Thursday, August 14, 2008

another pic

Here is a pic of after the cove and boot stripes were painted. There is still some masking tape on the cove stripe!

Work in Progress

Today the boot and cove stripes were painted. We (Alyson) finished with all the scrubbing and such. I got a few electrical problems corrected and am beginning to tackle the hatch leaks. I also had to dry out sails. It seems the groove that catches the water on the forward lockers drains directly into the lockers! As you might expect, anything in the lockers gets wet. One more item to add to my list. We are knocking off early and going to find some good seafood in downtown Beaufort tonight.

Wednesday, August 13, 2008

Fwd: On the Hard


Well, we are currently waiting for maintenance to be completed.  There are a lot of little things that need to be taken care of!  Alyson and I are spending a couple of days on her simply cleaning and scrubbing every surface.  OK, She's cleaning and scrubbing - I'm just trying to learn all the new systems, trace wires, and generally troubleshoot anything that doesn't work properly.  Tomorrow I hope to post a picture of Aly Cat out of the water.  She sure makes the Lincoln Navigator look small by comparison!

Sunday, August 10, 2008

Bringing her home

When we bought the boat, she was some 200 miles up the Chesapeake from Norfolk at Georgetown MD Yacht Basin. Our first task was to bring her to Beaufort NC for a refit at Jarrett Bay Boatworks. For such a task I enlisted the help of master sailor and delivery Captain James "Bo" Petty. We began our voyage around 3:00pm on national marina day, Saturday 1 August. The first leg called for motoring 10 miles out the Sassafras river to the Chesapeake and a turn south. By the time we reached the Chesapeake, squalls surrounded the bay and lightning flashed all around. We dug in and soldiered on to make Tolchester on the Eastern shore just as the most violent of the storms approached and the sun disappeared across the bay. Once safely tied off at Tolchester, we discovered the power was out at the marina. That meant no hot restaurant meal, no real toilets on land, and no long shower in the guesthouse. But, just being securely tied to a dock was better than nothing! We awoke the next day to gloriously clear skies. Departing at sunrise, we set our course for the Chesapeake Bay Bridge. By That evening, we had made it to a small river just north of the Potomac. We glided back into the gentle waters seeking a shelter for the night and found a beautiful bay to drop the hook. An early departure the next morning allowed us to close in on Norfolk by the late afternoon. With rush hour approaching, we knew the bridges would be under an opening restriction so we tied up in Portsmouth for a cold one and a Mexican dinner on the harbour. With restrictions over, we pressed on and made it through Great Lock in the Virginia Cut part of the ICW. We tied up after passing through the lock and settled in for the night. The following day we would see very little traffic compared to the Chesapeake, but would see much more natural and unspoiled beauty. We saw our first of a dozen or so Bald Eagles and Osprey too numerous to count. We made good time throughout the day only slowing to scrape our masthead antenna on the girders of 65' fixed bridges. That night we anchored at the entrance to the Alligator Canal. We had more squalls that night during which we ended up dragging anchor. Once our anchor was reset, we got a few more winks before starting the Alligator the next morning. Ah yes, the Alligator Canal; 20 miles of straight as the eye can see canal with houses few and far between. With the canal to our stern, we weaved our way along the Albemarle sound, across the Pamlico and up the Neuse River to Adams Creek. Jarrett Bay lay just 10 miles from the entrance to Adams Creek. We arrived at Jarrett Bay by 6:30. With Aly Cat's first inland passage already behind her, we tied up awaiting haul out the next morning.

Intro

This blog will chronicle the adventures of the sailing vessel Aly Cat