Take to the sea

The (mis)adventures of two dreamers that do

Open heart surgery: operating on a broken Raymarine ST2000+

We have had the Doctor, our
Raymarine autopilot, break on us three times in the 4,000 miles since we
left home. The first failure involved some kind of inability for the
electronic fluxgate compass to accurately read our heading. The
succeeding two times, the primary symptom was that the pilot could push
the tiller, but not pull.  

For
the first repair, we waited anxiously in Morro Bay for 5 days while the
Doc flew to the Raymarine repair facility in New Hampshire for a very
prompt turnaround. The second time, we were three days into a 7 day
passage of mainland Mexico, so I opted to crack open the case and
MacGyver a fix myself. This repair was effective for several hundred
more miles until our last passage after one too many squalls, which
brings us to today’s photo tour and a more robust repair.

Join me on an adventure in voided warranty!        

 

Passage notes: Puerto Chiapas, Mexico (Marina Chiapas) to Bahia del Sol, El Salvador (Estero Jaltepeque)

We had heard stories from numerous friends about their transit of the Central American coastline during this time of year. It is rainy season after all. The weather is extremely localized and highly variable. There are frequent squalls and it gets very very wet (hence rainy season). Two of our cruiser friends got caught in squalls with too much sail area up and were pinned against the violent ocean, water spilling into their cockpit and cabin. It was these stories we kept in mind as we said our farewells at Marina Chiapas and headed for the sea. Ironically, these foreboding stories didn’t tamper our overflowing excitement to be on the boat again, on the ocean, moving, sailing. It had been over 4 months and we were eager to be on the open water, though a bit fearful that we both might be rusty from the lack of recent practice (not to mention the diminished upper body strength that results from spending four months of not sailing).

That’s not an otter

Yesterday morning Harmony spotted something odd swimming around the boat. We’ll give you three guesses as to what it was…or you could just click the link : ). 

Gettin’ it: a photo essay

It grew. The boat list that is. Well, no…actually, the boat list itself remained the same size – our aspirations grew…and kept growing and dammit, we’re still working.  I’m happy to report that we have had a ridiculously productive month. This month has actually been strangely reminiscent of last September, except in a foreign country and with temperatures cresting 95 degrees. Makes me miss (albeit briefly) the cool, foggy days in Ilwaco, WA where we repaired our keel smile and replaced the entire bow of our boat last year. 

Never-ending boat list

Every cruiser has one. A boat list. It’s essentially a long list of chores that one needs or wants to accomplish, some in the near-term, some in the long-term. Oftentimes it includes future purchases that will make the boat more comfortable or seaworthy or beautiful. If you ask a cruiser about their boat list, they’ll laugh and tell you that for every item or task they check off, they add at least two more. The list is constantly expanding, rather than contracting. The work is never done. The boat is never complete.

The journey home

It took us four days to get back to the boat from Portland. Two long flights, one night attempting to sleep in the Atlanta airport, two days in San Salvador waiting for Jeff’s fugitive luggage to arrive, a 12+ hour bus ride across two international borders back to Tapachula, and a harrowing 30 minute cab ride in a deluge to Marina Chiapas.

July & August 2013: summer budget experiment

As you probably know I try to track every penny we spend in hopes that if we understand where our money is going we can better control its exodus. But this summer we decided to try an experiment, we decided to go dutch.

Sleep, duty, relation, ship

There are numerous patterns out there for establishing a watch schedule
for ships at sea, with names like “The Swedish System” and the “Five and
Dime”, all of which are trying to solve the problem of allocating
shifts of people in continuous 24-hour operation. These systems are
informed by the tasks required by time of day and what little we
understand about sleep and the human psyche. This is a question that you
will have to confront if you go out on a boat to sea, and what you find
may not be what you expect.