With nowhere to go for two days I was able to just hang on the boat, work, and… nope, that’s about it. No people came through, no going ashore, no swimming. Just quiet—except for the water being released from Lake Okeechobee.
The morning that the railroad bridge opened up, the boats came filing through in a steady stream. I’m pretty sure I was the only person who didn’t know about the bridge closure ahead of time. Navigating through the St. Lucie lock was considerably easier than the Panama Canal.
Muddy river. Quite a change in scenery in the space of a week.
The bridge that held me up for two days. Even when they opened, they weren’t really open—two guys in the middle had to walk around in circles, pushing a big metal bar to manually open the bridge for me.
Meanwhile, in Minnesota, the kids were exploring their room at Grandma and Grandpa’s new house…
And, I was happy to see, counting down the days until they’d see me again.
I figure we probably made about 5,000 gallons of water this season. Not a single issue with the watermaker. I love this thing. I remember our Spectra watermaker on the catamaran that made about 4 gallons an hour, and at the time I thought that was pretty cool. Now we’re pumping out 35 gallons an hour, and using water as if it is coming out of a city tap. I pickled the unit so it wouldn’t get nasty while we’re away for a few weeks—that took about five minutes, and was much easier than I had thought it would be.
Other random jobs, replacing an engine-room vent fan, replacing a toilet waste hose (fun), cleaning the chain locker, flipping the chain around and straightening it out since it was super twisted, taking the bimini down, taking teak nameboards down, cleaning the boat and bilges, changing generator oil, and I’m sure there was more.
Ali and the kids dug out a box of mementos that we keep from our travels, picking out a few things to bring back to the boat with them.
Cousins.
And sisters.
A few weeks ago the subject of banana splits came up. The kids had never had a banana split, but thought it sounded good. You can see the excitement.
Followed by the disappointment. It’s funny, our kids really prefer plain vanilla ice cream over just about anything else. Lowe doesn’t eat chocolate at all. Banana splits were not a hit. Not that they don’t like sweets/candy, but they really aren’t into anything fancy at all.
Getting the boat ready for hauling, and for possible hurricanes.
The boat came out a couple of hours late. The people at Indiantown Marina are crazy nice, though. They came over, apologized—despite it not really mattering to me that they were behind—and told me they were giving me a free month of storage. This, on top of the free month they’d already given us for mentioning who had referred them to us, and I believe even a free month or two for being new customers. By the time we’re done here I’m pretty sure our storage is going to have been free.
My only issue with Indiantown, so far, is that it’s a pain to get anywhere else from there. There are no buses, no trains, no taxis, no Ubers, and no car rentals in town. There is a list of three or four locals who will give rides, however, and one nice old lady drove me to the airport an hour away for forty bucks.
Back with the kids, and they even gave me presents. Being a dad is awesome.
16 Comments on “Hurricane Season Haul-Out”
You should come down to the Iowa State Fair on august 16th, that way I could finally meet you.
Thanks, Marc, it would be a good time. But we are out in Oregon visiting more family for a few weeks, won’t be back out in MN until late-Aug, September. One of these days…
Boats always look sad when they are on the hard. Have a nice break, your family looks great. When I was a kid in Venezuela I was white blond like Lowe, tropical sun does that.
Lowe’s hair is fantastic! I’m taking him in for a cut today, but hoping they don’t chop it too much. And yes our home looks very sad.
Racefa e. Ramp it, bro!
Raceface
We like plain too. I don’t like chocolate. Bill eats very little. Right now our treats are plain fruit bars
And just like that, they are eating ice cream daily (still just vanilla). I guess summertime at Grammy’s is a time to enjoy it. We will be back to the boat and no freezer soon enough!
It’s sad to leave the boat; but summer in the north is pretty awesome! It will be fun for the kids to have some extended time with family. Some of my favorite summertime kid memories are swimming in Lake Superior with my Grandma and playing cards out on the picnic table. I am looking forward to boat time with my Grandkids this summer.
Yes, it is a pretty nice set up and great for the kids to spend some extended time with family.
being a dad is the “BEST”. you are doing a heck of a job!
blessings,
scott
ps ANYTHING having to do with the head….”is a dark and lonely job!” ha
Two things came to mind from your previous adventures when I read about the jobs you’ve done to get the boat ready for next season’s cruising, Pat. One – replacing the waste hose in the head. I remember vividly your account of “cleaning” the waste hose somewhere in the S. Pacific on your circumnavigation by beating it on the pavement and slinging crap around the parking lot – and THAT memory always brings a smile to my face. Two – straightening the chain. You know where this is going, huh? Letting the original Bumfuzzle’s anchor straighten the chain itself by dropping it in sufficient depth until all 600′ of chain was out. Worked like a charm, of course, other than the, um, small problem of getting it all back in the chain locker.
As I recall, you motored back in toward shore until the anchor and chain were on the bottom so you could have the considerable weight of all that chain and anchor supported, then slowly brought it all aboard. Very clever!
Your account of the kids’ emotional roller coaster ride the banana splits gave them is, I think, concisely covered in what I like to call “anticipointment.”
And good ol’ Indiantown . . . I think they may actually owe you money after Bumfuzzle splashes again and you’re ready to head back to the islands. 🙂 Have a great summer!
What kind of watermaker do you have? We have the Spectra and feel very lucky to have it. We love our water maker. Yours sounds awesome.
Have fun with the families.
Franci and Stephen
We’ve got the CruiseRO, http://www.cruiserowaterandpower.com/30_GPH_Water_Maker_2.html, and it really is awesome. Customer Service is crazy good. The owner of the company even hands out his cell phone number. It’s almost embarrassing how much I can gush over a watermaker. 🙂
God bless you guys. I have followed your posts for years as so many others have too.I speak for all of us when I say “thanks for the adventures”. We look forward to many adventurous times with our great family.Enjoy your family visit.
Thanks, William. We are lucky in life that we get to have so many adventures and have family to spend extended visits with too. Plus all our “friends” that we get to share our stories with.