Sail Cutthroat

20 May 2009

Making Progress at the Marina

After two beautiful days, I think Seattle just experienced Summer and now we’re back to some “other” season. That’s right, yesterday afternoon the winds switched around, the temperature dropped and the clouds returned. Shortly thereafter, it began to rain, and rain…and rain some more. Now I just looked online at the weather blip that is fixed to Seattle on my homepage. It suggests that its 55° and Sunny outside…I beg to differ! It’s probably in the low 50′s but it rained since noon yesterday. Well, enough of my whining…this was actually in the weather forecast, so I’m not exactly surprised. So this lovely afternoon rain is allowing me to catch up on some inside work like checking all the electronics out and getting the necessary updates installed on my Navigation and Weather software. That is proving a tad more cumbersome than anticipated, mostly because I can’t access one of the programs (their servers are down), and I am using my AirCard for internet access which is SLOW! So I have spent a lot of time on the phone speaking with various tech-support types. God bless them…that’s one job I have no patience for, but at least they have all spoken English. That makes it easier.

We returned the rental car today in anticipation of departing tomorrow (and Enterprise’s weekend rate ended), but it looks like we’ll be here until Friday now. We need to get the watermaker expert down to the boat to help but he can’t make it until early Friday. Roger could probably do this job, but he’s a little concerned about polluting our water supply…I vote to wait for the water dude! Don’t want to introduce bad things into our precious water. So now we’ll be out there with the rest of humanity over Memorial Day Weekend. There’s lots going on and it should be fun to participate in some of the festivities – especially if the weather improves. Otherwise, being on the anchor in some remote, quiet harbor is very inviting.

Fast forward – it’s now Friday…the water dude was here and gone with a stellar report of the supreme working order of our watermaker. The bow thruster wasn’t quite up to snuff as we left the dock but when we got close to Port Orchard, it seemed to be just fine. We think the battery wasn’t fully charged after the long winter. We’ll keep an eye on it, but it seems okay. The weather is back to “Summer” where it should be with a forecast for the same through the weekend. We are at anchor in that lovely little cove I alluded to above. As a matter of fact, we are the only boat at anchor in the entire cove…exactly what I was looking for this Memorial Day Weekend. We are surrounded by beautiful trees right down to the waters edge on the western shore, and beautiful homes of many varieties on the eastern shore. There is a small village to the south – but with the tide still out, no way to get ashore unless we beach the dinghy. That’s probably NOT going to happen on this trip. We have plenty of food and other necessary provisions aboard. So we’ll save that excitement for when the guests arrive. It’s amazing how infrequently it’s just Rog and me on the boat and away from the dock. There is usually someone else with us, so we cherish these special times with just the two of us. That was really my vision of this cruising lifestyle to begin with…me and my sweetie hanging out on the hook in quiet, secluded coves.

The beginning of this post didn’t make it out on Tuesday because of the technical difficulties we were having with the website. Since they are now resolved, it should work better for everyone. I added a new album to the Gallery which has some pictures from our winter ashore. I’ll continue to add to this album in the next couple of weeks. There were so many activities between traveling and family/neighborhood events while we were back, but here is a smattering. Also, with this update came “Share” function that will allow you to share the posts via Facebook or Twitter. I know many of you Tweet (I just think that is so funny…tweet!). Twitter is also on the sidebar, so while I’m trying to tweet more, it will automatically post those entries on the website. For those of you who don’t know what in the world I’m talking about…just ask your grandkids. They’ll show you. I’m a big fan of Facebook. It’s by far the best way to keep in contact with people. At first I thought it would only be practical with grandkids and the nephews/niece. But I’m finding that so many of our friends and former co-workers are on it – it’s NOT a kid tool. Facebook and Linked-In are also a great way to find classmates from many years back. So it only makes sense to link them to the website. So Share away…

Over this winters break, Roger and I finally completed all the tasks for our US Coast Guard Captains License. We have been dinking around with it for over a year, and finally ran out of excuses. Passing the test is just one criteria…the list goes on and on and the process is quite costly. And lets not forget the newest requirement for a TWIC card – no, you really don’t want to know any more about that. We finally turned all the data over to an “agent” – a retired USCG guy who will take care of the processing (for another fee). Every time the Coast Guard guys identify an error they send the whole package back and charge you another hefty fee to resubmit it. What a racket! The agent has already earned his keep, but once we get the license in hand, I’ll consider it a task accomplished.

Elise and Roger

s/v Cutthroat