Sail Pandora

Today’s sunrise, over a calm sea and us in the middle of the Gulf Stream was beautiful.

Matt is all better now.  Two days of not feeling particularly well but now back in the swing. 

He had been turning up his nose at most food choices and I was a little fearful that perhaps he was what we might call a “selective eater”.  Nope, not at all now that he is feeling his old self.  (not as old as me and Peter, BTW) It does seem that he is an omnivore with a preference for M&Ms and Kit Kats 🙂

Anyway, we crossed the Gulf Stream overnight and could hardly tell except that the water temperature abruptly went from the low 60s to the 80s.  When I crossed the Stream in the spring it was very bumpy with a 30-40 knot southerly wind with gusts to 50.  With less than ten knots of wind last night, not quite the same.

We turned on the engine yesterday at noon and here we are, more than 24 hours later and still motoring along.  Chris Parker had given us coordinates for a very narrow favorable part of an eddy that was supposed to give us a push of a few knots.  However, we did not find it and instead have a persistent 1-2kt current against us.

However, that is not so bad, setting aside the endless motoring and little to no wind, as there is expected to be an area to the south of us in a few days that will bring near gale force winds from the NE.  The wind direction is not expected to be a problem as it will have us on a broad reach, but strong winds 30-40kts and add in some squalls to 50kts and it’s something that we’d prefer to avoid. 

By getting near Bermuda a bit later will help us avoid those conditions, I hope.  I will say that the forecasts have been changing virtually every day but the expected winds between here in Antigua should be mostly favorable, at least when there is wind. 

As of now, we expect to be motoring off and on for at least an additional 40-50 hours with intervals of good sailing in between.  With some luck we will hit the easterly trade winds about 300-400 miles north of Antigua and they will, hopefully, be under 20kts on the beam.  Fingers crossed.

We do not expect to need a stop in Bermuda as we have plenty of fuel.  I really do not know exactly what my fuel burn rate is with the new prop, but I expect it to be a bit higher than with the last propeller. 

With an estimate of say, .8GPH, I should be able to get at least 220 hours of motoring out of 180 gallons of fuel and the most motoring I have ever done on this run was 110 hours and that was on a trip with a lot more light air and dead zones than this run is expected to have. 

So far, I have motored a lot but I have only gone less than 300 miles and there is still a lot more distance to cover. 

Of course, forecasts change and perhaps this one will as the models don’t agree anyway. Key to keep our options open and not go to fast. What will happen? Time will tell…

However, I am a card-carrying member of the “cup is half full club”, so it’s going to be just fine. 

Perhaps it is too soon to say that we will have an uneventful trip, but it is day three and all is well with Pandora and crew.

It’s Thursday afternoon and we are nearly 200 miles into our trip.  That sounds like a long way but when you consider that the entire trip, not counting adverse currents that will slow us down, is about 1,550 miles. we are barely into it.

Put it another way and we are less than 15% of the way to Antigua.  To look at the chart, the distance we have covered is painfully small, considering how much lays ahead of us.

We left the Essex Yacht Club at 09:00 yesterday and made our way down the 6 miles to the river mouth and into Long Island Sound.  It was a dreary morning, cloudy with a light mist.

As we passed out of The Sound and rounded Montauk light.  The wind picked up from the ENE, putting us on a deep broad reach in 20-25kts.  That point of sail is not very comfortable and after a few hours Matt was feeling pretty uncomfortable and ended up “feeding the fish” more than a few times. 

It wasn’t until about 04:00 today that he was able to hold down something so that he could take a Stugeron, for the nausea, which seemed to work pretty well for him. 

Here he is, lounging and reading a book. 

A few hours ago we turned on the engine and it looks like we will be motoring until sometime tomorrow.  The computer weather app suggests that we will end up motoring about 2.5 days out of the 10 so days or so that it should take us to make the run to Antigua.  That’s about right as I have taken as little as 10 days and as much as 13 to do the southbound run.

Peter is on watch now and dressed for the chilly temps. 

It will be quite chilly, until we reach the Gulf Stream, with 80 degree water.  To keep the chill at bay, I cranked up the diesel heater.  It worked well and kept the chill off.   The water north of the GS is about 60 and the transition from cold to tropical is quite abrupt.

For the rest of the run we expect to have wind peaking in the high 20s to low 30s and also periods of no wind.   Overall, I expect that we will likely motor some 75 hours, about what I would expect for this run.   The good news is that we are hopeful that we will be able to head in mostly a straight line, nearly due south so not a lot of meandering around, I hope.

This is the first run where I have had Starlink when the service had been well worked out.  On the run north last spring, it was all new and the usage plans were not well defined.  For the run north, I signed up for a maritime plan at a cost of $250/month for not a lot of data and after that $2GB.  I didn’t really understand the plan and ended up using up all my data and then some, racking up a $350 bill for the month.   I now understand that I don’t have to change to a maritime plan and can just opt in for the $2GB on top of my normal $150/month mobile plan.  We will see how that works out.

Yesterday when we were still fairly close to land, the normal plan was working fine but earlier this morning, when I was on my 04:00 to 08:00 watch, I wanted to “toggle” on the $2GB ocean option but could not identify how to do it on the mobile app.  After about 2 hours of messing around, Matt suggested that I try going to the Starlink website on my browser and see if I could make the change there.  While the internet was blocked, the Starlink website itself was not, and we were in business.

The unit is still slow to acquire satellites but is working much better than last spring.  I understand that Starlink has modified the software so that the RV unit that I have, as opposed to the Maritime unit that uses twice the power, works better now on the ocean and “in motion”.

We will see how that goes for the rest of the trip but putting up this post is evidence that the unit is working.  What I don’t know yet, is how far that $2/GB will go and what my bill this month will end up being.  Details to come on that front.

It’s been pretty uneventful with the exception of it being quite rolly with large swells along with a number of mild squalls last night with heavy rain.   I am expecting that the next day or so of motoring will end when the wind picks up later tomorrow, into the 20s. 

So, one day into our run and not a lot to report.  Let’s hope that continues.

At the very least, we left, finally…

It’s October 31st and the weather for tomorrow, the first of November, our nominal departure date, bound for Antigua, is expected to be favorable for a departure. Well, if you discount the possible hurricane that may spool up in the Gulf of Mexico next week make us think twice about heading out. We will know for sure what the plans are this evening when we get a final briefing from our weather router, Chris Parker.

Pandora is ready to go and as much as I am bummed not to be in Hampton with most of the boats in the Salty Dawg Caribbean Rally, it is very nice having her near me here in CT. She is at the Essex Yacht Club dock, where I have been working on her for the last week or so, bringing stuff aboard and taking stuff off that has accumulated over the years and is probably no longer needed. The weather on Saturday was amazing, the temperature was nearly 80 and sunny. Not so much for the last few days when the temperatures plummeted into the 40s with rain.

In case you are wondering, the white stuff on the lawn isn’t snow although today, it is cold and but not cold enough to snow. Nope, those are white rose petals from a wedding held there a few days ago.

There’s not a lot going on around her and most of the moorings in the harbor are now vacant.

Much of last week was consumed by last minute items, moving stuff aboard, removing stuff that we don’t expect to need this season. I was also looking for a persistent leak and removed forward hatch and re-bedding it, with the hope of stopping an illusive dripping down the cabin side when the going gets sporty. Alas, after removing it and cleaning up all the old adhesive caulk, I could not find any evidence of moisture. Big hole in the foredeck with the hatch removed. I heard that a large catamaran sunk last week when two of her hatches failed off of Cape Hatteras. I can imagine that a boat would sink PDQ if a hole opened up on this scale.

After hours of removal, prep and reassembly, I realized that this wasn’t the source of the leak and finally found it in a nearby turning block for the jib. I am doubtful that I caught the only remaining leak but hope that I’m getting close. When I purchased the boat the seller told me of “THE leak”, the only one on the boat. HA! Seven years later, I am still identifying new leaks. I do put a lot of miles on Pandora each season so things loosen up. I expect that he wasn’t aware of some of the leaks as they only come to light when the going really gets sporty. Not sure I will ever completely conquer the leaks but I am pretty close, I hope, and probably more on top of the problem than most owners.

Another thing that I have been thinking about is Starlink and how that technology has changed the cruising game. Some years ago I was on a delivery of a large yacht from The Hamptons to Ft Lauderdale and was blown away to find that the yacht had broadband on board. I had a blast putting up posts with photos and never imagined that one day that would be possible aboard Pandora. However, that system cost upwards of $5,000 a month, certainly above my paygrade.

Well, now with Starlink, we have a “sort of” affordable option at $150/month and $2GB for data when underway at sea. Yes, it does add up but the service is AWESOME! and Pandora, along with just about every other boat in the rally, has Starlink aboard. This system, developed by Elon Musk, offers relatively low cost broadband and it is generally fast, and often faster than our cable service at home.

I first heard about the system last October when a boat in the rally joined a webinar from offshore, complete with high quality video. I didn’t think much about it until I was in Antigua a few weeks later and saw one of the antennas on a friend’s boat. I just had to have one and found myself as one of the “early adopters.” I was able to get a fellow Dawg to deliver one in their luggage from the US.

Here we are a year later and nearly every boat in the rally has the service. I still have the older style RV antenna and hope that it will work better this fall than it did on my way north last spring when I had trouble keeping a signal.

I have heard that the RV version that I have has better reception now as the software has been improved. I had the opportunity to upgrade to a maritime dish but the power consumption was twice as much and the unit is twice the size of what I have now. And, rumor has it that there will be a more efficient antenna out soon that isn’t a lot larger than the one I have.

Here’s the antenna mounted aft, adjacent to my solar panels.

Perhaps a better view of how it is situated aft to port.

So, we will have to see how well the service works on this run. Fingers crossed as I have not activated my Iridium Go, as that service costs about as much and is REALLY SLOW.

Well, hopefully, tomorrow, Wednesday morning, we will head out, bound for Antigua. It is possible that we will head for Bermuda in case we need to stop and wait for better conditions.

I’ll know more this evening when we get our weather briefing.

You can follow the fleet at this link, compliments of Salty Dawg and Predict Wind, and see the more than 90 boats that will be making their way south to either Antigua or The Bahamas, departing from Hampton VA and Newport, RI and of course, Pandora from Essex. Note that a number of boats have already left and there’s plenty to follow.

I have been working hard to get Pandora ready for the run to Antigua as part of the Salty Dawg Rally to the Caribbean for months now, always thinking that I would be heading to Hampton for the departure, as has been the case for years now. This year’s rally is a big one, with 96 boats heading south, mostly from Hampton, with about 15 from Newport.

As of a month ago, I realized that I was not going to be able to make it to Hampton, due to some mechanical issues with Pandora, discussed in prior posts, and decided, somewhat reluctantly I’ll admit, that I’d be heading out directly from Essex CT, on the CT River.

I say “reluctantly” as I, and many others, view a departure from the NE US as potentially more difficult than from Hampton, near the mouth of the Chesapeake, as more difficult, primarily as it takes a lot longer to get to the south side of the Gulf Stream from here than from farther south.

The Caribbean cruising legend and author Don Street, once said that leaving from Newport in November to head to the Caribbean was like “playing Russian roulette” given the uncertainty of the weather that time of year so while I have considered departing from here in the past, I have always headed south to Hampton or left earlier in the season. This years departure for Antigua will be my first from the area.

On Monday evening we had our first long range weather briefing with Chris Parker who painted a somewhat bleak picture of what the run would be like, regardless of the choice of departure point.

The problem is that the trade winds are expected to be elevated, making for a very sporty trip, south of Bermuda. Normally the departure from Hampton is easier than from New England but this year it looks like the New England run might be easier. But “easier” is only in comparison to Hampton and while I am encouraged, it is still uncertain and subject to change. Not the least of it is the continued presence of hurricane Tammy, who is churning her way northward as I write this.

However, I may have to leave a few days early to avoid what will be very strong northerly winds beginning on Tuesday and filling south the next day.

This is what the weather looks like today, 4 days from our estimated departure. You can see that hurricane Tammy is churning her way northward. The line from Essex represents the course to Bermuda, where I am likely to stop for a few days. Note that “red” in the following slides are strong winds, think 20-30kts and higher, and blue, no wind.

If you look forward to Saturday morning, when we are currently considering beginning the run, there is very little wind suggesting that we will be motoring much of 650 miles to Bermuda. However, at that time Tammy will be right over Bermuda. Not good to be heading south when she is moving north.

The current forecast suggests that we must arrive in Bermuda by late on Tuesday in order to get ahead of some very strong northerly winds. These winds are expected to fill in on Wednesday but of course that is a week out so the forecast could very well change but right now it looks like “threading the needle”.

I would very much like to leave on Sunday or later to give Tammy a chance to GO AWAY, but we will have to see how things develop over the next few days on the weather front. The reason, although not the only one, is that October 28th is the date of Brenda’s and my first date, a walk in the woods, if you are curious, way back in 1972, 50 years ago.

For the last dozen or so years, with only one exception during the pandemic, Brenda and I have NOT been together on that date, and I was so hoping that I would be this year.

However, it’s a long way to Antigua and I really want to do whatever I can to make it a safe and easy run. Fortunately Brenda understands that too.

And, speaking of 50 years ago. I took this photo when we became engaged. Who’da guessed she’d stay with me…

And while I soak myself in nostalgia, I have this photo on my phone as the background image. It was taken aboard the Bluenose II schooner in Lunenburg NS when Brenda and I vacationed there. That was right after we were married and before we even had our first boat. It’s one of my favorite photos of her. What a babe! Oh yeah, she knitted that sweater. It’s still in our “hope chest”, I believe. BTW, she still knits like a fiend…

So, will I be home for that special day? Who knows, and one can hope that I will get some good news at our next weather briefing and will be able to be home on the anniversary of our first date 50 years ago Saturday.

After a decade of running north and south each season, like a migrating bird, our plan is to take Pandora to Trinidad next spring to have some work done on her decks. It will be a big job but would be even more crazy expensive if we were to have the work done here in the US. I have friends that have been keeping their boats in Trinidad for years and rave about the quality of the work. The group that I hope will do some fiber glassing and paint call themselves “Perfect Finish”. From what I have heard, it’s not just a name. More to come on that.

Keeping Pandora south next summer will come as a welcome break from the seasonal anxiety about weather and of course, missing out on our “special day”.

Our next weather briefing is Thursday afternoon. Perhaps the news will be good for me and Brenda. And, of course, a good passage south to Antigua.

Every year I make plans, generally months in advance, on how the season will unfold. I spend the summer thinking about what work has to be done to Pandora to make sure that she is ready for the run. I also work hard to have the right mix of “stuff” aboard so that Brenda is comfortable and happy for the time away from “her people” and in the cruising community.

A few months ago I discovered that there was dampness in the side decks and that they need to be opened up, dried out and replaced. That’s a big job and one that I can’t even contemplate dealing with here in the US as the cost of labor, and it is a VERY labor intensive job, is so high. I have heard of horror stories about deck work costing $50,000, a number that I don’t even want to contemplate.

So, fast forward to today and we have decided that we will take Pandora to Trinidad for next summer and to have the work done there. I have been speaking with a vendor that some of my friends have spoken highly of and am getting close to “pushing the button” on the job. Ideally, I’d like to have the work done in Antigua but the labor rates there are just too high so Trinidad it is.

My original plan for the season was to make landfall in Antigua and spend the winter working our way north to the USVI, west to the Dominican Republic and north through the Bahamas before heading home to the US. All that was tossed out the window with the plan to run to Trinidad.

Additionally, a few weeks ago I discovered, more or less by accident, that a seal on our bow thruster had failed and needed to be replaced so out of the water Pandora came, for the second time this season. As of today she will be back afloat and the real effort of last minute provisioning and preparing for the run south will begin.

I hated the idea of hauling a second time this summer but at least her bottom has had a bit of last minute paint touchup and she will head south with a clean bottom. I had painted some special antifouling on the prop in June but was disappointed to see that even with minimal use this summer, some of the paint had worn off. I didn’t realize that there was a brush-on option and added it yesterday. The prop looks nice and, well, grey. It will be interesting to see how it holds up. At least I know that the paint is fairly thick to start.

I have written about the new prop before. It is a pretty nifty folding Gori that is quite streamlined when sailing. Actually, this shot doesn’t show it fully folded, so you will have to use your imagination.

I wrote extensively about the problems with the old prop and the expense of getting the new one installed. The phrase, “it’s always something” surely applied to this summer. However, it could have been worse. I saw this 70′ Pershing fast cruiser in the shed at the yard yesterday. It can go 40kts. No surprise when you see these propellers. I was told that this running gear would set you back a million or so. That makes my own prop issues seem insignificant.

Just keeping her in the shed for the winter set the owner back $21,000. Now that’s a “big boy boat”. Big? You know what they say about huge yachts that go fast with owners that wear fat gold chains? Big boat, little…

Anyway, back to Pandora, a boat that goes very slow. BTW but I am confident in saying that there is not a great correlation on engine size. Sad, but true.

So, she splashes today and back to Essex to begin final provisioning in anticipation of a departure at the end of the month. My plan was to head to Hampton and leave from there but the need to haul made that impractical.

I’ll admit that I am a bit anxious about heading south from New England into the North Atlantic in November as it is a lot farther from the Gulf Stream than Hampton. However a last minute haul made it impossible to first head to Hampton and start the run from there. Here the Gulf Stream is about 300 miles from Essex, and several days at sea, before we would be across the Stream verses Hampton where you can be across in about 24 hours. That means that a good weather window has to be about four days up here verses a bit over one day from Hampton. And, this time of year the windows are short, sometimes only 2-3 days. All this is because you DO NOT want to be in the Gulf Stream when the wind turns to the NE, which it does when every front comes off the coast.

Fortunately, according to Chris Parker, our weather router, the patterns of fronts exiting the coast right now seem to be about a week long, so that would give us enough time to get across the GS between North Easters, which is a good thing. We will know more in about a week so stay tuned for updates. I surely will.

Provisioning and deciding what will be aboard Pandora this season will be a lot more complex as we will have to assume that most of what is aboard when we head out will have to be aboard Pandora until we bring her back here in two years. In the past we always knew that we’d be back in the spring. Not so this year.

As a result, Brenda and I will be going through the boat and carefully considering what needs to be taken home now and what stays. I guess that much of what we transfer on and off Pandora each season will have to stay, meaning that we will now have a lot more duplicates than in the past.

Trinidad has always been a mystery to us even though we have heard a lot about visiting there over the years. Last weekend, our very good cruising friends, Stephanie and Jim, from Hero, visited us and told us how much they enjoyed their time in Trinidad last year and have offered to join us as crew for the run there in the spring. We will likely take them aboard in Grenada or somewhere in the vicinity, for the run south.

Brenda and Stephanie. Adorable.

I guess that’s about all for now. Lots to do and in spite of well laid plans, who knows? It does seem clear that Pandora will not be heading home next summer but beyond that…

Time will tell, as it always does. Best laid plans…

So, here I go again and Pandora is out of the water, for the second time this season. This time because of a leak in a rubber gasket on the bow thruster that keeps the sea out of the thruster locker. It is a flexible boot that allows the unit to pivot up and down, as it’s retractable. It’s acutally a pretty neat thruster as it isn’t like most small boat thrusters that are a hole in the hull crosswise at the bow. It pulls up flush to the hull so there is no effect on the speed of the boat.

Sometimes I wonder if I really own Pandora or if she owns me. Over the last few months I have worked hard to get her ready for the run to Hampton and then on to Antigua along with the rest of the fleet in the Salty Dawg Caribbean Rally and as hard as I try, she always has the last word.

I wrote earlier in the season about a problem with the shaft coupling failing as I headed up the CT River and home, haul #1, and how lucky I was that it had not happened any earlier in the 1,500 mile run home. I am sure that I do have a guardian angel watching out for me, that’s for sure.

In this case, a leak in the bow, discovered here in the comfort of the CT River, suggests that my Angel is still with me. I shudder to think about a leak 500 miles from land. Yes, good but, as always, a good amount of “boat dollars” to set things right.

Well, Pandora is now on the hard. The good news is that she now has a clean bottom and the problem has been solved with the installation of a new boot.

The bow thruster is a particularly finiky piece of equipment that has cost me thousands over the years. When it works, it’s worth it’s weight in gold as loosing control of the boat in close quarters can lead to expensive scratch repairs. And, it’s a very heavy piece of kit jammed into a very cramped place up in the bow, let me tell you. This is the third time that I have had problems with the unit, the first time when she was new to us. In that case, I discovered that the unit had been damaged by water before we purchased her back in 2015. That was a painful “upgrade” if you could call it that.

It is pretty neat. See this video of how she operates.

So, here we are on a similar repair path years later when a humble rubber part, lovingly called a “bellows” has developed a leak.  Fortunately, when I had the unit serviced in 2015, I also made a point of purchasing what might be the last bellows avaiable anywhere in the US, knowing that it would eventually fail.  

Well, it failed, started leaking, and now Pandora is back on the hard.

However, this time I was able to do the repairs myself.  Unlike the last time, when parts were frozen with corrosion, getting the unit apart this time was a fairly simple, if day long job. 

I should note that while getting her hauled in the past, in the summer or early fall, was a simple affair, it has become a lot more difficult, and expensive as Safe Harbor has been buying up so many of the marinas around the area so they know that they don’t have to be accomodating.   What used to be a fairly informal and competitive marina environment, the care and feeding of boats is now a lot more difficult. 

In my case, I have been hauling Pandora for seasonal maintenance every summer for a decade at a nearby yard.  Now that Safe Harbor has purchased the yard, they are a lot less flexible for anyone that does not store with them year round.  This yard, now with a new manager, said that they are too busy with winter storage to haul Pandora for a two week stay.  Sure, they will haul her for a few days but two weeks?  No way.  Sorry, go somewhere else!

There had been a missunderstaning when I scheduled the haul a few weeks ago so when I showed up and said that I’d need her out for about two weeks, they declined and told me to just go away.  No credit for being a customer for a decade.  Nice to have so much business…

This experience is not unique among yards owned by Safe Harbor, as a friend of mine that has rented a mooring in Wickford RI for a decade, from what is now a Safe Harbor yard, was told that he could no longer keep his boat there unless he was a year round customer.   No seasonal mooring rentals any longer.   

Sure, if they can enforce these new rules, good for them, but once business goes through a down cycle I expect that they will find that they may regret their arrogance. 

Anyway, I am now hauled out at a “non-Safe Harbor” yard and it was delightfull to be treated like a customer and not like one of the “unwashed” masses or in this case, “un-hauled”. 

Access to the thruster through the anchor locker and, under that, through yet another hatch. 

It is a very tight squeeze.

I fit, barely.  Not a great place to spend two full days, one taking the unit out and the other, back in. 

I had fully expected to spend days or weeks getting frozen parts out but this time it was, much to my surprise, a breeze with no parts frozen in place.

 That was a huge departure from my experience when I purchased Pandora.  Shortly after the purchase I discovered that thruster wasn’t working properly due to neglect by the prior owner.  I learned that the compartment had flooded a number of times, causing a good deal of corrosion.   That fix was very painful and more than a few “boat dollars”. 

What clued me recently that there was a problem was that when the unit was deployed, I heard some sort of “water” sound.  This happened earlier in the season but didn’t think much about it until a few weeks ago when I noticed that the compartment bilge pump was running.  Oops, that gave me a clue that something was amis.  It was this part, a rubber bellows that the shaft for the thruster goes through and allows it to retract and remain, until now, watertight.   It had developed a small crack.

The bellows is the proverbial “weak link” in the system and it’s a little scary that this fragile piece is all that is keeping water out of the thruster compartment.  

This shows the little crack.  Yes, little but big in effect at letting the sea enter where it doesn’t belong.   

The folks from New England Bow Thruster, did a wonderful job of getting things back years ago but at great expense.  This time, I did it, and it went pretty well, if I may say so.  Sure, it took much of the day to get it apart, but nothing was stuck.  

The biggest problem was finding the spare bellows that I had purchased a few years ago, in anticipation of a required replacement at some point.  I searched the entire boat, becoming more frantic as my options for finding it became more and remote. 

Finally, I decided to go home for lunch.  As I drove home it suddenly dawned on me where it might be.  Alas, there it was in a box in the attic.  Hurrah!

So, here’s the unit, all finished and checked out.

For the entire summer I have been fully focused on getting Pandora ready for the run to Antigua, with a stop in Hampton VA along the way to participate in the Salty Dawg Rally to the Caribbean. 

Alas, Pandora had her own ideas, and with a little help from my guardian angel, I had to rethink my plans and will now be departing from Essex, for a direct shot to Antigua.  Leaving from this far north brings with it a whole different set of issues that I will address soon in a subsequent post. 

For now, all I can say is that Pandora seems to be calling the shots and as much as I hated to change my plans at the last minute, leaving from here does make the preparation for the run a lot simpler.

Whatever happens next remains to be seen.  But, one thing that is certain, is that Pandora is in charge and she has been pretty clear in pointing out “who owns who”. 

As I write this I am heading to Annapolis for the Sailboat Show and the Salty Dawg rendezous dinner.  It will be fun.  For now, Pandora will be waiting for me.  Amazing how big she looks, especially when compared to Brenda’s Mini.

A last note, it’s been a very long time since my last post and that’s, in large part, because WordPress, the program that I write this blog on, has gone through a big upgrade so I had to re-learn all the steps to posting as if I was starting from scratch.  It was pretty intimidating, to be sure. 

And, last, last…  If you have subscribed to get notices when I post, you’ll have to do it again as all that was lost in a related software program.  So, go to the upper right of this page and put in your email address.  I hope that works.  I guess we will see how that goes. 

Signing off for now. 

Each summer I hope to have time to laze around and enjoy the hot long days but somehow it never seems to happen.  I am always busy balancing the needs of keeping a home up along with a boat and somehow both feel like “fixer uppers” in spite of putting tons of money into both each year.

And as summer draws to an end, it always feels like a scramble to get Pandora ready to head south and this year has been no different.  I’d be lying if I said that I am always happy with the pace of projects that need to be done and this year feels even worse.

While I am a card carrying member of the “cup is half full club”, I have found this year to be a bit overwhelming.   Perhaps it’s the sound of all those boat dollars pouring out of my cup.  My cup has not “runneth over”, it feels like the bottom just dropped out…

Arriving in CT with a damaged propeller coupling and then having to replace the entire mess, prop and all, didn’t set the tone for a lazy hazy summer.

I did get away with a friend for a week but otherwise, Pandora hasn’t left the river and yet I’ve been aboard, working on her most every day.

The last few weeks have been a whirlwind trying to get things settled including the installation of a new water heater.  The old one, recently out of warrantee, started to leak fluid back into the engine from the internal heat exchanger so I had c0ugh up nearly a whole “boat dollar” to set it straight.

Here’s where the heater lives, ready for the install. I had to move a huge amount of stuff to make room for it.  Here’s the finished install.  “Water heater?  I don’t see no stinkin waterheater. ”  Trust me, it’s somewhere back there. I also finished the upgrade to the solar array.   Last summer I learned that the old style panels, those that are more than a few years old, degrade at about 5% a year and the four original 80w panels that came with the boat when we purchased her were only putting out about half of their designed capacity.   Las summer I upgraded the  80s four 15ow panels, leaving me with a single 290w panel over the davits that I had added when we purchased the boat.

So, I did some research and learned that I could upgrade the 290w panel with three 150w panels and only increase the footprint by about 5″ in length, with three smaller panels taking the place of the one large 290w panel.  The newer designs put out a lot more power per square foot.

This photo is of the “new” 290w panel when I installed it in 2015.  It’s still huge.  Amazingly, I was able to put three 150w panels into the same space with only an extra 5″ of overhang aft of the original davit supports.  An amazing increase in capacity. These panels make the four 150w panels forward look small but it’s only a matter of perspective as you can see from this shot from forward.  In order to be sure that the three new panels are well secured to the davits, I had to fabricate a half dozen custom brackets made up of starboard and 1/4″ marine grade aluminum.  They were a lot more complex than they look to get in place with properly drilled holes.   This version on four corners. And these in two spots on the aft end to support the middle of the panels. In summary, this meant that by replacing all of the panels, between last summer and this, with seven 150w panels, I was able to bring the total wattage for the mix to 1,050w from 610w, a near doubling of the capacity of the array. 

And, all this, in addition to the wind generator and the lithium bank, I now have enough power to run everything on the boat directly from the batteries, all maintained by wind and sun.

Oh yeah, and Uncle Sam paid for 30% of the entire bill under the Inflation Reduction Act that covers green upgrades including boats if they are your primary or second home.  And yes, I checked with my accountant, a very straight shooter, and he said that I was good to go.  It saved me over $10,000 in direct tax reductions.

Among the items that I run directly from my inverter.  Note that we don’t even have a house generator.  A washer.  No, not the dryer but we don’t use that and let the relentless wind in the Caribbean dry things.  This unit doesn’t draw much power in wash mode anyway. Our Starlink, a pretty power hungry unit that I power from a small 600w plug in inverter. It is amazing how many appliances we have to plug in each day.  In the last few years I have added a number of USB ports in the nav station. And, I have gone out of my way to procure some low voltage lighting including this wonderful table lamp.  I saw it noted as the “must have” lighting in fancy dining places in NYC as written up in the NY Times a year or so ago.And, these nifty rechargeable lights that Brenda got for me.  They can be made to dim and change color.  I use them down below on passage for soft red night lighting in the galley.  We also hang them in the cockpit when we head ashore so it’s easier to see in the cockpit when we return later.    And, of course, rechargeable bluetooth speakers.  We use these to listen to music and also to extend the sound from our laptop if we watch movies in the cockpit.  We also run or watermaker every other day for a few hours to fill the tanks and run the waterheater each morning for about 30 minutes to heat hot water, all off of the batteries.

Prior to the upgrades to the batteries and solar, we had to supplement our electricity with a small portable Honda generator but now we are able to run everything, including our electric hookah compressor that I use to dive and clean the bottom of the boat, and never have to use our engine or generator to charge the batteries.

Of course, if we were to get cloudy weather for a week, that would be problematic but that is generally not a problem in the Caribbean where it is usually sunny and plenty windy to get power from the wind generator anyway.

So, this brings me to heading south and in the next few weeks I will bring Pandora to Hampton, VA where she will sit until I head back at the end of October to meet up with the nearly 90 boats that will be heading for points south, some for The Bahamas but mostly to Antigua.

Yes, things are plenty busy and I still haven’t settled on crew but hope too soon.

So much for those hazy lazy days of summer.

So much to do, so little time…

It’s Labor Day weekend and it’s been chilly in the mornings, a clear message that fall is on the way.

I recall years ago, a friend Port (he was a sailor and yes, that really was his name) once remarked that on Labor Day, if you listened closely, you could hear the “doors” of summer slam shut.

For most this weekend marks the end of yet another summer season that went by way too fast.  “What happened to summer?  It seems like yesterday that it was Memorial day.”

Yes, summer is over in more ways than one with the passing of singer Jimmy Buffett, THE original summer guy, marking the end of decades of summers that he shared with millions around the world.

On Friday Jimmy Buffet died in his home in Sag Harbor at the age of 76.  It has been reported that he died of lymphoma, a complication of melanoma, in itself a sad reminder of the dangers of living an “endless summer”.  For a guy that embodied “summer” that was a particularly cruel end.

To be sure, Jimmy had a lot of fun over the years and inspired generations to kick back and enjoy life in a world where it seems that everyone is scrambling to climb to the top.  I expect that there are thousands that have taken stock of their lives, in no small part, inspired by the words of his songs.  Perhaps his passing will inspire more to head out for adventure before it is too late.

He wrote in his memoir “You know that Death will get you in the end. But if you are smart and have a sense of humor, you can thumb your nose at it for awhile.”

In a way, the timing of his passing, on Labor Day weekend, the official end of summer was sadly fitting.

Along with being a talented singer and song writer, he also wrote a number of books and when I turned 50, 18 years ago not to put too fine a point on it, a friend gave me copy of his book “A pirate looks at 50“.    You can order a copy from Amazon for about five bucks. It is a touching and amusing book about his life and a trip that he took to mark his half century, seen through the eyes of someone who was crossing the threshold from young to “old” or at least into the second half…

When I remarked to the friend that shared a copy, the message of the book resonated with me but my friend was quick to point out that “your turning 50 is NOTHING like Jimmy Buffett turning 50”.  Fair enough.

For me though, it was a timely read as we had sold our company and I knew that I’d be retiring within a few years, by my 55th birthday, my goal since I was in my early 20s.  It turned out, compliments of the “great recession” that I had to work an extra year and retired six years later at 56.  Not bad for a “newly sort of old guy” that I had become.

Like Jimmy, I too had no particular idea of where life would take me if I looked back when I was young.  The idea of heading to the Bahamas was the extent of it and that was a stretch, never imagining that I would end up in the Caribbean, sailing thousands of blue water miles and would now be leading a group that runs rallies there every year, Salty Dawg.  In many ways, my involvement in this group has come to define my “later years”.

I have been thinking of Buffett more lately as when I was in Sag Harbor a few weeks ago I saw Buffett’s boat.  In spite of being worth an estimated one billion, he still owned a small boat, his 49′ Pacific Seacraft built “Drifter” and it was there.  She is only a few feet longer than Pandora but probably cost 3x as much. Her accommodations are amazing. I’m guessing that a lot of Margaritas were served in her cockpit.

The coolest of his vehicles though, was his Grumman Albatross flying boat.  An awesome plane that I believe he flew on and piloted during the trip that inspired his book “A pirate looks at 50”. This is a walk-thru of a sister ship of Buffett’s plane.  It’s a remarkable “yacht” or “camper” as it’s described in the video.   Enjoy.This link will take you to the sale listing for the plane at the broker.   The listing is from 7 years ago and I doubt that it’s still on the market.  However, at the time, the asking price was $375,000.  For a machine of this complexity, I expect that the annual maintenance is plenty.  What a plane.  Land this baby on a lake somewhere and enjoy the moment. Makes me want a margarita.

And, speaking of margaritas, here’s the a video posted over the weekend by CNN, a short summary of “the man”, Margaritaville himself and all that flowed from his laid back island vibe.I guess he had plenty boats, planes etc, appropriate for a guy with a net worth of a billion.

When he built his sailboat, Drifter he had downsized from a Delta 125 which he sold ostensibly because he didn’t use it enough.  His last boat, built in 2019 was also blue, appropriately names Last Mango.  is blue as well, like his sailboat “Drifter:.  Here’s Last Mango, Jimmy Buffett’s last boat.I have no idea if Pandora will be our last boat but this coming season, as have noted in past posts, takes me and Brenda into our second decade of winter cruising.

I have booked a slip in Hampton, VA for the month of October to allow me to run Pandora down to VA before the weather gets too cold.  An easy trip might be wishful thinking as according to our weather router, Chris Parker, even late September may prove to be a bit challenging for southbound traffic as the  weather windows for southbound runs are already getting shorter.    Wish me luck on that as it’s only a few weeks until I begin to head south.

On October 26th, a month later, I will head around to downtown Hampton to join in the rally departure festivities, leading up to the start of our run to Antigua on November 1st, weather permitting.

I wonder how many have “cast off the docklines” and headed out to cruise the world, or at least the Bahamas and Caribbean over the years, inspired by Jimmy Buffett.

In my own small way, I hope that I too have done the same for at least a few others that have decided, over the years, after listening to may many webcasts on the Bahamas, Cuba and the Caribbean, to head south to warmer climes,

When it begins to get cold up in the north, Labor Day arrives and the “iron doors slam shut” another opens as the warm tropical waters beckon for yet another season afloat.

Soon enough it will be winter and those who are not lucky enough to head south to the mythical Margaritaville will have to take solace in listening to the laid back summertime ballads of Jimmy Buffett.

And yes, after all those lazy summers, it seems that his passing makes the iron gates of summer slam just a bit louder than normal.

Perhaps a good place to end is with this live recording of the Margaritavill man himself from a concert way back in 1993, no less relevant 30 years later.   This song always makes me smile as much as it did when I first heard it so long ago. Makes me feel old but I still like margaritas and they will always make me think about Jimmy Buffett.

Ken and I ended up our cruise with two days in Newport secure on a mooring at the New York Yacht Club.    This club, one of the most prestigious in the world, does not offer reciprocity with any but a very small number of yacht clubs, two I think.

For this reason, visiting the club requires you to do so in the company of a member.  Ken is a member so off we went to Newport.

The run from Cuttyhunk to Newport began very sportily, with east winds behind us beginning with a squall in the upper 20s.   As we rounded the point to head west to Newport we were treated to a rainbow.  Perhaps not the most perfect one but a rainbow, never the less. We sailed the entire way to the mouth of Narraganset bay when the wind shifted to the north and on the nose as we made our way the last few miles to Newport harbor.

The Castle Hill Light, still maintained by the USCG was completed in 1890.  It was the first sight that greeted us as we headed up the Bay.  It is always a treat to see the grand hotels that overlook the Bay. With all the investments going on with wind power, this brand new service ship is evidence of all the jobs that this emerging sector is bringing to the area.  And, in the background a house perched on a rock that’s been there since the early 1900s.   It’s called “Clingstone” as someone once remarked that it was “a peach of a house”.   This “cottage” is 10,000 square feet with 23 rooms.    Check out this link to learn more about this remarkable home.

I love visiting Newport for all the wonderful boats and all it’s history.  For decades Newport was the playground of the ultra rich in the days before income tax.  Today, well, it’s still for the very well heeled.  And, the center of all that is, arguably, Harbor Court, the Newport “clubhouse” for the New York Yacht Club, once the summer home of the Brown family, founders of Brown University.

The home was purchased in the 80s by the club and renovated to serve members as it does today. The club is very focused on all things sailing with a huge and active member racing fleet.  This video is highlights of the 2022 Rolex race week.  It gives a good feel for the true international reach of the club.The number of “tenders” is evidence of how much goes on during the summer. In the evenings members line up on the bluff overlooking the bay for an “adult beverage”.   A spectacular “bespoke” view, just like the clothing that they sport when they are “out to be seen”.    It’s quite a spot.  Here, a view of the back of the clubhouse from the formal gardens.
Imagine having a pond of lotus behind your home.    It’s always hard for me to understand how something that looks so tropical is hardy in our winters. Each of these flowers is the size of a grapefruit. And beautiful architecture isn’t limited to the huge mansions.   As you walk on side streets one home is more beautiful than the next. And what New England city is complete without a church with a white steeple.Or a home with a turret that evokes the style of a lighthouse?  I’d be curious of who owns this place but can’t find any reference. Touristy of not, Ken and I enjoyed a lovely lunch overlooking the harbor in Bannister’s wharf, downtown.    It was a busy place, even on a weekday.And off to the side, Rumrunner II, built back in 1929 for some NJ mobsters to smuggle, well rum, among other illicit liquors.  Now she is an elegant day boat that gives tours of the harbor.  Your group is large?  No problem, she can manage a group of dozens for a tour of the harbor and bay.  Tennis anyone?   If you follow the sport I am sure that you have visited the Tennis Hall of Fame.  It’s an elegant place and a throwback to earlier times. Makes me want a mint julip, whatever that is.   Nice gardens. Well, it’s nice to be home again but I have to admit that I am already thinking about when we can get back aboard Pandora.  Still lots to do to prepare for her run to Antigua in November. 

Not a lot of time left as I have a reservation at a marina in Hampton in late September for a month before our departure.

For now, all I can say is that visiting Newport and the NYYC was a fine ending to a wonderful week afloat with my old friend, and we are all getting old it seems, Ken.

Yesterday we had a very long run from Sag Harbor to well, guess where we are?If you squinted really hard you probably figured it out.  Cuttyhunk…

The run from SAg Harbor took almost exactly 11 hours with perhaps about half to 2/3rds motoring the 70 miles.  A long day but easy sailing.

We anchored in the outer harbor last night as it was getting dark and I saw no  reason to come into the harbor so late and pay $55 for a mooring.    As we rounded the point there was a very nasty line of thunderstorms to the north.  Fortunately, they passed north and east of us.  It looked very forbidding, never the less.   A sort of “roll cloud” that often accompanies a line of thunderstorms. To the west, quite a show.   This sort of display makes one feel insignificant.   A good reminder for so many that think that they are very significant.  However, I expect that most of them would miss the symbolism anyway.   You know the type…Once snuggly anchored, we had a lovely evening and the stars were amazing.  Alas, no shooting stars spotted in spite of the meteor shower that was predicted.  Probably because I didn’t stay up much past “cruisers midnight”,  That’s 9:00 for you landlubbers.

The good thing about going to bed with the birds is that you wake up with them too.  This sunrise greeted me this morning at O-dark-30.   What a view.  This morning we walked up the road to the highest point on the island.  The road is impressive, the best on the island.  It was built by someone years ago to provide easy access to a planned mansion that was never built.   The road remains and was recently repaved.
The view of the harbor where Pandora sits, snug on a mooring. Just to prove that she’s there.  A closeup. A short time later this charming Marshall Catboat showed up.  I mention this as Brenda used to come here on our own boat of the same design.  I can’t believe that we came all this way with two little guys on such a small boat.  It was on one of those trips, and it was a rainy and nasty trip, that I left the three of them once we were anchored, all in various states of distress and suffering from severe cabin fever, and rowed up to a nearby 38′ yawl and said to the owner “would you be interested in selling your boat?”  The answer, a curt “no” but I gave him my number anyway.  The following spring she was ours.   It proves that everything is for sale.

Anyway, fast forward, many, many summers forward and here I am again, four boats later and 47′, up from 22′, and aboard Pandora.  Life marches on.

And, speaking of change, it seems like yesterday that my dad, gone for so long now, came here with my two boys, Rob and Chris on my last Pandora in 2009 when we went out on a week long cruise.  It remains one of my most cherished memories.  This photo, taken at the top of the hill I visited this morning, of the four of us. The same picnic table view today   A bit sad, I’ll admit.It was nice to show Ken around the island.  We walked a long way to the western end of the island.  There are many well groomed, well mostly well groomed trails to choose from.  Interestingly, there are a number of gun emplacements and viewing platforms from WWII when they were used to keep an eye out for U Boats . In the distance is where the Cuttyhunk Oyster Company does their magic.   In the distance you can also see the Bartholomew Gosnold monument, marking the first European settlement on the island, perhaps in all of New England.  On that exposed point, the settlers didn’t stay long.  Check out this link to learn more about Cuttyhunk.  If you looked very closely, you could see the floats for the cages that hold oysters.   This shows it better.  All those floats.  While we were there, one of the locals was harvesting some of their stock.  In the evenings, about in time for “sundowners” they tour the harbor selling their oysters, shucked to order.  Can you say “fresh”?  We are planning to check some out this evening.  I’ll bet they will be good with a G&T.The island is dotted with lovely ponds.
I particularly liked this one.   A well planted garden in itself. Of course, what New England shoreside is complete without beach roses?  Perhaps the last of the summer blooms.One thing that has changed after all these years is the addition of a solar farm.  This is one of 4 rows of panels in undulating rows, tucked in a low spot so as not to spoil the view. I was struck by the voltage that the array is rated for.    Try 480V AC.  “Warning, electrical shock hazard”  No kidding!In spite of this impressive setup, their diesel generators were still humming away near the village.   I guess all those cappuccino makers draw a lot of power.

Along the way, this this beautiful old John Alden designed Malabar schooner built in, I believe, the 1920s.   She is beautiful.
And don’t forget the sort-of new Pandora but with the same timeless view from her bow. So, here I am, Back in Cuttyhunk and a bittersweet cruise down memory lane.

Off to Newport tomorrow for the grand finale of our week, a visit to the NY Yacht Club, Harbor Court.

I do miss Dad…