Life is falling into place

We find ourselves looking right into the last month of living a land based life. This past week found us on the boat for 8 days, the longest I think since we purchased her 2 years ago this month. The weather was fairly crappy as we had a large front lingering around Florida for quite some time. Not too much rain in Panama City but the winds were pretty hefty and the temps actually got down to about 57 one evening. We managed to pack the truck full before leaving home and actually found a home for all items. Got the new mattress installed on our berth and I slept like a baby most every night. Got lots of organizing done, lazerettes cleaned out and stuff we can live without packed into the truck for long term storage. As I sit here and write this I am now recalling that I left a bag of potatoes behind the stove. Whew! That's gonna be rank by the time we get back down there. Maybe we need to make a call to a dock neighbor.

We did manage to head out to Shell Island on Sunday afternoon and spent the evening grilling steaks and enjoying sun downers with Gary & Jan of S/V Divine Miss Em. Memorial day we headed to the island and did a little beach walking and taking a quick dip to cool off. The water temp is still only 75 so its a bit chilly when you first try to get in. After grilling some dogs for lunch we pulled anchor and headed for the docks. Dirk threw out a line hoping to catch some fish or perhaps the fish that the day before ended up with a new lure of ours. Anyone catching a large fish with a red and white lure attached we claim dibs. From the anchorage to the fuel docks I had the wheel and when I tried to pass it on to Dirk to take over he claimed "You will be fine" Oh no, not again.....He did this before to me. Surprise!!! your taking her in. He knows better then to tell me before hand because he knows how anxious I get. So like the good husband he is, he springs it on me last minute. Once I get close to our dock I see Charley from a couple boats over standing on our finger pier there to offer assistance. Guess once he saw me at the wheel he figured I would need it. Perhaps he was just protecting his boat...With gentle encouragement from Dirk I got her into the slip with no problems. Even got some atta girls from the hubby and Charley saying I did a job well done. (as I grinned from ear to ear) Ah the little things. Once my heart rate dropped below 100 bpm I opened up a Corona and toasted the evening. Life is good.

Oh, before I forget. Dirk is officially among the ranks of the "retired" About 2 weeks ago there was a luncheon recognizing him and bidding him farewell. Here he is accepting the black hawk helicopter given as a token. (Hummmm, maybe we can put it on top of the mast as a wind vain of sorts) Congratulations Dirk, you deserve this time off for the many years of service you gave to this country. So here we are back at home dealing with packing, storing, and beginning to tie up some loose ends. I will check in soon and let you all know how its going. Till then.....

44 days till we become liveaboards

Figured I needed to put out a blog as here it is almost mid May and I haven’t done one yet. First things first, for those keeping up. Our official count is 44 days but we have had so many wrenches thrown in the mix I really am not sure what I was counting down to. I think I originally was counting till Dirk was completely done with work. That changed…. He had so many leave and sick days accrued that this morning finds him heading off to work on his last Monday. Yep, that’s right, Friday is his last day. Then we had gotten our lease renewal in the mail Saturday and realized our lease isn’t up on the 30th of June but in fact the 24th. So we have a week less of living in the apartment. Yikes!!! So I guess if we count the number of days until we become liveaboards then that would bring us to huh......I just counted and its 44 days till our lease is up. So my count is correct, I just didn’t realize it.

Two weeks ago found us down at the marina for a three day weekend. Saturday was the annual marine flea market so we put out a few items that we had removed off the boat and tried our luck. We made just enough money for Dirk to turn around and spend it at another booth. That’s how it goes sometimes, but the items he bought we in fact had intentions on buying anyway. He managed to get a good price on them to boot. Was a long day as it started at 6am and by 11am we packed up the left over gear and headed back to the boat. We met a great couple from a 50 foot trimaran that were on their way south. Beautiful boat which Bill the Captain had built himself. His wife JoAnne and he charter their boat “Yacht Ultra” in the Texas area and decided to take a break and do some traveling. They will be heading down to the Bahamas next season so I’m sure we will run into them again. So our evening was spent having dinner with new friends and old as we joined Gary & Jan from Divine Miss Em for great food and conversation.

Sunday found us packing up and heading home to prepare for a yard sale this past weekend. How do two people accumulate so much stuff? Up at 5:30 to face the day and by 6:30 the people started showing up. All in all it was a very prosperous day. Thank goodness that is done.

This week my goal is to get the bedding custom fit for our berth. I had said in the past that we purchased a memory foam mattress system. It came with a 90 day in home trial so we did the trial for about 6 weeks and decided we liked it. So yesterday was spent cutting it down to the size of the berth. Simple? Yeah right…..Nothing is ever simple…Not only is the berth an odd shape it also has an odd angle as in one spot it follows the shape of the hull. Measure twice, cut once, or in our case measure twice, re measure, sit and think about it a while then ah what the heck cut and leave a little extra. Then I spent the evening custom fitting the mattress cover that came with it. Guess it’s ours now, no sending this one back. Today will be spent custom fitting sheets and after yesterday custom fitting the cover I don’t think it will be too big of a deal. I am no seamstress but I am learning my way around that sewing machine.
We are planning on taking some time during the Memorial Day weekend to put down the tools and plans and just relax. Slip away from the dock, sail over to Shell Island and anchor out for a couple days to decompress and enjoy. What a needed break that will be. Will try and have something interesting to report or pictures to post after the weekend away.

60 days and counting, or maybe less

My counter reads 60 days till Dirk is done with work and is officially retired. Then we begin our new chapter in life. However in reality it is less as Dirk has accumulated time off and sick days that need to be taken. In less then a month he is outta there......Things here at the home front seem to be put into overdrive at least for me. Packing, sorting, organizing, stacking, and piling, the story of my life right now. Were getting some last minute items ordered as we realize that before long we wont have a home address to ship things to. I'm coming to realize that this is all happening weather I'm ready or not, but it just doesn't seem like reality yet. I guess because this has been so long in the making that it actually getting here just doesn't seem real. Let me pinch myself, yikes, yes it's real.

As far as the boat goes we were down last weekend and pulled the cushions from the vee berth in order to start transforming it into "the garage" See the pic below to see the before. It wont look like this for long, now, how to maximize the space.

Dirk also finished putting the shelves in the closet in the back berth for me. Now we have begun to transfer clothing down. How does one take a walk in closet and 2 dressers full and cull it down to two shelves a piece? Two and a half if I can figure somewhere else for the endless number of flip flops, boat shoes, and land shoes to go. We have this one and a smaller closet right next to it that use to house the drop down sink that was removed. I'm still wondering though, hows it gonna fit? Minimize, minimize, minimize, ummm scary words for a woman, not so bad for a man, he who can wear the same shorts for so many days on end that they could stand up on their own. I myself will need to get use to wearing the same thing more then once. Gonna take some practice. Get me some rum, that will make it easier, I just wont care.....

We also installed the new table we got for the cockpit. After thinking that it would be straightforward to adjust it for height we were sadly mistaken and after a few small setbacks we got it done with happy results. Now we can enjoy our meals outside and actually have a place other then our lap to put our plate. This of course shows the table in the folded position.

Other progress being made is the new mattress arrived for the back berth and we have it on our bed here at home giving it the test trial. Seems pretty good as I have not awaken yet with a sore back as I do each morning on the boat. We just wanted to make sure we liked it before whacking it down to fit our odd shaped berth. Words keep ringing, measure twice, cut once, measure twice, cut once. Cross your fingers...Anyway, just wanted to give some kind of update as its been a few weeks. Till next time..........

Up grades and new additions

I decided to sit and make a list of the up grades and new additions that we have been doing with Tybee Time since her purchase 2 years ago. I guess we could have gotten more done, but living two hours away from her doesn't afford too much time for work on board. But then again I know that during the summer we usually spend more time enjoying her rather then working on her. Hey, ya gotta have some fun sometime....I know everyone when considering cruising has to make decisions about what is important and what they can live without. One must make compromises about the little nicer things in life but its the compromises we are willing to make in order for us to pursue our dream. I think we have for the time being gotten all the larger projects out of the way and really are only left with doing the small things. Below is a list we compiled.

General

Replaced all Hatches & windows with new Lexan
Refurbished engine control panel
Added a new Raymarine 24 mile 18” Radar and mast platform
Added a new Raymarine C-80 for the nav pod
Added a new Raymarine Wind Vane
Replaced the Throttle and Clutch control Handles
Refurbished the compass on the cockpit pedestal
Added a new bigger pedestal guard
Added a new fold out teak table and drink/binocular holder
Added sheet bags in the cockpit
Added a new anchor windless
Added a new battery under front berth designated for anchor windless
Added a new Kyocera 135 watt solar panel
Added a new 12 v Air Breeze wind generator
Added a new party size Magma grill
New mainsail
New mainsail cover and lazy bag system
Added a new sunbrella cover for cockpit pedestal
Added a new larger nav pod for steering pedestal
Refinished all topside teak
Added 3 new house batteries and 1 new start battery
Added new mounting blocks and foot blocks for Genoa
Replaced the old manual bilge pump in the cockpit
Added a mid-ship cleat to each side
Added a new remote station for radio c/d player down below into the nav pod
Got 150 foot of triple B chain for anchor
Had the bottom sand blasted, keel joint re-done, rudder repaired, 5 barrier coats applied and hard bottom paint applied.
New Walker Bay Genisis 10’2” hypalon hard bottom dinghy
New Mercury 9.9 horsepower 4 stroke outboard for dinghy

Head area

Added a new faucet with shower head diverter
Installed a new shower curtain track

Nav Station

Added a Tri Metric 2020 Battery system Monitor
Added a new water & waste Sensa tank marine 100 tank monitor
Extended shelf above nav station to better utilize space

Salon
Added a new 21” Flat Panel TV for salon
Installed new Teak & Holly flooring throughout the boat
Redoing the cushions on the settees

Galley
Installed a new faucet
Added a new salt water faucet and foot pump
Added a cutting board cover for the stove to increase work space
Added a new glass rack over galley sink
Added shelving in the cabinet over fridge

Back & front Berth
Added shelving to hanging lockers and cabinets in back berth
Recovered cushions in both the front and back berth

We have decided that we are going to pull the cushions in our back berth and buy a new memory foam mattress. Our berth just isn't that comfortable and if we are going to be sleeping on it every night then I have to be comfy. Looking online for a good quality memory foam mattress will give anyone a good case of sticker shock but I found one that seems to be a decent quality and the price is right. They also give you an in home trial so we will give it a go and if we like it then we will cut it to fit the ever so odd shaped bed that every boat seems to have. One other thing we are planning on doing is pulling the cushions from the front berth and changing that into our garage/store room. Yes we are getting rid of one berth but our guest will have to either sleep in the salon, or we will give up our area for their stay. The salon has a single and a u shaped settee that has a filler, so they call that a double. At any rate we will make it work. If anyone has any ideas for creating nifty storage areas in the vee berth or other places please feel free to comment. At this point I need all the pointers I can get. Also if anyone has any questions regarding anything we have up graded or added please feel free to ask. We did everything ourselves so we know what it took to get it done. Oh yeah, 77 days and counting.....Whooooohooo.

Spring is here and time is short

Well here it is spring. A time Dirk and I have been looking forward to for a very long time as it signifies that we are getting down to the wire. In fact our countdown indicates that we have 85 days till his last day of work. I am noticing in the blogs I read that everyone is beginning to wind down their winter cruises and beginning to make tracks back home to the U.S. and Canada. As much as I hate seeing their cruising season ending I know that Dirk and I will be among the group heading out next season. On the home front here, things are beginning to get mentally hectic for us as we have started making piles. Piles of stuff that will be going on board with us, piles for long term storage, piles for the dreaded garage sale, and finally, piles for giving away to family, friends, and to charity. Once we make the final jump to living aboard then I think maybe we can begin chilling.

Work on board is coming along great. Dirk finished installing all the shelves in our back berth closets and he did such a great job that now I'm looking for other places for him to do the same. The last time we were down at the boat we took the new dinghy down. We had to wait until we sold the old one before this one could go down, so for several weeks we had it sitting in the middle of our living room. We picked up the new outboard on Saturday morning and after reading instructions for it Dirk got it up and running. I had to mention reading instructions in the same sentence as Dirk as that doesn't happen very often. I even had to capture a photo of it.

Alright, alright, sorry. Just that men reading instructions before they do something is almost unheard of. Usually its only done when they have exhausted all other means. I will have to say, I have been guilty of the same in the past, I just don't like to admit it.Once Dirk got everything up and running we decided to head out to the bay and start breaking the engine in. I had driven our last dinghy exactly once so looks like I needed a lesson. It was so nice how easy it started for me and I had fun zipping around the bay. We both agree that this new dinghy is to our liking.

So the last couple coats of varnish are going onto the new cockpit table and it will be installed this weekend. Little jobs here and there to be done but for the most part the big jobs are behind us now. I think.......

Solar panel & wind generator up and running

Well we had four full days of beautiful weather to work on the boat this past weekend. Although we didn't get everything done that we wanted to, we did get two important things marked off the list. First thing was to get the wind generator installed. Last time we were down we had mounted the main bracket on the transom and measured the two support poles to cut. Well the two support poles were mounted and the generator itself got wired and mounted. We didn't have much wind, but what little we had showed us that we will be happy with our choice. The solar panel that we chose was the Kyocera 135 watt solar panel. Its fits very nicely on the dinghy davits but proved to be a pain to install. We figured that it would go in very easily, first mistake. We measured twice and drilled once, well maybe twice on some. We have an aluminum bracket that goes across the davits as extra support. Dirk added two more brackets to support the panel pictured below.

Here the panel is being attached to the new aluminum brackets.
Below is a photo of the wind generator and solar panel in their final homes. We still have plenty of room to use the swim platform for entering and exiting the dingy, or showering using the transom shower without hitting your head.
A few other items that we did not get to was the install of the shelves I am putting into the hanging lockers. I think adding shelves will increase our storage space dramatically. We did a rough cut and took them down to do a final fitting. With the curves in the closets it always makes for interesting cuts. Haven't found an easy way to do it yet. And after the time and effort I put into refinishing our cockpit table and drink holder we decided to purchase a different one anyway. Dirk was going to build one, but that was before we sold the house and had to put all our woodworking tools in storage. Our current one is more for a snack and drink table but doesn't afford you to be able to actually eat off it as its too small. After hunting around we actually found one reasonably priced. If anyone has ever priced teak cockpit tables you know what I mean when I say I got sticker shock on most of them. The table does come unfinished but I like the fact that I can finish it to match the other outside teak. The one downside we found and I read this in the feedback that others left was that the table was tall. If you mount it like they say to, yes it is a bit tall. Anyone have a booster seat I can use? So we have decided to alter it to fit our height preference. Not a big deal at all from what we can tell, we haven't started on it so its still up for debate.
Here is the table with the leaves open, closed they are still larger then our existing table. Hummmmmm, looks like it will make a good poker table to me. And it holds four drinks or two drinks and the binoculars, I think I like it. You can tell spring is in the air as the docks were occupied with owners working on and prepping their boats for some summer fun. I know that both Dirk and myself are more then ready to head out to the island for some R&R. Our count down is now 106 days to go till retirement and moving aboard. Woooohooo, were excited, can you tell? Hang in there readers, interesting stuff to read about is right around the corner.

Is the cool weather leaving anytime soon

Well the three day weekend we were looking forward to brought with it rain, rain, and more rain with cool damp temps. I keep telling Dirk that I can't wait until the weather gets nicer and we can begin enjoying our time on board. I'm so ready to be able to put the cockpit cushions out, make up a nice appetizer, sip on a nice sun downer and just sit back and relax. One day.....Well the wind generator came in and was transported this past weekend with us. We managed to at least decide where was the best place to mount it and got the holes drilled and the bracket in place. We then had to decide where the support brackets would be located so as not to block the entry from the transom and someplace that would not cause us to have to cut the bimini top. We measured and marked the locations, and the poles came back home with us to be cut to size. Here is a picture of Dirk down in the cockpit locker working. As you can see we have a nice big deep locker that makes working in it not so bad. It's amazing how much crap we put in there and need to put more of said crap into it. In other news we decided to dig a little deeper into the cruising kitty and purchase a new dinghy. The one that came with the boat is about 8 years old and has a couple worn spots on the bottom. It also has a minor air leak that we have never gotten around to fixing. Knowing how important a good dinghy is when cruising helped us make this decision easier. I mean it is our one and only means of getting from boat to land. So if you compare it to the cost of a new car I think we faired very nicely. Of course now with the new larger dinghy we will be purchasing a new larger outboard motor. Above is a photo of the Genesis RIB that we purchased. It has a few nice additions such as a dry storage area up front under the floor, and also a flip up seat that has a dry storage area. It is a Vee hull but has a flat floor inside which I think I will like. Our current one has the vee hull but also has a vee floor which always makes for a nice drop off as you are entering it. This one also has a bilge to help keep the floor from pooling with water. Still haven't ordered the solar panel yet as we are still trying to decide how it will be mounted to the davits. At this point we have enough projects to keep us busy for a couple weeks.