Well today is theoretically our last day on the hard.
We finished cleaning up the topside, stowed stuff and then went to get the courtesy car to run into town. It was gone already so we waited for it to come back then shared it with Beth and Art from Adagio. We went to the grocery store for last minute items, to West Marine for fenders and to the fire dept. for water. Then stopped at Maggie Moo’s (a deli) for a late lunch/early dinner. They have pretty-good sandwiches there. We still need to try out the ones at Bellas.
Wednesday, October 28, 2009 Deltaville Boatyard, Deltaville, VA
Very rainy night last night. I listened to wave after wave of rain come in – some of it quite heavy. We were supposed to get the boat launched this morning but when they came to launch us they did an inspection and they noticed that we had a loose cutlass bearing. Sooo we’re waiting to hear the prognosis on that. Matt was supposed to come down and look at it and give us a cost but at noon when I came down to the marina lounge he still hadn’t been to the boat.
We noticed that the Island Packet “The Dove” was coming back out of the water (he just got launched yesterday). He discovered that he has a leak around the propeller shaft. Hope it’s not too serious and I’m glad he didn’t get to far out before discovering it.Wayne is still onboard emptying out the lazarett so they can get to the shaft, etc… I’m in the marina lounge catching up on reading/writing/playing computer games and generally staying out of Wayne’s hair while he waits for the bad news/good news. Bad news in that we need to fix it and it probably won’t be cheap, good news in that it will be fixed so we don’t have to have her pulled out of the water at an inopportune time to have a repair done.
Thursday, October 29, 2009 Deltaville Boatyard
Mack was at the boat at 7:40 this morning – as we were sitting in the cabin drinking our morning coffee, we could hear wham, wham, wham, outside of the boat on the propeller shaft. I threw some shorts on then we went down to see who was there. We were expecting a couple of guys but Matt has the flu so it was only Mack. We said good morning to him and he went over what the plan was for the day. I thought we should tell him that other Bayfield’s had to have the rudder dropped to get the prop-shaft off but Wayne said - I shouldn’t. “Mechanics don’t like to be told how to do things.” Two hours later he told us that we’d have to drop the rudder to get the propeller shaft off. Gee imagine that. Wayne decided to go onto the Bayfield site to see what others had done. He seemed to remember that not all of the Bayfield’s had to do that. Quite a few had to drop the rudder but Carolyn & Rick (Windborne III) didn’t have to so it looked like it was a toss up where the Bayfield 36’s were concerned. Some seemed to have to and others didn’t. We thought it might be that some had already been through the process and had left clearance for when they had to do it again. We didn’t have the wiggle room necessary.
Mack worked on trying to get the shaft loose for the day and they’ll have to lift the boat when the parts get here - whether its tomorrow or Monday… We’re going to wait so the boat only needs to be lifted once. It was interesting to note that one of the stainless bolts that he showed us looked like it had started to become eaten through – almost like wormholes. Stainless steel is stainless from the chromium in the steel. The protective surface of the stainless is formed from chromium oxide. If the oxygen can't get to the chromium there's no protection and the bolt corrodes (Crevise corrosion of stainless). So we had a little corrosion going on there. They're going to replace the old bolts with silica bronze bolts which won't have that problem - Theoretically.
Wayne and I tightened the bolts to the bimini (required one above deck and one below deck) then I decided to go exploring with my camera. Since it was quite a bit cooler today than yesterday I changed from shorts to jeans and a hooded sweatshirt and left the testosterone to work on the boat. I took one of the bikes from the marina and went over to the nature center/museum to explore. The museum was closed but it was an interesting looking place. They had huge fields of zinnias that were all in the later stages of their life – not a good picture but quite colorful. From there I explored some back roads then went back to the main road (33) and pedaled up to Maggie Moos to pick up a couple sandwiches to take back to the boat. By the time I got back, my legs felt like rubber. It was a great ride. The air was cool and it felt like one of those wonderful fall days where there was a nip in the air, but not cold enough to feel like you needed a winter parka yet. It kept looking like it was going to rain but never did.
Wayne was in the process of putting the boat ladder back together (it had been dissassembled to varnish the teak steps) and Mack was off looking for a magnet to retrieve bilge treasure. He came back magnetless (it was in use somewhere else) and proceeded to drop his flashlight into the bilge water. It floated though so it was retrieved and in good shape once he dried it off. I handed him a few tools while he was in the engine compartment, and after he left, scarfed down my sandwich from Maggies. By the way the white bull terrier’s name is Maggie too. She’s one of the boatyard dogs that hang out here and seems all right if you don’t try and pet her. I managed to get a picture of her as she was checking out one of the new boat dogs that are visiting at the marina.
A great bassett hound 3 boats down belongs to one of the fishermen that’s working on his boat. The fisherman seems like quite a character and so is the Bassett hound. The poor dog seems to be allergic to grass so the guy feeds him Benedryl, hidden in a hotdog to keep the poor dog from scratching himself to death.
Its partner is a small Chihuahua with stripes like a tiger that wears a little pink sweater. Talk about Mutt and Jeff…Saturday, October 31, 2009
Crazy night last night, crazy morning this morning. Can’t wait to see what the day brings. Last night Wayne had a night of vivid dreams. This morning I was then awake before sunrise to the sound of the boatlift 2 boats down so decided to get up and make coffee. While at anchor, I always make it on the alcohol stove (it’s the only way that I can). When we have shore power, I use the little electric drip pot. A little jobbie-do that makes 4 cups that are really only 2 mugs so I always make two pots and put them in the thermos.
In the middle of this operation, the coffeepot stopped making coffee and the light on it went off. So I check the hummingbird nightlight (which is always on under shore power) and it was out too. I threw on my pants and shoes and checked the power in the cockpit to make sure we were plugged in then followed our power cord down the ladder and around two boats to the power post in the boatyard and the cord was lying on the ground. Someone else had unplugged us and had plugged into the socket we had been plugged into. I eye balled the cord and scanned where it went up into an old powerboat between our boat, and the plug and heard movement inside the boat. I shouted “hello!” No response. “HELLOOOO???” and a guy stuck his head up out of the boat. “Yeah?”
“Did you unplug me?”
“Yeah, I’m with the boat yard and needed the electricity.” The boatyard takes precedence over the power when we need it.
“Oh… I was in the middle of making coffee when the power went out.”
“Well. I’m with the boatyard and the work with the boatyard takes precedence over your making coffee!”
“Well… I just didn’t know what happened. I was making coffee and the power went off.”
“Well it looks like I can’t pump the boat out anyway.” “Like I said, the boatyard work takes precedence. Then I’ll plug you back in, in about ten minutes.”
My mouth dropped open; I turned and tromped back to the boat trying to figure out if I could drain the water back out of the little Mr. Coffee and into the stove coffeepot. By the time I got back up the ladder and below to the galley the coffee pot was busy doing it's thing again, filling the cabin with the smell of coffee. I went back up top, then down the ladder and over to the powerboat to thank him for allowing me the use of the power to finish making my morning coffee, but when I yelled “Hello?” again there was no response and he was gone.
It’s going to be one of those days. 7:40 in the morning, and the boat yard is in full swing confiscating power. I started really getting ticked, the more I thought about the whole thing, as I sat topside drinking my coffee. You’d think they’d have had the courtesy to let us know before unplugging the power, instead of just taking the power away from us. We could have been in the middle of something that could have been disastrous. I realize that the boatyard work takes precedence over my making coffee, but it seems like it would have been a common courtesy to inform people that their power was about to be disrupted instead of just turning it off. Grumble, grumble, grumble…
After coffee and breakfast (scrambled eggs and smoky links) we headed through the boatyard to the showers. The mechanic that had gotten snippy and had unplugged us was walking back towards the boats. Our eyes locked. As we approached each other (insert the theme to “the Good the Bad and the Ugly gun fight scene here”), he began apologizing for unplugging me. He said that he didn’t know if there would be anybody up or not and didn’t want to wake us. I told him when I got back to the boat and saw the coffee pot brewing away again, I came back up top and down the ladder to thank him for letting me make coffee but that he’d disappeared. He said that he’d unplugged the other boat and she came up saying he’d unplugged their freezer (Jim and Christine from Baroness). After that, he couldn’t get the pump to work anyhow, and had to take out one of the thru-hulls to let the water out of the boat. I gave him a hug; we made up and continued on our separate ways and I felt better about the incident.
Once I got to the showers the two that I’m allowed to use were both occupied. There are 3 shower stalls in the women’s area, two regular ones and one handicapped shower. The one that said “Handicapped Only” was unoccupied. I debated with myself over this, and then headed to the office to ask Ed if it would be okay for me to use it since both the others were occupied? He said sure, why not? I said because it said “Handicapped Only” so thought I would check. He thanked me for checking and I headed back to the showers faking a limp. Ahhhhh, a hot shower… for 1.5 minutes, then the water got lukewarm, then cold… Yep… that kind of day… Since I was already wet with shampoo all over my hair, I hurried through the rest of the shower, rinsed off, conditioned the hair, then jumped back out to the shower to try and warm up again. It’s good feeling clean but the dentist will scold me for grinding my teeth against the cold water. I’ve been told that I grind my teeth a lot in my sleep and should get a guard – something to put on my over-due to do list.
After that I grabbed a bike for a bike-ride through the park while Wayne checked out the plumbing and took a nap. The girl on Foxglove was busily carving up jack-o-lanterns to sit outside the boat & she did a nice job of it. At 5pm we headed over to the museum/park to get ready for the spooky fun. Matt and Jen were there still setting up and they had a witches costume for me. Wayne helped me put on face paint and fake blood. I was soooo wishing I had my costume from home, but hey – beggars can’t be choosy and after the white face paint, blood and white spray for the hair, standing above the green light in my cauldron I looked down right spooky enough to scare some kids with my cackle and laugh. “Commmme to me chilllld – I have witches candy for youuuuuuuu. WAh hahaha haaaaa…” I had a blast. Even with the teenagers that came through looking like ya – right – realllly scary… At one point after cackling at a group of teens and getting a humph back, I cackled “watch it, I’m your teacher and you better have your homework done for Mondayyyyy”, they all turned around with eyes wide to stare at me one more time to see if I was their teacher LOL. Got em! I went through 6 large bowls of candy tonight that I passed out as “witch’s candy – specially brewed” and there was quite a turn out! It was great. The tin man and Dorothy showed up minus Toto so we joked around about the Wizard having Toto as I cooed “I’ll get you my pretty!” There were a lot of businesses that participated in the haunted forest. The Coast Guard Auxillery was even there with their little robotic tugboat (I love that little tug!). Deltaville and the museum at the point put on an impressive get-together for the kids on Halloween. Wayne and I walked back to the marina lounge after the festivities to see if I could scrub off the face paint. The white hair will have to wait for morning though. Two of the kids that I saw on the spooky trail were there in the shower room also detoxifying their make-up and when they saw me I got a big grin. Guess they recognized me without the witches hat and costume – hmmmm…
The night definitely ended better than the start of the day – ahhhh haaaa haaa haaa haaaaaaaaaaa… Pickle loaf sandwiches, chips and beer before retiring anyone? My voice feels busted after cackling and cooing “I’ll get you my pretty and your little dog too”… ahhhh haaaa haaa haaa haaaaaaaaaaa… I probably won’t be able to talk tomorrow (much to Wayne’s chagrin I bet).
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