Palm Coast Fla.

 Today's trip went smoothly enough. No inconsiderate boaters in spite of this being a beautiful Saturday on the ICW. We blew past St. Augustine this year since we are behind schedule and got a late contact.

 You ask, "Dan, you're retired now. What's this schedule business?".

 Well we have to be in the Bahamas by December and the way things are going on the Gulf Stream, who knows when it is going to calm down again.

 We are planning for New Smyrna tomorrow, although we may stretch to Titusville. Given all of the North winds, we were hoping to anchor out but East winds would have been much preferable. Maybe we will see.
At left you see the cross from St. Augustine. It's kind of spartan but it works for me.
Here's another shot of the city from the water. Since there were too many waves we didn't get a clear shot without some fuzz. Maybe next time.

An OK day on the water.

 We've arrived in Palm Cove Marina within the Jacksonville area. All is well and Freedom ran like a champ all day. No leaks, no drips no grief. I actually had a day at the helm with only spot checks in the bilge per the normal routine.
 Tomorrow we may stop in St. Augustine or Palm Coast. It all depends. I'm wondering if the Gulf Stream is ever going to lay down. It's been rough out there for almost two weeks now. While there was a break in the waves it was a short break. Not the sort that allows it a day or two to calm down before it picks up again.

 GPS data updated. No photos we've all been here before.

Billy Mays said it best, "But WAIT! There's more!"

Ok so today we left Sunbury in great spirits because the stbd engine's raw water pump was installed and running fine. There was a bit of knuckle bashing but it went in smoothly and is operating fine. Off we went at around 8:45 AM after I spend about an hour cleaning out the salt water from the bilge. So I have a good sweat going and as we enter St. Catherines Sound for the second time I went into the bilge to check on things. The stbd engine was fine, but there was a new drip from the port engine. As it turned out the raw water pump on this side decided to let fly also. But this was different. It decided to puke a couple of the small bolts that hold the cover plate in position over the impeller. The heads of the bolts sheared off! Dang. That's looking like a new pump also. Not another 1200 bucks.... We were devastated.

So I said let's continue on to Fla. on one engine picking our weather. She said fine, but the Bahamas is out. I said I would scale back on going to Exuma. So we sat on the bridge a bit at the break neck speed of about 5 knots when I said, ok. Look. Maybe I can drill out the cover bolts and salvage the pump. She, knowing the boat was moving (the water was calm thank God) thought this was folly.

 As you can see in the above photo, I was able to drill out the bolt and ram an allen key up it's butt and back it out. While the boat was moving, with ear protection and a pencil flashlight in my mouth.

 So what happened? This pump developed a small calcium stalagmite on the inside at the perimeter of the pump. This pushed the impeller blades out so they hammered the cover plate. That popped a couple of the small bolts.

 So I scraped that out, put in a new impeller (always have spares) and used bolts from the old pump (never throw out old hardware until it's replaced). The result is success. We even had Freedom up to 18.6 knots at the end of the day with a heavy load of fuel and water.

 Deb was happy on the day. She said that she enjoyed the day on the water because driving the boat through some narrow passsages at low tide was challenging and made the day pass quickly. Normally I do all of this. I was glad this all made her day.

 The sunset photo really doesn't do the image justice. The sun was "like a red rubber ball".

 GPS data is updates also.

 By the way Jeff here are some shots of the transom. Let me know if you need more. We bought the boat and the davit was installed. It is plywood backed on the inside and I use an ATV winch controller to drive it with a key fob. It's ok until you have to back into a slip.

The offending raw water pump

 It made my day. Still waiting on a replacement. At least it came out relatively easily. No overly stuck bolts and the hoses actually came off without a fight. There is actually some history behind this. Apparantly it is so expensive because after the agreement between Jabsco and Detroit expired, Jabsco started to under cut Detroit so Detroit said they'd buy all their pumps elsewhere unless Jabsco jacked their price back up so after market folks were charged more. At least this is what the after market folks have told me. You know something like CNN and the headlines always say. A person close to the source without permission to speak told me so.

 Over 900 bucks.

 This season is getting expensive.

 P.S. If you look at the GPS tracks for this year you'll see we were happily headed towards the South end of Walburg Creek for an overnite anchorage when we made an abrupt U-Turn and headed for Sunbury Ga..

Savannah and Sunbury Ga. the hard way

 So we traveled down to the Savannah area and wound up at Sail Harbor Marina on Turner Creek. This was a great two night stop because we got to visit with Michele and catch up a bit. While there is not much around the marina within a short walk, there is a Publix that can be reached by dink and a couple of other marinas where you can tie up so as to access the store. The water was calm the power was good and so were the people.
 Since we were going to be here a couple of days while waiting for the gang to show up I took the time to clean up the dink. This had been hanging from the davit on the transom under a pecan tree. The entire topside of the dink was a light tan color that had to go. Since I had not cleaned the bottom of the dink in maybe two years, I dropped it into the water and used the davit to lift the engine off. Then I hauled the dink out of the water and went to work. About 8 hours later the dink looks fine with a fresh coat of wax on the bottom and clean tubes.
 After a great dinner with Michele and Tim out on Tybee Island the next day we set off for Walburg creek where we intended to anchor out for the night. Just north of St. Catherine Sound I did a bilge check and found water under the starboard engine. After swapping out an impeller on the run we found that pump had munched a bearing seal and it was time for a new pump assembly. Given that we turned North up to Sunbury and here we are waiting on the pump which hopefully shows up tomorrow.
 I could have gotten a slightly better price if I had the net working when we ordered it but in the interest of moving forward I went with Detroit instead of deferring until the net was up. That happened a little while ago. It turned out the local wireless here had the same IP addresses assigned that I did on the AIR802 on the radar arch so I changed them and now (ya think?) we have access. It was a gamble that paid off. Last night we could use Skype but we could not hit pages via url's. Suspecting that Skype did not need a name server I used ipconfig and saw the gateway was 192.168.0.1 and that was smack in the middle of my DHCP range. So I moved on.

 The Sunbury Crab Co. http://www.sunburycrabco.com/ has a great dock and we have good power so the stay will be as pleasant as it can be. The owner was gracious to bring me into her house yesterday to try the net there, and since that was a wash she even offered to let me use her dad's suburban as long as we did not drive to fast. Everyone around here was trying to dig up a pump to help us out and we thank them!

A good day on the water

 Today we traveled from the Mega Dock down to Port Royal Landing. The weather was good and the boat ran well. All in all it was a great calm ride that was interrupted by a squall that popped a couple of zippers loose from their panels. Probably too much bleach was used cleaning the hard top mildew out. Oh well.
 We passed by Ross Marine today and touched base with a couple we met down on Guana Cay last year. Perhaps we will do some traveling with them if schedules work out.
 From their we had the pleasure of these three women in their boat 1001 Rule. The were blowing by everyone on the ICW because they were unable to control their boat on one engine. After listening to them profusely thank people for letting them by with a large wake, I had experienced enough and afterwards told her that she should learn how to pilot her boat and that she had no reason to wake us the way she did. Others on the ICW concurred and she started lashing out at everyone for not slowing down. We all climbed back all over her for being incompetent.
 So anyway, the rest of the day was smooth and here we are.

 I've added another link to GPS data for this year's travels.

Busy day of repair and prep.

 Today was a very busy day. We removed and installed a new gally refrigerator. This took about 1700 bucks but that included removal and disposal as well as installation. We all chipped in and got the basic installation done in about an hour. The new Norcold 61 unit slid right into place without any cabinet modifications required. This was great news for us because it means we can hang onto the configuration we have without having to resort to interior changes. So far it is behaving much better than the old unit and I have to admit Norcold has made some good changes to the basic product that improve the amount of space and perhaps efficiency. It used to be they were the only game in town but over ten years that changed so their product has been improved as a result of the competition.
 Consider that the front window had to be removed. I think there are something like 60 screws that hold it in place along with sealant that has been stuck since the boat was built. The clean up from this was extensive because it was this black gooey stuff that never hardened. A roll of paper towels and about half a container of Goo Gone cleaned up most of this.
 Once all of this was resolved and the interior restored to order, the brige cleaning proceeded. Having Freedom stored down South exposed her to some mildew we have yet to experience. Bleach and scrubbing resulted in a clean hard top and a bridge we can work on again. But we still have quite a bit of cleaning because a boat was sanded nearby Freedom and she has quite a bit of dust on her.
 Regardless, we're getting ready to move.

It's a Floater!

 Freedom is back in the water. It was a challenge but "here we go again". Billy I know how you and Deb feel.
 We left Kingston NY on Thursday and stopped in Md. to visit with some friends. This was an easy leg of the trip that only took about four hours. After a great lunch and dinner prepared by Karin plus a good night's sleep we cannon balled to Wando Sc. where Freedom was laid up. Here are a few photos of the SUV we rented to haul "stuff" down there.

Believe it or not there is a 3 cu. ft. freezer in there loaded with frozen food as well. The cooler and our luggage went in just before we left. All of this had to be lifted about 10 feet to get it onto the aft deck of Freedom, and then it had to be stowed below.
 The gates at the marina normally close at 4:00 PM. We arrived Friday at 3:58 PM and checked in at the office. They said one of the employees would be there until 5 so we had one hour to unload and get all this set up on Freedom. We did not like the idea of leaving the freezer at ground level where the animals could get to it. So that was also brought aboard. The cooler and freezer were the worst of it but we got it done and the car back outside the gate when Larry decided it was time to leave for the day.
 So after a couple of nights aboard Freedom on the hard, and a night at a hotel, we launched Freedom on Monday.
 I cannot say enough about the staff here at the Charleston City Boatyard. They are all great friendly folks that hustle to get the job done. They have the equipment to do the job and they do it professionally.
 Anyway after checking all of the sea cocks, hoses, rudder shaft logs, drive shaft logs, and etc. we settled in for the night. We figured that it was best to lay over a night just to be near a lift if anything went wrong.
 Fortunately everything went well and today we took Freedom down the Wando to Charleston Sc. and the City Marina (Mega Dock). The ride down could not have been better. There was not a cloud in the sky and the water was flat calm. Within 20 minutes we were surrounded by dolphins that welcomed us back into the water. At the marina we are well inside where we can provision for the long haul as well as get some maintenance done.
 The front window has to come out again so we can get a new refrigerator installed.
 But all in all things are going well. We're bushed but things are going well.

If you know the boat you can find us on the web cam!

http://www.charlestoncitymarina.com/web_cam.html

Here's a snapshot of Freedom from the webcam.

Wow, the summer is over

 In spite of Freedom being on the hard, we have had the pleasure of spending a number of wonderful boating days with some great people.

 Out of all of those people, Ray and Jean, you are the best.

 Twice you took us up to Ravina and we had a great time at the Yacht Club with all of the wonderful folks at that place. We would not have had this opportunity without your thoughtfulness. It was fantastic to be on the river, let alone letting me drive and dock the boat (your mistake). We had some adventures with fuel issues where it was one boat or the other, and rocks came into play, but we all pulled through and we all had a great time. No one was hurt and no damage was done! Maybe next time I'll have better aim with the champagne corks!
 We loved it.
 Beyond but not surpassing that, several acquaintances have their blogs going and have sent us email detailing their ports of call. While this might sound like a vicarious delusion of some sort, there is actually quite a bit to be learned from their travels. Some times it's as simple as being able to find a loaf of bread, but other times it could boil down to locating diesel in a remote spot of humanity.
 In any event, as the Summer winds down and Freedom approaches launching on the 19th we want to express our profound thanks to all of those that either included us or told us about their travels.
 It was a great (if boatless) Summer!