the way home from work, a recipe shared at lunch by co-workers, something one of the kids would say... So now I find myself in charge of being sure we have the staples we need and the surprises that might make a trying day tolerable. I have been using Beth Leonard’s The Voyager’s Handbook as a guide. Keep the fresh vegetables in a place where there is good air circulation. Know which countries restrict incoming fruits and vegetables – including such things, even, as honey! Buy eggs that have never been refrigerated or washed – they keep the longest. Placing the eggs in a Styrofoam egg carton will probably afford the safest ride; and turn the carton over every day or so to lengthen the shelf life… I wake in the night with this litany of rules running through my head…

And I breathe…

Three and a half days working in the hole (was I bad?) – dan

Susan and I worked four long, hot and productive days this past weekend. Swimming off the boat was a real treat during the hottest part of each day. The "hole" alluded to in the title of the refrigeration box which I gutted, lined with 4” of foam on the bottom and 2” around the sides (the pink stuff in the photo) and then Susan and I fiberglassed over that. Susan cut the glass mat to size as I layered it into the box. We put 2 to 3 layers of glass in the fridge and one on my forearms. I also bonded in a teak mounting block for the condenser. Next I’ll fill, fare and then paint the surface before installing the condenser & compressor. It’s been a lot of work that I hope will payoff by bringing the fridge efficiency up to the point that it’s able to run exclusively from the output of our solar array. Ice from sunlight; what a strange and wonderful idea.

Our marvelous canvas artist Jim Funk rowed over from his loft across the river with our new sail cover which we’re thrilled with. It has a proud blue star within a circle on it. Jim said that the circle represents our planned circumnavigation and the star is to guide us by. I think it should also get us in good with any Texas Republicans that cross our path and possibly with the Wiccans too. I wonder if we could get both groups to come to a vegetarian barbeque.

Jim made a pattern for our new bimini-to-dodger connector when he delivered the sail cover and was back the next day with the finished product; another most excellent piece of work. He’ll finish up by putting side handles on our dodger and curtains on our bimini. We should then be all set canvas wise. It’s amazing how much good canvas work can improve the comfort of a boat.

Susan continued her work on the topside teak, she getting scarily good at removing varnish with that knife. It’s a tough job that’s challenging her seemingly boundless capacity for hard work.

I made a mock up or our companion way entrance to give to Charlie over at Mystic Stainless. I’m hoping that with the mock-up and with some drawings, he’ll be able to fabricate a security grate for us to use when we have to stay at dodgy anchorages. The grate will drop in place of our companion way boards and lock from the inside hopefully keeping the nice people separated from the scary people at least long enough for me to prepare a proper reception for the uninvited.

A sheepish admission here: the LED reading light I indicated in a previous post as defective was in fact ok, I had simply wired it incorrectly. It has an additional wire for a dimmer that must be coupled with the hot wire when not in use. I had mistakenly tried to pair the dimmer wire with the ground. One of the very good salesmen at Defender Marine straightened me out. The good news is that I’m not cursed by LED gods, the bad news is that I still don’t follow directions very well.

I’m getting a little crispy around the edges with the strain of pulling all the loose ends together in the time frame remaining; the boat projects, moving out of my house and onto a boat that’s “in progress”. We’re a little ahead of schedule but still it’s hard for me to relax as I fear rationally or irrationally, I’ll somehow lose my edge.

77 days...

Friends and Root Happiness - dan
I had forgotten to mention in my last post that friend Tom spent a day helping on Gypsy last weekend. He came equipped, as usual, with some amazing tools from his vast inventory of high-end woodworking gear. This time I got to use his Festool skill saw which I must say it is the most amazing saw I have ever used. It comes with a guide bar so it always cuts straight. I ripped marine plywood for shelving and was blown away by how clean, crisp and splinter free it left the wood. I’ve been using a skill saw all my adult life and have never seen anything like this. When Tom wasn’t helping me with the shelves he was helping Susan scrape and sand teak. Thanks Tom!

It was a good and productive weekend and I realize that I’m much closer to my root happiness than I can ever remember being. I’m fully engaged, firing on all cylinders and can feel my smile close-at-hand as I go about the many things that need to be done in preparation for our journey. I think there’s several reasons for my abundance of joy; first and foremost is that I’m in a healthy relationship with a wonderful woman, second is that I’m following a dream that is true to me and central to my authentic self and third is that I’m involved in something that’s so vast (circumnavigating our earth), that it almost seems beyond me and I thrive on challenge. Sometimes it’s important to attempt something that is larger that ourselves in order to get out of ourselves, out of our day-to-day ordinary selves and take up our extraordinary selves.

Krishna Das has said that happiness is our native state but that over time we loose touch with that happiness. Like most true things it’s a beautiful concept and KD sums it up, as all great teachers do, in a simple, straightforward sentence. But how does one go about getting reconnected with our happiness? KD says that we get distracted and lose touch with our native joy. What to do? KD being a Bhakti yogi will tell you to chant and I can’t argue with that. I chant as often as I can. There are other ways also. It all starts by reducing our distractions. Turn off the TV and the radio, calm yourself, get in touch with your breathing, then ask yourself what’s important. Do this often enough that you get an unwavering and strong answer. Then give yourself permission to follow through because dreams are nothing without action.

Several people have asked me if I have ever done anything like this before and the simple answer is no. That answer usually leaves them with a big blank look on their faces and they usually follow up with; “Well you have as least crossed an ocean” and again I have to disappoint by saying; not yet. “Well how do you know you can do something as big a sailing around the world if you haven’t done anything like it?” I can because I know it in my heart. How did Columbus know he could cross an ocean or Drake know that he could take a ship around the world or Slocum know he could do it alone? Where else is such information written but in one’s own heart? I’m not saying that we will, without a doubt, make it around successfully; that remains to be written. What I am saying is that we’re a strong, capable crew & vessel and we will do our level best on the pursuit of our dream.
83 days...

Art, boat work, furniture moving & mojitos - dan

Everything seems to be accelerating, even more than before; my last few days at work, last days in my house, the little amount of time left to wrap up our boat projects, the last of our days in Connecticut. It’s getting hard to find time to blog but I’ll try to keep posting at least once a week but please know that if I miss a post or two, it’s not because I’m goofing off.

Susan has been making great progress with the arduous task of refinishing Gypsy bright work. I built some storage shelves in Gypsy’s head and storage locker. That wasn’t a priority of mine (I would rather have worked on installing the new refrigeration unit and I really should be installing our fresh water catchment system) but it’s something Susan asked for and she it my biggest priority. Also, this is what we do; support one another. Once we’re out on the ocean, we’ll only have each other to rely on.

I started to install the LED interior lighting but unfortunately the first one I put in last weekend proved faulty. I seem to be jinxed with all things LED. Perhaps one of my ancestors entered an Egyptian tomb and turned on a forbidden light or maybe there’s just lots of room for improvement with respect to reliability with this technology. I just hope it doesn’t turn out to be 2-out-of-3 bad units like it did with the masthead light.

Our most excellent rigger, Jeff Morgan, stopped by and finished the last of the work that he’s doing for us by completing our running backstays. Wooohooo! I’m excited; the only thing saltier than running backs is yardarms or ratlines and Gypsy is unlikely to see either of those. It was fun and informative watching him work as he effortlessly spliced eyes into the Amsteel stays. He’s a true craftsman of the highest order and we’ve been delighted with his work.

Speaking of excellent craftsmen, our rigger Jim Funk, also stopped by to take measurements for our bimini-dodger connector and mainsail cover. Jim is a genius with stainless steel tubing and installed a 6’ section between two of our lifeline stanchions. We plan to use it for lashing fuel tanks instead of the wooden boards that cruisers usually lash on. The stainless tube will let us see more out of our port lights than our old boards, they’re low maintenance and look great too. Thanks Jim!

We’ve been getting to know our neighbors (2 boats down), a couple who restore classic fiberglass boats. We’ve seen two of their projects; they’ve done 24 so far. They do an awesome job of restoring old beauties. This graceful double ender is their latest project.

We took a little time out to tour the 50^th annual Mystic arts festival which abutted our marina as seen in this photo. They had some beautiful artwork and crafts on exhibit along with lots of made-for-market stuff. It was a nice and easy diversion from boat work.

The extended weekends have been great for getting things done. In addition to all of the above Susan and I moved a van load of stuff out of my house and I even managed to squeeze in a computer class at the Apple store.

Next weekend I’ll start insulating our cold box in preparation to installing the new refrigeration unit. I can’t wait to see how well our solar array handles the demand of refrigeration. Our goal is: cold & ice without running our engine.

Cruising tip: 2 things that have been helping us along; yoga on the dock in the mornings & mojitos in the cockpit at dusk. As usual, it’s the simper things in life that enrich & enliven.

84 days...

Clearing the decks; old log books the moon and more - dan

I’ve been clearing out my old computer files in preparation to transferring the useful files to a new computer (a 13’ MacBook Pro) that I picked up yesterday. My old G4 workhorse was starting to act wonky and I decided that this was a good time for a new computer. At the same time that I’ve been transferring files (iTunes, Gigs of photos etc), I’ve been cleaning out my basement filing cabinets of: car files, insurance files, files on interesting places to visit and years of old tax files, all going, going gone. Feels great!

Along with all that detritus of modern life I’m throwing I came across the logbooks of my two previous boats. Somethings set a body back and force you to take stock and these old logs did just that. There’s a lot of me set down in those pages but in spirit and necessity, they’re going in the barrel too. I dearly loved those two boats; Falcor the F31 that went to weather like a witch, tacked like an Olympic class dinghy and off the wind skedaddled like a bat-out-of-hell. Luna Maru the Dean 400 that loved nothing better that a strong gale to kick her heals up in. The times I had on those wonderful boats but that’s past and allover now. It’s time to make room, lots of room, both physically & mentally, for plenty of new adventures, so into the barrel they go. I’m clearing the decks.

It seems the more one clears out the past, the more room one has for the future.

I walked out into my back yard tonight and raised my arms in a greeting to the full moon that’s raising in the eastern sky; chandra namaskara!

91 days...

Focus and fun - dan
I have to admit that I’m having a little trouble maintaining focus and discipline project wise lately. I’m not feeling worn-out or out-of-energy. It’s something different. Actually I feel like a kid who wants to do everything at once; insulate the cold box and install a 12 volt refrigeration system (can’t wait to see how the solar system handles the load), build shelves in the head and storage locker (I enjoy doing carpentry work), install the rain water catchment system, security grates for the companion way & main deck hatch, macerator pump for the holding tank… but it’s a little hard to focus on what exactly to do next. We’ve been working steadily for over a year getting the boat ready to sail and our houses ready to sell. Lately we’ve been working on the boat over 4 daylong weekends and on our homes, (me repairing tornado damage) during the middle of the week.

So what we did this weekend was to load our new Montague folding mountain bikes aboard Gypsy and head to Block Island. We left last Thursday and had a beautiful 4-hour sail out to Block in delicious 12 to 14kt winds. It felt incredibly wonderful to be sailing again and we did some man-overboard drills along the way to sharpen our skills. The Great Salt Pond had its usual full load of summer boats and we ended up anchoring deep (in 44’ of water) in the middle of the pond, next to a Navy tug which, judging by the lawn furniture on the aft deck, is no longer in the Navy. I’d love to know the story on that.
The little Garmen GPS that I had installed next to our berth proved its worth as thunderstorms moved through during the night. The anchor watch alarm went off whenever we traveled more than 80’ from it last setting. That happened three times during the night and a quick glance at its chart display showed that we were just traveling in a circle around our anchor as the front moved by. We ended up doing a full 360 by dawn. Once when I got up in response to the alarm I heard a bit of yelling over the storm as two of our neighbors separated themselves from an unfortunate nocturnal encounter.
The next morning we loaded our new bikes into the dink and headed for shore. The bikes assembled easily and we were soon on our way enjoying the pastoral beauty of Block Island.
One thing I abhor is buying things as couples that “look alike”. Please don’t get me wrong; I love being with Susan, am proud to identify with her, and truly feel that she is the better half of the us that we are. Even so, I don’t ever want to dress similar to her and would have to kill myself if we ever jointly purchased shirts that said something like “I’m with him/her”. So it was a little hard on me when we ended up buying identical bikes. But here’s my excuse; Montague only makes one civilian mountain bike and in comes in a verity of one color scheme. The up side it that they are excellent bikes and we both were thrilled by them.
We headed out the Northern tip of the island, just past the old lighthouse. That place has always seemed like a natural power spot to me and I noticed that Susan seemed to be picking up on that as she broke out in a fit spontaneous yoga.
We next headed south to town when Susan noticed a storm moving in so we deiced to call our ride short and get back to Gypsy while the getting was good. Saturday was a gorgeous day and we took the dink for a trip out of the harbor and up the coast. I had more fun than a proper sailor should with a motorized boat as we blasted over the ocean’s liquid mogul field. It was really a pristine day. After we had our fill of bumps and thrills we toured the harbor ogling the boats from far and wide.

Susan really is a genius and I’ve learned to pay attention whenever she suggests something and ever better I’ve learned to go along with her wisdom. It was Saturday and we had planned to return to Mystic either the next day or the day after that but Susan observed that it was a beautiful day for sailing and we had a lot that we could be doing for the boat if we were back at the dock where we'd be better able to get things accomplished. Even though I was having a great time I couldn’t (nor wanted to) argue with her logic. We immediately up-anchored and had another wonderful sail in 8 to 12kts of wind. We arrived safe and sound (after a slightly rough landing) at our dock in Mystic. Drinks with Rights of Man’s crew lasted til midnight; then we were up early for a full day of boat projects the next day. I mostly did electrical work and cleaned up the nav station (which had become a dump) and Susan worked on the bright work.

93 days...