Settling back into stationary life.

The tree is out of the front yard and driveway. The neighbor that did the work is absolutely a jewel. Started last night with cleanup of the vehicles. I personally caused the rain. I know this from many past experiences and could easily do an infomercial citing documented proof that when I wash my cars and RV the rain will come in 24 hours.
For just $29.95 plus shipping and handling, I will break the drought in your neighborhood too! But wait...There's more!... for an additional $39.95 plus separate shipping and handling I'll protect your car from bird droppings! Watch this! After causing the rain by my patent-pending "Wash-o-rama" method, I'll wax at least one of my vehicles! This will cause, without fail, all birds within a 3 mile radius to void their cloaca on my vehicle, thus protecting YOUR Car! Amazing!
Yesterday, the propagation and ionosphere was perfect for HF radio to Japan. Heard several loud stations working, but couldn't get a word in edgewise. Most of the "Big Gun" stations are running ten times my power and highly directional beam antennae. I'm setting up a new antenna here to try to learn the skills necessary for reliable HF work on the boat.
I shoot a light line over the 80-90 foot trees in my yard with a pneumatic potato gun I built several years ago. The gun is made of 2-inch PVC pipe, a Rainbird electric sprinkler valve and a home-made electric trigger box. Clears the trees easily.
After the new antenna is up, I'll install my new-to-me antenna tuner and see what we can get going. I really want to be able to tune the 80 and 160 meter bands here and 40 meters on the boat.

Getting home to a clean house and yard!

We made the trip home uneventfully. Which after the news about the tree falling over in our driveway was a welcome circumstance. On the trip home, I decided to just follow the GPS and take I-10 to Jacksonville then I-95 and I-16 to Statesboro, GA then home on US25. I've always avoided that route, preferring to take the back roads through the middle of the state. I like the GPS route. It is very easy to drive, except for the 40 miles of construction on I-95. When you're driving a wide vehicle like our coach, narrowing the lanes with concrete barricades is jangling to the nerves. The worst of all was right here in Augusta!
Sure enough, the tree is down all over the garage and front of the house. I cut off the limb that was still lying on the garage to allow access.
The tree was actually the property of my neighbor, Richard. The way it works with trees is that unless a professional or your insurance company has told you to cut down a tree, the responsibility for repairs and removal is that of the homeowner that the tree fell on, not the one who owned the property where the tree originally was. We have cooperatively taken down limbs and even a huge cedar tree at our expense to protect our neighbors cars. And we've all helped to clean up after windstorms. That's the sign of a good neighborhood.
True to form, Richard has offered to pay the majority of the removal cost and another neighbor Melvin will do the work.
Micky's mom scrubbed our house spotless, and her brother's family kept up the yard. The surprise was the repairs that Rex and our friend Greg did to our deck. I had around a dozen boards that needed replacing. The work involved in removing the old boards after more than a decade and screwing down the new ones is miserable labor at the wrong height for humans. I was literally floored! Floored! Get it?
Coming home to such loving friends and family makes planning the next trip seem sneaky. But we are planning more adventures.....

Kind of a Good Day All-round!

Okay, After all the problems with getting underway from Ichetucknee Springs yesterday (see last blog) I never thought that the delay would be a good thing. But it was!
Pat, our next door neighbor, called to let us know that a suspect tree that we both had been watching deteriorate had fallen across the front of the house and our driveway. If the rig had been parked there, major damage to all our toys would have followed.
I called Rex, Micky's brother, and asked them to get some pictures and document the situation in case we need them for insurance purposes.
Pat said "some guy" drove by and said he could clean the tree up and haul it out for $375. We have chosen to wait to contact our insurer and find out the coverage. With our high deductibles, it'll be up to us for the majority of the cost anyway.
As it stands, a problematic tree is no longer an issue, the cars and this rig are undamaged, and home is still standing.
Oh, and ReserveAmerica waived the $10.00 cancellation fee! I won.

Floods, Lightning, and Other Calamities

Micky and I were going to kayak today in the Ichetucknee River. This is a wonderful gin-clear 72-degree river with some of the most idyllic southern scenery in the nation. Took the convertible and drove US27 into Branford, a funky little intersection that used to have signs at the entrance proclaiming them the "Cave Diving Capital of the World." Along the way, the road passes over the Ichetucknee. It was not the clear beauty with a white bottom we expected.
When the rivers here flood in the spring, the pressure of the high water reverses the flow of some of the springs that form the local rivers and force tannin-colored water into the Ichetucknee. I have encountered pockets of such water 1500 feet from the entrance of Peacock Springs while cave diving. At Branford there is a major spring feeding the Suwanee. It too was tea-colored. That cancelled our kayaking desires for this trip.
But not the shopping fever that occasionally swirls over Micky. She loves Bealls Outlets. she had me locate the nearest one on the GPS and promised that she only wanted one item and that it would be a "guy shopping trip".
Men enter a store, walk in a zombie trance to the exact location of their purchase, snag it, and walk purposefully to the cashier. Send a man to a store for a blue tie and he cannot tell you if they also sell red ties. We don't shop.
Women view the exercise differently. It is not a defined mission, but an activity. The mission is to see everything in the store that pertains to that category and all other related items. This drives most men loony. It has taken me years to submerge the testosterone-driven frustration enough to allow me to even enter a Bealls Outlet, Steinmart, or Ross with any woman. I am quite proud of my growth.
Shopping over and freshly provisioned from Winn-Dixie we also stopped at True Value and obtained new lynch pins for the tilt-bed of the car dolly.
After letting Don, the manager of the campground that we would not be kayaking, we started packing up intending to drive home immediately.
First came the thunder, then the vigorous and frequent lightning. I do not like lightning so close that there is no discernible gap between the stroke and the sound. Too close. And the rain was coming in sheets. So inside and stowing stuff we went.
I hooked up the GPS and attempted to start the coach. Lots of noise, but no engine run. And the GPS acted like it had no power also. I have to be careful with this Rochester carbureted 454 as it will flood easily. No, not easily, willfully. On the other hand, you do have to pump it once or twice after sitting. It would not start. I didn't smell excessive gasoline, so I started checking for ignition voltage and other electrical problems.
One thing that happens when a rainstorm comes through is that the density of the air changes as it saturates with water vapor. That increases the likelihood of flooding a sensitivie engine. After 45 minutes of truly impressive probing around with a Fluke 73 multimeter, the engine started right up. Not my fault!
I did learn that the GPS power plug had only 2 volts on it, so I need to trace the wiring back and find my hookups.
The upshot of all this commotion is that we will not leave here tonight. One of the big advantages of being among the "un-scheduled" is that we travel when ready. And tomorrow is a philosophical touchstone as well as a time cooordinate.

A series of mistakes (Ours and Theirs)

Today we travelled from Sebastian Inlet to Ichetucknee Springs in North Central Florida. Before leaving the campsite, I went on line, and checked the reservation at Oleno State Park. Florida has contracted with a Canadian outfit named ReserveAmerica to handle all their park reservations. I was floored to see that not only had my reservation been cancelled, but also a $10.00 fee had been charged. A call to the park, yielded a very nice park ranger that confirmed the lack of a reserved spot and that there was only one spot left. My internal pressure began to creep up at the thought of having to drive this rig 5 hours to find out if I could stay there. I thanked her and moved on to ReserveAmerica.
A phone call to "Marie" informed me that they had a "problem" and the credit card did not go through leading to the cancellation. They called my home phone number and left a message on the machine and cancelled.
I did not argue with "Marie". Micky wanted to make sure there was no problem with the credit card. There was no problem. In fact, at the same sitting we had made arrangements on the same card, same method for the stay in Sebastian Inlet.
Now the scramble was to find a place to park this thing. We do not like the thought of camping in a WalMart, although WalMart doesn't mind.
I had indeed, given ReserveAmerica my current cell phone number and they had successfully emailed all the confirmations. I was fully pressurized at this point! Fired off an email to their, as Clark Howard calls it "Customer No Service" portal demanding that they refund the $10.00. Micky found us a spot at the Ichetucknee Springs Campground. More about that separately.
Confident that we had a place to park, we pulled out of the site and prepared to put the convertible on the dolly.
The tow dolly has built-in ramps, a feature dependent on a strong half-inch diameter pin that must be pulled out each time to load the vehicle. Once loaded and strapped down the pin is replaced and secured with a clip. Micky and I have been having unusual communication problems with this process. Telling her to put the vehicle in "Park" as compared to setting the "Parking Brake" has been uncharacteristically difficult. This too increased my pressure.
Additionally, one of my unidentified Marine brethren from the Vietnam War had gotten to the dump station ahead of me and was taking forever to make his deposit and move on. I know that man has dealt with fecal matter. The Lysol Spray into the ends of the sewer hose seemed a bit prissy for a man of his size, especially considering the number of tatoos.
We loaded and strapped the car, but left the tilt-bed pin laying on the pavement.
It all rode surprisingly well. Even when I did a full-on emergency stop, nothing spectacular happened. I could feel a strange "rubbery" action to the rig, as though there was a "bungee" cord between the trailer and the coach. When we stopped for gas, I checked and found a loose strap on one wheel. No more "bungee"!
It wasn't until time came to unload the car that I found my mistake. Nice to know that Master Tow built enough redundancy into the system.
We are staying at the Ichetucknee Springs Campground. I've been here before around 1985. Jim Gill and I were down here cave diving and ran into Ron Wheatley with a student class. The tavern here is called the "Jug". We all ended up here,and after a sufficient surface interval drinking beer, started playing volleyball in the rain. Among the casualties were my right shoulder, an injury that I still suffer with, and the dignity of several players as we decided that diving under the net and "Pantsing" an opposing player was just a tactical ploy.
When a certain lady used this tactic on John Lowe, I'm sure she felt safe from retaliation, protected as she was by her husband's presence and her status as a Southern woman of considerable charm and pulchritude. She just didn't know John Lowe well enough!
The camping here is spectacular. Micky and I have become accustomed to mangroves and the short trees of the hammock. Here you are in a green cathedral of water oaks and huge cedars festooned with Spanish moss. I'll try to get some pictures, but portraying the scale of these trees will be difficult.
Tonight I got the typical non-response response from ReserveAmerica. I've sent the rebuttal, and they have about two days to see the light before I get my credit card company to mark it as a disputed charge and stop payment. Such is the power of platinum. And retired guys have plenty of time to write long irritating letters and wait through phone queues to speak to supervisors. All over $10.00

New Florida Travel Toy

We've moved from Bahia Honda in the Keys up the coast to Melbourne and the Sebastian Inlet. This is one of the premier treasure-hunting beaches in Florida. A fleet of Spanish galleons stuffed with looted Indian gold sank in a hurricane in 1715 and the gold and silver have been washing up here ever since.
We took the Turnpike and used a new Sunpass transponder for the first time. I know that the more civilized readers will scoff at the idea of my wonderment with the thing, but in Augusta we don't even have toll roads. The transponder is suctioned to the windshield of the RV and instead of stopping to pay the tolls, I've set aside money from a credit card, and we just roar through the special lanes at the toll booth at full speed. The transponder gives a satisfied long beep and I know that not only did I pay the toll, but also got a discount. The savings in gas alone makes it worthwhile, the time savings are just gravy.
My legs look like shredded toilet paper. The burned skin is sloughing off in inch-long sheets. It's creepy and ugly, but doesn't hurt. I'll be very careful to never repeat this particular recto-cranial inversion again.

Odd places to meet nice people!

Biked the Old Seven-Mile Bridge this morning. Cool morning with the 10-15 knots of wind back. Overheard one fella telling another, "Yeah I missed the three days of boating this month!"

On the way out we came across several large turtles. This is like riding out over an aquarium. And the tailwind made it very easy pedalling. The reason the old bridge is still used is to get out to Pigeon Key. This small, round island was a convenient place to house and feed men while building and operating the Flagler Overseas Railroad. It's mostly used by youth groups as a summer-camp adventure.

They also used the old bridge as a set for the movie "True Lies" . There are several burned spots and series of small holes where charges were set to simulate cannon fire from the Marine Harriers used in the film. Micky and I were down here during the filming and got to see a stunt that never made it into the film. They had a stuntman in a parachute harness suspended beneath a Bell JetRanger helicopter over Stock Island. The man would kick and squirm in apparent terror as the JetRanger lowered him into an electrical substation. The traffic was all stopped in both directions as this scene was repeated three times, then the stuntman settled back in the harness for what had to be the best scenic ride over Key West possible.

At the Pigeon Key end there's a gap in the bridge. Across from the gap is where a van truck was delicately balanced with a bad guy in it, until a wayward pelican landed on the windshield and sent the van nose first into Florida Bay with a huge explosion.

At the barricade protecting us from the gap was an obvious expatriate Yankee carrying on animatedly with his friends aboard a sailboat just clearing the bridge a mile further on. After his call finished, he told us of the three sharks that had just passed and of his love of riding out on the bridge. We introduced each other and made the acquaintance of one James MacArthur, retired from the city of Tampa, but indelibly stamped with the intonations of Back Bay Boston. Winthrop, to be exact, which James assured us was the only reason there was a Boston. James is living on his 33-foot Morgan Out Island "Second Avenue" at the Marathon City Marina. His boat name causes some confusion at drawbridges when calling the operator for an opening of the bridge. It would be hilarious to hear the exchange when one street asks another for the span to be raised! Came down last September and intending to stay the entire season. The Marina is apparently the best deal in the universe at $280/month for a mooring. I agree.

Immediately, as is habit with cruisers, the conversation fell to the three obsessions of sailors, DC power generation, water suply, and waste disposal. James has no overboard discharges at all, since his is a Great Lakes boat, but the marina has great facilities and, I believe a pumpout barge prowls Boot Key Harbor like a demented remora.

James has a really good solution to the problem of supplying water without making a trip to a dock. He puts a 60-quart cooler in his dinghy anf fills it with water at 5-cents a gallon. At the boat he drops a bilge pump rigged on an extension cord and pumps the water into the tank. Never has to lug 60-pound 7-gallon water jugs around! Brilliant!

DC power on his boat is boat solar and wind generated. He claims you need both. Recommended the Air Marine brand without the slip rings. Since the unit is used primarily at anchor/moored the 360-degree rotation of slip rings (and chance of corrosion) are not needed. Makes good sense to me.

Anchoring down here is best done with a "Claw"-style and fixed-shank anchor. Says a delta-style anchor will slide around without catching. Now I'm looking for a "Claw". There are no universally useful anchors.

James also had a few tips on getting free parking at the City Parking structure in Key West. Go to Turtle Kraals and drink two Happy-hour beers and your ticket gets validated. During Fantasy Fest go to the Bull and watch the craziness from above rather get down in the mix. Porky's in Marathon is recommended.

James' brother Tom sails a $2000 Pearson and recommends anchoring in a place shunned by most cruisers- near the Coast Guard station. Says there are no Pirates there. James says the mouth of Boot Key Harbor is similarly infested with the Brethren of the Coast and should be avoided.

All told a most productive 20 minutes. The only regret is-- No cold rum drinks were exchanged!

Out of the sun for awhile.

I need to stay out of the sun for a while. The blisters on my legs are popping and the skin is peeling. I feel so stupid about this. I preach sun protection and then get fried. Dumb!
Stayed inside on the computer most of the day. As usual, that can be an expensive hobby.
I'm looking for a method of world-wide communication via email that doesn't have ongoing subscription or usage fees.
I am a licensed amateur radio operator with privileges on all Ham frequencies. I've already setup a station on the boat, RV and in our home. The home station is running a wire antenna strung up in the trees. That's not possible in the boat or RV. I have what is called a "screwdriver" antenna mounted on the bimini frame and the side of the RV. It is a noisy and inefficent solution. The efficiency of an antenna is not related to whether it works, but in how much current it converts to RF energy.
On sailboats, the common method is to insulate the backstay and use a tuner to turn it into a antenna. My Hunter has a split backstay with the radar mounted on it. That pretty much rules it out as an antenna.
I've been loking for a way to deploy an antenna separate from the rigging. One solution is to run the wire up like a topping lift. I plan to sink a suitable wire inside a section of line and then use the line to take the load. This is not a new idea, but the execution of it requires an antenna tuner. Without getting more technical than I already am, an antenna tuner adds different capacitors and inductors into the antenna line to make the radio think the antenna is perfect.
You can do this manually if you only want to operate on one frequency, but that won't work.
So today I bought a used automatic tuner for use on the boat and RV.

Why post all this techno-crap? The same method and equipment works with a standard Marine SSB radio. If you don't have either an amateur radio or a Marine SSB in your plans, you need to change your plans! VHF and cellphones won't work over the horizon. Reliance on an expensive satellite phone in a small boat without a dedicated satellite antenna is not a good idea. The problem is in a raging storm you would have to leave the relative safety of the cabin (think drum of a washing machine) for the cockpit to make a call. Most of the phones will quickly die when exposed to breaking waves and heavy spray. And you will find it impossible to hear and be heard over the roar of even 30 knots of wind and flogging sails.

Amateur radio has dropped the Morse code requirement, and a General-class license is just a matter of study. Marine SSB is a license for the boat, and a no-test license for the operator. The fee isn't bad.

Both amateur and commercial systems use the same equipment with costs in the $3400.00 range installed on the boat. And it's a one-time cost for the amateur system with no user fees afterwards. You can use the same radio to get weatherfax, call for help, relay messages home, and even do phone patches to your homies. But you can't do business. If it makes you money, it's illegal on the amateur bands. Commercial doesn't care.

In reality, the speed of the systems will restrict photos to very small and very rare. Web-surfing and web page downloads will not be practical. Satellite phone and sat email will allow that usage, but the expense of even a rented phone is nuts!

A year out is the time for making preparations for sailing away, so for those of you heading out like Micky and I next year, get the license, install and test the gear before you go.

Parrotfish in the shallows.

Went for a nice kayak paddle this morning. On the way, while hauling the kayaks on the Seitech dolly, met a couple that volunteers in the park system, Ed and Jennifer Bilby. They're from Greenville, SC and come down here to get free extended stays in return for labor. A good way to cut the cost, but more importantly to stay down here in Bahia Honda longer than 14 nights. They had to wait a year to get a slot.

The wind has died and we timed the tides for a high tide crest to cut down on the flow under the bridge. Didn't see much in most places. The normal sponges and soft corals. Really not electrifying sea life. Then we found an area of maybe 200 feet just beyond the quarry pit that was teeming with stoplight parrotfish mob-feeding on the rocks. These were large super-male fish in their best mating colors. Parrotfish have the normal two sexes, which they go through in phases, all start out female, then male, then the final stage of super-male during which the neon-bright colors are displayed. Try as I mught, I could not get a picture of these fish from above or below the water. I forgot that you have to set a special U/W mode to get it to work well. So, sorry, you'll just have to take my word for the brilliance of the colors.

We also found a pair of horseshoe crabs mating. The smaller male climbs up the females back and hangs on for an extended period of time. I'll have to look up how long they do this and whether they drop over dead afterwards. I know a couple of weeks of rodeo sex would kill me!

As we kayaked through the quarry pit we saw Ed and Jennifer cleaning one of the cabins they have here. They asked us if we'd like to look inside and we jumped at the offer! These are very nice and at $130.00 per night for a two-bedroom efficiency, the best deal in the Keys. If you can get a week or two in them, it's well worth changing everything else in your schedule just to make it work.

The blisters on my legs are popping and the skin is peeling. I went very heavy on the Bullfrog for this mornings trip, but may have to lay low for the rest of the trip.

Water- the not so pretty part!

Micky and I really enjoy the water. In it, on it, around it and drinking it in. Most people do. But for the American psyche it's all about input. That changes when you get a boat, sail or power, or an RV. Or simply take more steps away from civilization than your bladder will allow.
So, shoo the children away from the monitor, I'm going to talk about output.
Except for sweat, every ounce of water we take in is gonna come back out. If you do all the right things it comes out on schedule, has the right color and consistency, and you feel really happy!
It's the colors and consistencies that the water picks up on the way through that cause the problem.
We have evolved a very deeply seated revulsion aimed at our own waste. This is really good as we call those who indulge in coprophagia crazy! And other people's output is absolutely horrible when compared to the daintiness and necessity of our own. Even a loved one makes a horrible mess.
I calculated for a friend that his baby would generate 800 pounds of soiled diapers in a year. Even the Gerber baby is a terrorist on this account.
On a sailboat, it all has to be dealt with. Even though we spend the time and money to simulate the same white porcelain dainties we have at home. The pipe ends about four feet away.
In an RV, we have a home-style facility not 150 feet away. But you wouldn't believe what happens to the water that we drain from the sinks in the kitchen and bathroom when it sits in 85 degree heat for anytime at all.
Which brings me to the point of all this. Waste always flows downhill.
In our RV the highest point of the euphemistically-named "grey water" tank is about 3 inches higher than the drain of the bathtub. When the tank fills, the bathtub does too.
Last night, despite the presence of electronic tank gauges, and a regular schedule of taking away 27 gallons of wonderful at a time, the tank filled. Micky demonstrated to me the DNA-deep nature of our aversion to that smell in no uncertain terms. No amount of rational explanantion absolved me of the smelly fact that the dirty clothes bag was soaking in the fetid, bacteria-rich soup that is our "grey water".
This is not a good use of "Grey". The low, leaden clouds scudding across a New England winter sky. That's grey. The smooth side of a porpoise sliding next to your boat. That's grey. Even the upholstery on a rented 1988 Ford Taurus is grey!
It should be called what it is. Waste. Necessary, ubiquitous, world-choking waste.
What you do with it is what matters. We are evolved to make waste and move on. The problem is there are limited places to move to. So I did the right thing and in the middle of the night, moved the waste from the internal tanks to the portable tank and then put it in the sanitary system provided. All so that I didn't have to move on.

Light

Thinking about light. Micky and I are both drawn to light. We travel to places that have more light than home. Our main hobbies are all outdoors in the light. We enjoy being outside. And we both desparately need to avoid the sun! Micky is so fair-skinned and freckled that sunburn doesn't work out well at all. And I have blister the size of a half-dollar on my right ankle from the sun two days ago. But we all love the sun.

I've really enjoyed the sunsets and the stars here. It's jarring to realize that light takes time to travel. That means that everything we've ever seen was always in the past. From mere nano-seconds in the past, to millions of years in the past. The closer things are the less time it takes for the light to get here. And most of the light we see every day is already thousand of years old before it escapes from the Sun's surface to get here. Sure, it's only about 8 minutes from the time it leaves the surface until it glows up from the bottom of the water here showing us the rays, tarpon, and turtles.

When the sun slides beneath the edge of the planet and the sea darkens to a leaden, rippled sheet, blue-green stars twinkle, not in the sky, but in the warm water sliding under the bridge. In some undeciphered code, tiny shrimp announce to each other their readiness for a reproductive waltz in the swirls.

The stars are next. Their pinpoint, eons-old light shifting position in our thick, hot atmosphere causing them to twinkle. Only the planets are close enough to retain their round disks. All their twinkling is kept to themselves.

Light only takes a little more time to bounce off the moon, but it creates beauty on that trip. Scattering most of the blue out to give us a deep, rusty red ball rolling on the horizon. And after a few minutes, a shimmering ladder of light on the water.

Chickens in Key West.

We went to KW yesterday shopping. It's always a hassle in the old section finding a parking place. And they are rude! Not the tourists, but the natives. I'd be pissed too if I had to work in all that. But laying on the horns is just plain rude! I guess they're not used to little retired women carying big Glock handguns!
Back to the chickens... They're everywhere! Gives new meaning to the term 'free-range'. And they are gorgeous. These aren't the genetic mutant albino dumbasses that get mashed into McNuggets. These are the cocks and hens of art and story. Remember "Chanticleer"? I saw him yesterday standing behind a strip mall near the Winn-dixie. Nearby was his hen and all the chicks. These chickens fly, roost in trees and hide under the houses to get away from the really scary homeless people.

Blistered!

My legs hurt! This is the first time that I have actual blisters from a sunburn since 1968. I'm gonna lose the skin on my lower legs in a few days and feel really stupid. I know better! When Micky said she wanted to go around the island, I should have stopped it for just that reason. About an hour later, I was committed. Literally, too close to the point where it was equidistant to get back. Bullfrog goes into the kayak- today!

A Lazy Recovery Day Making Plans.

My legs got badly sunburned on the trip around the island. Other than that, Micky and I did not have the expected soreness after paddling for that distance and time. But we still just took it easy yesterday. I did happen across a spectacular flowering whatever growing beside the road in the park. I haven't a clue on what it is, or if it's a native species, but it is gorgeous. Micky thinks it's some version of lily. Any ideas?

We did get out for a little while checking out the monthly rates at Big Pine Key Fishing Lodge. We love the place, but next year we plan on cruising in "Jazz" to the Bahamas. This year we want to use the boat on the Lake and begin the modifications and preparations to transform her into a real cruiser. Although she's a good boat for a week or maybe two in close to American-style marinas, she'd be a pain in the butt for remote locations.

Here's what I plan to do, in a nutshell. Add refrigeration, solar power, and storage.

The boat uses an ice box built into the hull. At the Sailing Club ice is free, so 40 pounds for a weekend is okay. When ice costs $3-4.00 for 10 pounds and takes 2-3 hours to get in a dinghy, when you can get it, an ice box is not a good option.

Once you put refrigeration on the boat, power generation and storage have to be increased or the motor must run for 1-2 hours each day. The fuel cost is not extreme, but the heat in the boat, noise, and wear on the motor are objectionable. Wind and solar are expensive to install, but free after that. I prefer solar to cut down the noise. A rack of solar panels will fit over the bimini aft of the boom and provide a large amount of power in the sunny southern latitudes.

Sailboats have a lot of internal volume that can be used to store all the stuff and food needed for cruising. The problem is most of it is really inconvenient to access. For sailing trim, it's better to have weighty stuff as low as possible, but getting down on all fours to retrieve a can of pork 'n beans gets old. By putting hinges on dinette seats and creating vertical storage areas, we can stack and load much more efficiently.

Fuel storage will be plastic Jerry cans tied to the rails. Water is in similar containers kept below. My boat has good sails, anchors, and electronics. We do need better cockpit cushions, though. And all the bimini/dodger canvas will need replacement.

For Micky and I preparation is half the fun.

Circum-kayaking Bahia Honda

Micky led me all the way around Bahia Honda Key this morning. The GPS track says we did 6 miles in a little over 3 hours with 10-13 knots of wind. On the way we saw two big eagle rays, three cormorants on a stickup, several smaller fish, and a huge turtle! Kayaks in the Keys are a lot like magic carpets. You can glide in less than a foot of water and the water and shorelines are beautiful beyond belief. When you get in the wind shadow of a point and the water goes flat, you can see everything on the bottom. The bayside is turtle grass and sponges. Barrel and big black ball sponges that look like discarded tires.

Micky was able to glide up to a trio of cormorants drying their wings. They get too heavy to fly after a dive and can only scurry away until they dry out. That's why they're so reluctant to leave their perches.

I wanted to get some overhead shots of 'Miss T' with the sails up as he left for Newfound Harbor. When you combine wind and a fast running tide, the photo shoot was not a leisurely affair. John shot through that gap in the bridge and tacked and was gone! We'll probably see him again later this week or next. He's going into Key West to argue about his truck engine with the Ford dealer. His speedometer only shows 18 miles since the engine was put in. It seems that Fairway Ford couldn't fix the speedo at engine installation in November , but the locals in Marathon did. John says the GPS says the motor has 1800 miles on it. Big trouble now with warranty claim!

Pictures and comments- use 'em

Did you know that the pictures on most blogs (including this one) are thumbnail links to the larger picture. Try clicking on it to see the full-size image.
And comments are always welcome! Let's see some conversation here, people!

Now, That's What I'm Talking About!

This morning is already spectacular. Clear sparkly skies and a light breeze to knock down the bugs. Had seven meteors including three major skystreakers, four satellites, and an Iridium flare. All in one hour!
The shower will continue tomorrow and I'll be there.
It might not have been a confirmed Iridium flare. I have to look it up, but sometimes when the sunlight glints off the flat, reflective surface of a space vehicle, you get a brilliant flare of light. Bright enough to cast shadows and even be seen in daylight!

Friends in Paradise, But No Laundry!

We had a late morning start and then had to take care of one of those age-related issues that has become surprisingly easy! Refilling prescriptions out-of-town is a slam-dunk with CVS. I suspect Walgreen's is just as easy. I'd steer away from the mom-and-pop pharmacies along with Wal-mart/Sam's. There are many places without WM/Sam's and although it can probably be done, the process is very easy with the others. Always bring the bottles. Avoid the temptation to leave them at home and bring little packets.
Found a geocache on No Name Key and on Big Pine Key one of those funky mysteries that makes this place so endearing. I don't know who Jim was, but he has friends and apparently was an old-time diver. In the picture, those are "J" valves on the tanks. Automatic reserve valves are at least 30 years old!

The only laundromat on Big Pine was closed and being remodeled so we aborted that project and went back to Bahia Honda. John Edwards boat was at anchor off thebeach. Called his cell and arranged for him to kayak in for dinner. He carries an inflatable kayak in his 17-foot boat.

Had nice dinner of my bride's baked ziti and watched a DVD of "Dogfights". Paradise is kinda hot in the mid-afternoon. Kayaked out with John to get some pictures. Another interesting day.

Meteors, Ibises and Bahia Honda

This morning and tomorrow morning are the peak of the Eta Aquarid meteor shower. This morning after the moon set I had maybe twenty minutes of clear skies and saw one good meteor before a cloud moved in an shut that session down. But before it did, the skies were gorgeous. It's really a shame what all the sodium vapor lighting does in even a small city lightscape. Here the Milky Way pops out at you from horizon to horizon. Venus is as bright as it will be all year.

We're going to play with the kayaks again this afternoon, but reading needs to be done. I stepped outside and found a white ibis probing the leaf litter for a meal. Successfully, too!

Got the camera and learned the humbling lessons of wildlife photography. They do not pose. They don't let you get close. You never have the right lens. The background is always wrong.

But you shoot anyway.

Found a nice blog from a NY couple sailing the Bahamas with 2 kids. Look up S/V Pelican. He did a really good job explaining the communication options from the Bahamas. Batelco has successfully locked up the market. Skype is actually illegal! High speed internet is very hard to come by. His solution is Iridium satellite phones and a cable to allow email that way. He makes a very good economic argument for that large 'per minute' charge whenyou compare it with the Batelco 'per megabite' charge and a slow modem. I'm going to really look carefully at a Pactor modem to use with my SSB/Ham radio. I know that I can talk on this radio to Georgetown and even though the equipment cost is around $1300.00 there are no charges after that.

Kayaks, kabobs, and Keys, Oh My!

How can it get any better? Try this--- rode the bikes this morning over to the Sand and Sea Nature Center and watched a DVD about manatees with Jimmy Buffett (recorded). Then up to the top of the Flagler bridge for absolutely flawless scenery. Then a short walk down the bridge approach to a beautifully hidden geocache named "Wind and Wings". Saw a beautiful blue-black skink lizard and gulls kiting no more than five feet over our heads. Then back to the RV for lunch, cooked up bacon and sausage for the next week and took a cooling nap.
Decided that Micky and I needed to make sure we could reboard our kayaks in deep water. My brilliant plan was to drag the kayaks by hand on the Seitech Dolly over to the swimming beach and we did. It's a lot longer than I thought! Launched off the beach and then paddled under the bridge and over to the 'borrow pit'. Saw a heron so still, he could have been carved. Found a much better launch site not 100 feet from camp. Took out there and then I walked to the beach and recovered our dolly. A quick shower and cool-down with some juice.
A well paced day.
This evening we're having steak kabobs from Publix with corn and a flashy sunset. Only eleven days left.

Moving Again.

Yester day was moving day. The whole reason for coming to the Keys was to get here! Bahia Honda is one of those rare places where the natural and man-made come together to create nearly perfect. The beach here is consistently listed in the top ten for the world.
And as far as the place itself- "location,location,location!" as Betty and Marj would acknowlege always makes great sense. Bahia Honda is close to both Marathon and Big Pine Key for essential shopping. Thirty-six miles to Key West for 'culture'. Right here for everything else.

When Henry Flagler built the Overseas Railroad the Moser channel here was the toughest engineering challenge. The depth of water and strong currents forced him to build a truss bridge on very substantial pilings. After the Hurricane of 1935 destroyed the rail line, the US government decided to build the highway over the TOP of the trusses. Needless to say, the result was unique and a terror to drive over.
In 1967, Tommy Chumley and I came down here in his '66 Corvair Monza convertible diving for a week. The Bahia Honda Bridge was a series of parabolic dips that launched that light-weight car off the ground until we got it under control. Tommy was doing slightly more than the 45 miles an hour limit!
We slept on the beach at Sugarloaf Key and dove and snorkeled. Seventeen was a great age to be in 1967 with a surfboard sticking out of the back of a convertible!

The Green Flash

Last night we rode the bikes 2 miles to get the 100 yards across the street to our favorite sunset place. The parks people made it easy and put a gate in that we could have used, but we love the ride. It's quite a phenomena. All we tourists stop whatever we're doing for 15 minutes and rush to a spot to see the sun go down. I think it irritates the locals just a bit.

That sunset was unique, as they all are, I suppose. When the horizon is clear and the spot where the sun apparently disappears is over water, there's a refraction that takes place. It spreads the spectrum out a little and causes color shifiting. That and absorption cause the shading you see in a sunset picture with the dark, blood red at the bottom.

Just as the last bit of the Sun slides over the horizon, there's the opportunity for a green flash of light. It's very fast like the glint of a diamond and fiercely green. I've heard that on rare occasions it flashes upward to the base of clouds and makes a very fast green hue line running to the horizon. Never seen that one, but yesterday I saw my second green flash.

Sorry, No pictures of the flash.

Spur of the moment? OK by me!

Took the local newspaper to the john with me this morning and came across their community calendar page. It's Armed Forces Week and NAS Key West had a static display going on. Now, I found this at 1130. The Air station is sixty miles down the Keys, Micky hasn't had breakfast, the display is over at 1400, etc. Not only did she want to go, she was enthusiastic about finally getting to see Boca Chica! I really married the right girl.

Got down there with right at 30 minutes left on the schedule. Took lots of pictures, including an aircraft that I not only worked on, but flew as a crewman on. EA-6A Bureau Number 148616 was in VMCJ-1 and VMAQ-2. They've got her painted up as a Navy airplane with a purely bogus modex number of 100. Recon/EW and other combat support types had modexes in the 5-800 range since the fighters were 1-200 and the attack guys 3-400. Incidentally, a -00 airplane was always the skipper's mount.

They brought down a Coast Guard HU-25D Guardian. I worked on the civil version of that one as a Falcon 200. Same basic avionics package, but cheap fabric seats. The CG is getting rid to them finally and going to a slow Spanish-built turboprop CASA 250 soon. Had a nice conversation with the crew.

My Fortieth Anniversary of Yellow Footprints

Forty-one years ago at about 2300, I arrived at Parris Island. The bus pulled up at the main gate and a Drill Instructor got on. Ignored all of us and chatted with the bus driver. Then he turned and in a gravelly, venomous voice only heard on the Depot welcomed us to the Island with, "You are now on Marine Corps Recruit Depot, Parris island, South Carolina! You are now subject to the Uniform Code of Military Justice. You will sit straight up, lock your scuzzy eyeballs to the front and shut the f--k up!" We did just exactly that except for the kid that sobbed softly somewhere.
The bus pulled up to a white two-story wooden "temporary" World War II barracks on a street with odd overhead steam pipes. The DI turned to us and ordered us to get all our stuff in our hands and walk off the bus. Once our feet hit the pavement, that was the last walking I did on PI.
Receiving Barracks had around 100 painted yellow footprints on the pavement perfectly spaced and aligned to form a group of know-nothings into a platoon-shaped mass. The DI yelled, "Who's got the orders?" "I do, sir!" was my response ending my first military mission. What followed was a three-minute tirade at maximum volume delivered with the brim of a perfectly brushed Stetson service hat (yes it IS a hat, read the tag!) bouncing off the bridge of my nose correcting my use of the personal pronoun "I" and helping me to avoid future use of the word "you". This lesson was proven to be invaluable within ten minutes when while in line for a haircut, I learned that the carefully practiced position of attention I'd learned in ROTC at the Academy of Richmond County was horribly defective is several particulars. DI's, I learned, love to mix questions in rapid-fire with instructions. Each interrogatory required a precise formulaic reply. One such exchange endlessly repeated was, "Are you eyeballing me, maggot!" The only approved tribal answer was "Sir, No Sir!". What followed was a litany of how good it was that I did not like looking at other men as that would have made me a homosexual and unworthy of recruit training. Or that the sergeant already had detected my latent tendencies and was vastly disappointed that I did not find him particularly attractive. Recruits never had the right answer.
The rest of the night and morning was a blur of paperwork and stowing our civvies. The one humorous moment was that I was third in line for my first haircut. The barber, a civilian not thrilled with being a barber at midnight, selected a black guy with an huge Afro from back in the line and while the line was slowly building up, started chiseling on the 'Fro from front-to-back while the DI looked on with a knowing smile. Piece-by-piece the barber, a thin black man, peeled the Afro off that fellow in one perfectly formed wig-like chunk. Then he handed the thing to the recruit who was ordered to stand there like a cigar-store Indian holding his pride in front of him while the rest of us were peeled in less than thirty seconds each. The purpose of taking his time while peeling the 'Fro was just to get the line charged up enough so that the barber's hythm was right.
Later, when they put us unto our racks (beds) for what amounted to 2-hours of sleep, I laughed silently at the spectacle as I did for the next 23 years in my beloved Corps.

Rescue Mission

Micky and I were riding the bikes to go see the sunset when my phone rang in my pocket. It was John Edwards. He'd had a big day. We had a nice breakfast and took John to the Sea Bird Marina to launch his boat in the morning expecting to hear from him later. What had happened was that his truck had an oil leak and he'd driven into Marathon to put it on a lift. The local mechanic said it looked dicey and to watch it on the way home. Didn't make it back to the marina before it turned into a steam engine. John has had rough luck with his truck. This is the third engine in his truck. But he had enough trust to drive it down here. John and AAA have an ongoing relationship with his Ford. So, it was no trouble getting them to tow it to Key West. Getting back to his boat wasn't their problem. John got back to Marathon with the truck driver and called us from the Dolphin Research Center, We got in the convertible and went to get him. Now when John is reading, he's concentrating on the book. We drove right past him and had to circle back. He didn't look up until I called his name.
Had a nice meal with him at the Keys Fishery on 35th street. A different kind of service. Place your order at the window and get your drinks sort of like Burger King. The view in the dining area is much different, though. Nothing like Orion over a beautiful Keys horizon.
John will be sailing the Keys until his truck is fixed.

Rum, Guitar, and Nowhere Bridges

John Edwards (the real one, not the fake psychic [and that's an oxymoron] or the sleazy NC lawyer/senator/cheat) is down here in the Keys. He brought down his Montgomery 17 and will spend the next week or so sailing the bayside. John is an all-round genial fellow to have around. Tells humorous stories of his time trapping bears with the Forest Service and of growing up in South Philly with the street crooners and bad guys.

Had a disappointing piece of fish at Herbie's in Marathon. It was dolphin with Key Lime butter sauce. Heavy on the lime and got bitter. Went searching for the original "bridge to nowhere". The drawbridge over the Boot Key harbor channel was built for a planned development on Boot Key. The local water and electric services play real hardball about growth. All the water is piped down from Miami along with most of the other juice. The city of Marathon and the developers didn't have enough political juice to get the permits for sparks and water, but the bridge is there anyway. It's on 20th Street semi-permanently locked in the raised position.

After a dessert of RV-made brownies (I really married the right one!) John and I sat out side under a thin moon and cocoanut palms playing around with my Ovation guitar, Fender G-DEC amp and all the old songs we could play.

Then after an uplifting session of fine music, we watched "The World's Dumbest Drivers 5" off the satellite and turned in. Another in a long string of perfect days.