by miami | Dec 6, 2013
We crossed into Florida late morning.
Since Goose’s eyes were looking a little more brown than usual, we dropped an anchor off a likely looking beach, dropped the dingy and all went ashore for frolicking, sand spurs and pooping. Not necessarily in that order.
BTW we did bring the piece of carpet and slid it under Goose at the perfect moment. It was pretty funny to see him look around with an expression of WTH? You can see me carrying the carpet. Now just picture me running through the sand spurs barefoot chasing Goose while he frantically looks for the ‘perfect’ spot.
Back on the road and another 40 miles brings us to 15 miles north of St. Augustine where we plan to stop tomorrow for fuel, some sewing machine parts and a few other things.
Shelly has a Reads heavy duty sewing machine we have carried around since our first boat Naiad, and needs some parts for it so she can start making canvas for Yume. We need sail covers, a Bimini for the cockpit, motor covers , bike bags and more…
Anchoring was fun tonight as we ran until almost dark, then could not find anywhere off the waterway deep enough. We need at least 6 feet to feel comfortable. So we had to line ourselves up just out of the channel and hold ourselves there with two anchors so we can’t swing out into the Chanel when the tide starts running the other way.
We can see the lights of St Augustine to the south and Jacksonville to the north and it seems every star in the sky is particularly bright this evening. It is warm enough to be outside in a tee shirt and we are all a bit burnt!
Ryan is learning a lot fast. He is learning how to lower and run the dingy (in a current no less), about anchoring, steering and navigation, radios and engines. Homeschooling?
So far so good. We want to stop and make Yume pretty cosmetically but we have to keep moving South.
There will be time. One day we will post a picture and the boat accents and canvas will all be navy blue, with proper sail covers, nice woodwork etc.
Even with all of that, we are still very pleased! And very glad to be in Florida!
by miami | Dec 6, 2013
We dropped anchor as the sun was going down about 5pm today after just 4 hours of running.
On Tuesday we made about 60 miles in ten hours and anchored in St. Simon’s Island for the night. We are trying to train Goose to do his business on a piece of carpet but he is having none of that yet. In fact he is actually a bit leery of the moving around on deck ever since he slipped and fell in the water off the dock in Savannah.
A 60 pound wet dog is not easy to pull out of the drink!
Anyway, we dropped the dingy in St. Simons and motored in to let him fertilize the ground. He was extremely grateful. Tomorrow we will try the carpet again.
Yesterday (Wednesday) when I started the motor at 0630 there was a funny burning smell. I have been a bit worried about the alternator as we are using a LOT of power to run the 30 year old AC refrigeration compressor off the alternator and the inverter. It works but…
As soon as we pulled up the anchor the smell got worse and the tachometer quit. (The tach is driven off the alternator) so I shut it down and dropped an anchor to check.
Three hours later I still had not figured out why the alternator was squealing like a stuck pig and getting very hot. Luckily just a few miles down the waterway was a marina with a mechanic who could look.
We made it to a dock at the marina, and the mechanic and an older electronics guy I had found showed up. They spent 2 hours to tell me my belt was not tight enough. Charge – $380.00
Dumb me. I just did not trust myself, and had over thought the problem and had convinced myself there was a bigger issue. In fact I convinced these two guys too! There is a really good lesson here!
No worries. I enjoyed talking with both of them and they helped me understand some other questions I had about alternators and inverters.
Then as soon as they left, Ryan and I tackled getting the old non functioning generator out of the hole…
This had been nagging at me for four weeks. How to do it, what was wrong with it and can it be fixed with our limited resources.
We got it out in 2.5 hours and used the main halyard to get it up on deck. How many 15 year olds get to remove a generator from an engine and get a lesson on how they work? Ryan is fun to work with. He is smart and willing and asks good questions…
The field windings were measuring open and when we took it apart it was obvious that due to salt water leaking on the main engine and being sucked in by the cooling fan on the generator, the insulation on the wires connecting the field windings had deteriorated, and they had broken. (For all you mechanical minded friends!)
Hopefully we can get it fixed in south Florida…
We got off the dock today at 2 and turned south again after a short detour due to the captains inability to pay attention!
Tomorrow the goal is Jacksonville Fl, and then on to St. Augustine the next day.
299 miles to West Palm Beach and we have to meet Ian there on the 20th.
And the shakedown cruise continues! Hopefully the sunny 70 degree days will continue. Not bad for December!
by miami | Dec 2, 2013
Yume preparing to get under way!
After a morning of installing a couple more last minute storage shelves, we borrowed at rich for one last run to the store for essentials. Then we moved Yume to the fuel dock to see how much the bill would be. It was very nice to find out we only needed to top the tanks off with 32 gallons instead of the 130 holds! Especially at marina prices of 4.99 a gallon!
UPS arrived with our new mizzenmast sail just as we were finishing so we paid the bill, said goodbye and headed down the river on a glorious day…
We made it about 9 miles before the sun starting setting and anchored in a quiet creek for the night. The rum is out and the grill is going for the London broil.
The sunset is awesome. And we are so glad to be here!
by miami | Nov 29, 2013
Putting up a first sail on Yume
We put up a sail today. This is a big deal! Had the boat a month and finally got to go out. Not far, no wind, but nothing bad happened either!
We did discover that the chart plotter would not come on ( found out later some idiot hooked the power wire to the gauge light switch), and that the knot meter did not work ( Ryan learned how to take it out while in the water and clean it), and we learned that the genoa unfurls and furs quite nicely.
She ran a bit slow but methinks the beard and barnacle on the bottom have a lot to do with that. The revs were running very high as well but that could be dirty bottom and/ or wrong size prop. I would not be surprised if the prop were incorrectly sized at all.
A diver is coming this weekend to clean the bottom, check the zincs and the prop…
After a nasty couple of days, Thanksgiving started cold (ice on the dock) but once the sun came up it was a glorious day. We started looking for the leaks (think the screws in the rub rail need rebedding) and cleaned the hull a little.
I replaced the propane solenoid first thing only to find some idiot (me) had ordered the wrong voltage so it had to be taken back out and the old one cleaned up and replaced so the bird could join us for dinner!
And what a first dinner it was!
The best part of the day was definitely going out though. We only have a few more days here as we have to be in west palm beach DEC 20 which is 525 miles away. Since we only do 6-7 miles an hour, and can run about 10 hours at most a day we have to get moving!
Ryan got a 6′ cast net and was out as soon as the weather cleared learning how to throw it, and I got up on the bow to test the anchoring systems.
We are all excited to get moving on. Settling down to routines on the boat and learning how to manage three people and one dog in 41 feet is actually easier than we thought. In fact it feels like we have always been here.
Getting more work done online too!
Plus you just can’t beat those views off the back deck!
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