Author: harv1941

Wednesday, December 14 – Well folks wintry weather is finally showing itself in spades.  The temps have been in the low forties for a high on the last week and expectations are for 40’s, 30’s, and some 20’s.  The temp today will climb to about 45, but will then start dropping steadily as the afternoon, evening and overnight temps go under 30.  Expectation is that tomorrow morning (Thursday) the temp will be 28, and for both Thursday and Friday the high will be 28-29 with lows in the mid to upper teens.  Lordy!  Boats are not designed with cold weather insulation and as a result you use heaters, and with us, we used three to four space heaters where we warm the major areas of the boat to ensure that the we don’t freeze, the Sea Cats are reasonably comfortable and our bilges/engines and external connections are kept above the freezing mark.  Hello electric bill!!!

Also a goal was achieved when we were able to get the port engine to cooperate this past Monday and brought the Misty Lady over from the A Dock T berth to the C Dock Slip C11 and are now in a better more sheltered spot, we have a large motor yacht on each side and another couple across the dock from our slip.  Yeah!!  Our bow is now pointed toward northward so the winds, even if they are able to slip through the other boats with the bow facing north (mostly the winds come down our water way from the north and the northwest so this really helps.  The photo below is a shot of the Misty Lady in her winter slip on the C Dock.  This slip actually can accommodate a yacht of 70 Feet LOA.  Our yacht is 54 Feet LOA so she has plenty of room.  The person who is assigned to this slip normally has his yacht in winter storage.  I understand that his yacht is 68 feet LOA. He pulls the boat in early October, down river, and has it stored in a environmentally controlled warehouse.  Nice to have tons of money, huh?

The picture below is a view of the I-395 bridge over the Washington Channel.  The blue LED lighting was installed and is maintained by the Hoffman company which is conducting the redevelopment of the Washington DC waterfront.

The CEO of the Hoffman company is also a member of the CYC and he told us, during a walkthrough of the redevelopment (and our new clubhouse) that the LED lighting on that bridge is of miniscule cost, virtually a few dollars a month.

We discovered the fuel pump problems were increasing when we brought the Lady over from the A dock to the current slip.  The smell of fuel was getting pretty strong.  One of the club members is a mechanic and he helped in moving the boat, then took a look at the fuel pump.  Turned out we had a small crack in the pump which had gotten bigger and instead of problems with leaking air, we had a compounded situation of leaking diesel fuel.  Erik, the CYC member began the process of removing the pump.  We will be installing a new remanufactured pump as soon as it is delivered, expectation of weeks end or Monday.  Finally we hope, the Lady will be able to have both engines start as designed.  YEAH!!!

Also this week, or at the latest, the first of next week, the Misty Lady will be shrink wrapped for the winter.  This process will cover the boat from bow to stern and from the Electronic Arch to midway down the hull.  Openings will be inserted to accommodate the access to the water filler pipe, the waste holding tank pump out ports, a doorway for our entry and exit and a couple “windows” to allow us to see the world.  The expectation and the yacht club long time sailors statements are that we would be a lot warmer through the winter AND the electricity bills will be significantly reduced.  One can only hope, right?

With Winter coming this strong this soon, I see a need for better warmth and this shrink wrap process is reputed to be the major solution.  The kinds of weather we are all experiencing over the past few years tells me that the climate change deniers are as full of crap as a Christmas Turkey and the preponderance of evidences put forth by REAL scientists are spot on with the ideas that our climate change is happening and we humans are responsible, with our refusal to care for our planet.

Okay, am going to have to wind this down, I am expecting the diesel guy shortly to finish removing the fuel pump from the port engine and as soon as he arrives and gets started I will be driving Charlotte to National Airport for her trip to her Nashville office.  She has about 6 people working in that office and they are folks who were part of the company that they just merged with.  She will be there for a couple of days, assigning projects, meeting with people (problem solving>) and just showing her management chops.  Me and the Sea Cats will be holding down the fort aboard the Misty Lady (hopefully not freezing ).

More later>  as soon as the shrink wrap process is completed I will generate another issue and include some pictures.

See Y’all later.

December 4, 2016-Aboard the Misty Lady

Well, it has been a few weeks since our last update, so now is a good time I guess that we could bring about the latest from the old Captain and the First Mate along with the Sea Cats.    And speaking of Christmas, every see Santa Claus riding down the Washington Channel on a paddle board?  Well, here is one, shot from the dock at the stern of the Misty Lady this afternoon.

Last Evening the Mate and I were treated to viewing the Parade of Lights and a fireworks display.  This is an annual event where the various captains in marinas up and down the upper Potomac decorate their boats with lights usually in themes and they gather at the City Of Alexandria waterfront.  They are then launched in a Parade along the Potomac, then turning into the Washington Channel.  The boats are judged in two categories, sail powers and motor powered.

The photo in the two top and the lower left images are of our slip neighbor, his boat depicted an old locomotive and even had the sounds piped through speakers.  Larry and Linda, the owner and creator of this display took Best In Show!  The photo in the lower right is also a boat from our A Dock, and has a large menorah along with four Star of David renderings along the hull.  There 60 entrants but we don’t know how many actually came through, the judging stand was up here on the DC waterfront, next to our Yacht Club house.

Following the Parade the promoters had a fireworks display and we have included four of the images we took from the deck of our yacht.

Of course these are only four of the shots, the show ran for a constant fifteen minutes with no pauses in the works.  The Sea Cats by the way were NOT amused.  But we enjoyed it.

Today we were invited to take a tour of the Wharf development including our new CYC clubhouse.  The presentation was excellent and the facilities and services that will come online as the development winds to an end (around October of next year).  We will have Irish Pubs, a “jazz alley” with live music, restaurants of all possible tastes, including some of the top names in restauranteur venues.  Our club house (which is supposed to be completed in early fall or late summer will be over the water and will have sensational views.  I will include some pictures of the display table for the development models.  This thing was fantastic in detail and our pictures do not do them justice.

The bottom picture is a view of our yacht club marina, the docks already exist and we occupy them, the club house, shown as a two story building overhanging the water between two of the docks is scheduled for occupancy late summer or early fall next year.  The other pictures, including one that shows Charlotte are all various views of the display table which covers probably the length of two large conference tables.  Buildings are inclusive of three hotels, a concert hall seating 6,000 people and various retail businesses including a ton of restaurants, pubs and live music venues.  Going to be a ton of fun as a neighborhood and we look forward to the opening of the various buildings.

The two photos above are artist’s conceptions of the Wharf as it will be when complete.  The Bride/Mate and I are excited that this will be our home neighborhood.

Over the past couple of weeks we have been addressing some situations with the Misty Lady.  Not that the Lady is unique with these situations, basically almost all yachts are supplied with situations when it comes to the winter weather.  Boats are usually atrociously lacking in insulation.  Great fun in the warm weather, but can be miserable in the winter months.  First off, we are installing a set of new technology heating for our upcoming cold weather comforting.  These heaters are very economical and use very little electricity to provide warm air.  They have no fans, so the heating is providing through a “radiant” process where the air is brought into the unit from the bottom, processes through a series of heating elements and comes out the top as warm/warmer air flows.

The Lady comes with four HVAC units but they use a process whereby raw water is brought into the system from the outside and processed either as air conditioner or as a heater.  When the water temps drop to 40 degrees or below, these units cannot be used due to potential freezing and they simply become ineffective.  Ergo, a “cruising” family must resort to space heaters to warm the various cabins.

We currently depend on what are knows as Amish Heaters (smaller, portable, heating units) that use electricity to heat elements and the heat generated is then blown out into the room by fans.  While these do provide sufficient heat, they are very inefficient regarding power usage.

Ergo the new technology ENVI units using a “stack convection” process to generate heat.  These heaters are wall mounted and therein lies the difficulty of finding sufficient open wall space to hang them from.  They are 19 inches wide by 22 inches long and measure about 2 inches thick.  Should have three of these units working by the mid week time frame.  Having these efficient heating units should keep us warm, warm the boat overall (keep ice from forming in the bilges), and ensure that we don’t keep popping circuit breakers will make our “cruising” lifestyle a lot more comfortable and pleasant.

Next weekend, if all goes well, we will be moving the Misty Lady off of the “T” of A Dock and temporarily berthing in a slip on the C dock.  The boat that is usually in that slip belongs to the CEO of the company that is the builder/developer of the Wharf.  He pulls his boat from the water each winter, places her on dry storage in a environmentally controlled boat storage house. (must be nice being a multi millionaire huh?).  Anyway we will be in that slip until April or until we are awarded a slip of our own.  At the time we get tied up and situated in C11 slip, we will have the Misty Lady shrink wrapped.  The entire super structure will be wrapped in heavy duty plastic-like sheeting from bow to stern and from the bridge to mid way down the hull.  This process will also provide us with more insulation from the December/January/February freezing winds and protect the boat from snowfalls.  The snow will slide right off the smooth surfaces of this shrink wrap and the old Captain and the First Mate will not have to get out on slippery decks to clear off show accumulation.  As soon as this process is done, I will take some photos of the boat to show you all what a shrink wrap boat looks like.

Well, today is Sunday, November 20, and the Bride and I are riding out a bit of interesting weather.  The winds started last evening around 6, but were only about 8.5 knots and over the night time grew in strength.

Ye Old Captain was a bit tuckered yesterday and fell asleep in the master cabin around 7 so I missed the majority of the growth in the winds.  We had a bit of rain last evening, starting about 4:30 or there about.  We had been over in Alexandria, VA at Home Depot and the temperature dropped from about 73 to around 48 during the 40 minutes we were inside the store.  WOW.

This morning we awoke to winds averaging 14 to 20 knots and gusting to over 45 knots.  Enough to make standing in the shower an exercise in agility and balance!  Dressing, then grabbing the first coffee of the morning, the adage about “sea legs” came to the fore as we balanced ourselves in the galley to attend to morning chores, coffee, breakfast for us and of course breakfast for the Sea Cats. (Funny how two little brats who hate when the boat is underway, had no problem moving about in the roughest time).  Pouring coffee was an exercise in skillful handling of a coffee pot and cup.  We had a microwave breakfast of a Jimmy Dean breakfast sandwich (still no darn stove, thanks to a incompetent merchant organization), and then spent the morning in the salon, watching the waves grow, the boat rock to and fro and side to side.  Since the Misty Lady is secured to a dock rather than in a slip, we are tied up only on the Port Side while the Starboard side is exposed to the winds, waves and has no restrictive lash up.  As a result, we get pushed against the dock (thank God for great “bumpers or fenders”) that keep the boat’s side from hitting or rubbing against the dock edges.  In a bit of fore knowledge, we bought several brand new fenders in Edgewater before casting off for home.  They have truly come in very helpful with this wind storm.  funny to see sun and clear skies, coupled with dark clouds but above all, strong wind with even stronger gusts.

A couple of pictures of the waters outside our starboard salon door.  Bear in mind that under normal circumstances the waters surfaces are very smooth, almost glass like.  But when the breezes come up, we see some chop.  Not like this however.  Guess the Wind Gods decided to give us a harsh, windy, cold day to make up for the snows further west and north.

Thanks to the rapid drop in temperature we now know that we have got to get a couple of winter coats soonest, we gave ours away last April, expecting to be sailing through the summer and then shop in October for winter foul weather gear.  Things got a bit busy September through the first week of November so now we are facing a hurry up trip to a clothing store for coats.  Go figure….

We bought some wall panel heaters for the Misty Lady to keep us warm this winter.  These are supposed to be very efficient electricity cost wise so we will see.  But now we have to find spaces on the boat where there is enough space to mount the heaters, AND an AC plug nearby to provide the electricity.  Oh Joy!

Anyway, if we don’t write before, wishing everyone a wonderful Thanksgiving Holiday.  We will spend our with my children and grand children at my daughter Kurby’s new home.  May your holiday be wonderful and full of family, love and good food!!

Been a while since I sat long enough to bring the blog up to date.  As I said in the last entry, we finally made the voyage from the Gingerville Yacht Center at Edgewater Maryland to our cruiser home at the Capital Yacht Club in Washington, DC.  But here we are and here we will be rest for the cold season from now until March or April.

Presently we are berthed on the “T” head of the CYC A dock and from a time it looked like we would be here for months.  To get into a permanent slip one must bid using seniority for any slips that come open AND that your boat or yacht will fit within.  For instance, the Misty Lady is 54 feet long and therefore we much have a slip with a length of at least 55 feet, so 60, 65, and 70 foot slips are the only ones we can bid on.  We thought we had our slip a couple of weeks ago but someone with a lower member number (more seniority), placed a bid on the very last day.  Today the Club Manager informed me that a slip holder was going to move his yacht into winter storage and his slip would be available from now until the end of March.  We are seriously considering taking this slip for the winter months since it will shield us from the vagaries of winter storms and associated rough water at the T.

One of the advantages of being berthed where we are is the ability to see all sorts of visitors and large yachts that come into the CYC marina area.  For instance,  the yacht below belongs to Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia.  Of course his yacht is named: “Almost Heaven”.  It is 75 feet long and Joe has a problem because our longest slips are only 70 feet.

Joe spent much0 dollars to install hydraulic lifts for his swim platform to fold up against the stern, to reduce the Length Over All (LOA) of the Almost Heaven but when the Rear Commodore and the Dock Master measured, even after all the expense, the yacht was still too long for our slips.  At CYC even Senators have to abide by the Club rules.

The Sea Cats, Penny and The Duchess (Penny is the Tortie in the front and The Duchess is the grey tabby to the rear) have adapted to their new home and have explored from bow cabin to the salon and all the points in between.  The still do NOT like the sound of the engines and the vibration that they cause.  We are hopeful that at some point next summer they will have adapted to that noise as they have with the noise from the plethora of helicopters that fly down our waterway from the Pentagon and the White House.  At first they were jumpy when one passed overhead, now it is just another noise and they ignore them for the most part.  Now if I can just get them to ignore the sound of the Lady’s diesel engines.  Perhaps on the first voyage of next year we should bring them up on the bridge and then see how they do with both of us within sight.

Our boating neighbors do love to decorate their boats, the docks and anything else that stands still.  This was one of the docks decorated for the Halloween season.  The sign reads Creepy Dock and it was a very neat display.  Lots of “spider webs” hanging across the dock from boat to boat.

Today, a new vessel docked at our B dock T.  She is a beauty and will be here for a couple of days and then off for parts unknown but she can sail anywhere!

Isn’t she a beauty?  The crew are young people and their visit here was sponsored by the primary developer of the Washington, DC waterfront.   Some of us were hoping to be invited on board to tour this gorgeous yacht!

We have ordered and will be installing some new technology heating units to keeps us warm this winter, as well as provide warmth to the boat’s external shell.  I ordered three wall heaters from a company (made in the USA by the way) and these heaters are just a few inches think, mount without making holes in our fiberglass walls and will keep each room very nice and comfortable.  In addition, we will be putting an “ice eater” unit underwater next to the Lady’s hull to protect her from ice incursion.  This device is also referred to as a “bubbler” because it uses a prop to circulate water from the lower depths (where it is warmer) to the surface.  Both the warmer water and the agitation of the water will prevent the accumulation of ice.  Of course we are hopeful that the weather will cooperate for our first winter aboard and not generate much if any ice on our section of the Potomac.

We are also planning the “shrink wrap” of the Misty Lady in a couple of weeks.  This process involves the wrapping of the entire boat from the top of the radar arch to just above the water line of the hull and from the bow to the stern.  The material is a heavy duty vinyl type product and this wrap will save us tons in the coming winter months by not only insulating the boat with a secondary layer, but will also cause any snow that might fall to slough off and we will not be covered with snow should this year bring snow fall similar to the previous years.  The alignment of the wrap eliminates a lot of the flat surfaces of most boats of our size.  The wrap will have an access portal or two to provide us with entry and exit.  The installation will also include a clear panel to provide a “window” to prevent the claustrophobic type of total enclosure.  When this process is started, I will take some pictures of the process and the final look.

Well enough for tonight.  I will try to be more attentive to the blog in the coming days.  Not sure if many people read it at this point, not a lot of excitement in being on a boat in the winter time.  But it is a brand new experience for Charlotte and I so I will continue to relay our activities and the circumstances we encounter.

More later, stay tuned.

This blog entry will be rather long, I am trying to cover our adventure from our second night stop until our final berthing at our home port.  Hope that the photographs will entertain.

Sunday afternoon we laid over at the Colonial Beach Yacht Marina, at Colonial Beach, VA.  Below are a couple of photos of that layover:

The top left photo is of a small houseboat (sort of the size of an old fashioned outhouse), on one of the docks of this large marina. The second top phot is of a view across the stern of that small houseboat toward the back of the marina.

?

The photo above is a shot from the dock where we were berthed looking aft toward an old 1920’s yacht that at one time was a Presidential yacht that we were told was the Lady Ann.  She was in rather decent shape considering her age, but certainly could have used a few thousand dollars (tens of thousands actually) in at least some cosmetic changes.  The Bride and I went to the onsite restaurant for this marina and had some very delicious seafood for our supper.  We earlier had visited the marina office and settled our bill for the transient berth and we were then ready to depart at our schedule, rather than others.

Monday morning, October 17, 2016, broke with a nice sun coming over the horizon.  The skies were lit with a warm reddish/orange glow and the clouds were puffy and innocent of bad weather.  We cast off lines and found the treacherous current in the Colonial Beach Yacht Marina had not abated.  Leaving the dock was an exciting adventure.  Problem was compounded by the fact that the channel out of the marina is rather narrow and the water clearance in several spots is less than 2 feet (we draw a minimum of 4), so we watched the depth sounder instrumentation with great concerns and I thought I was in a slalom environment from moving port to starboard, and starboard to port.

Finally the water depth was deep enough that we could breathe again and we turned out of the “creek” leading to the marina and into the main channel of the Potomac.  We had finally, on the third morning, actually left with first light.  Now that we know how to do it, perhaps next season we will be more successful with out planned departures.  The biggest thing it to ensure that you have performed every prep task possible before you retire for the night.  Making sure that your transient dock fee is paid the night before is also important, as we discovered that most marinas have a 8:00 to 8:30am opening time.  Not good for getting away at first light.

Daylight on the Potomac moving from the marina entrance.

Anyway, back to the journey, we moved away from the marina/creek and into the main channel of the Potomac only to be confronted by more crab and fish pots/traps all through the channel.  Had to ply those areas very carefully, with Char watching for these floats as well.  Seemed only a few minutes after we cleared one pot area, we were seeing another batch further up river.  Now understand that I don’t begrudge these fisher folk the right to earn a living, but putting hundreds of these pots and their floats in the main navigation channel seems a bit much.  I am sure that the large ships that come up the Potomac do not watch the pot floats like we did, so I wonder how many of these crab or fish pots get dragged away by these large ships.

As we began to increase our speed, passing the town of Colonial Beach, we were looking forward to passing under the Harry Nice Bridge (US 301).  We motored well, making about 11 knots, up the Potomac, and dodging flotsam and wood dangers (tree limbs, even a 2×4 plank), making our voyage rather interesting.  Finally in the distance we spotted the 301 Harry Nice Bridge, and this marked a significant milestone on our trip as we were well up the Potomac and truly going to make our home port that day.

The above are views of the Bridge, our approach shown in the upper left, a closer view out the bow windows, then on the lower left, passing under the bridge and finally the view from our stern as we left the bridge behind.  We motored on up the Potomac, and as with most rivers it was a winding, curving passage.  We saw lots of nice scenery but nothing really worth photographing on that section.

As we drew nearer to the DC metro area we began to see interesting locales.  The three photos below are of Fort Washington which is on the Maryland side of the river.  It was a military post from the early days of our nation and a few years ago was turned into a national park.

Across the river, was another national heritage treasure,  the home of our first president, George Washington.  Mount Vernon is a site well worth a visit if you are ever in our national capital area.

After we passed Fort Washington and Mount Vernon, we knew that home was just a short distance left in our voyage.  Our next landmarks were the National Harbor Resort and Marina on the Maryland side and the view of the Wilson Bridge, and our gateway into the upper Potomac and HOME!

?

?

As we motored up to and through the Wilson Bridge, Alexandria, VA appeared on our port bow. As we closed on the Wilson Bridge, a water taxi carrying passengers from Alexandria to National Harbor passed us astern.

?

?

?

?

Alexandria in the distance, and you can just make out the George Washington Masonic Temple above the skyline.  The next photo is a close in view of Alexandria and the Torpedo Factory which is a repurposing of a WWII facility into a crafts mall.  The bottom show is of the one of the buildings that make up the US Naval Research Laboratory.

As we passed by Alexandria, the small white buoy markers along the way warn boaters to go slow and “Don’t Make Wakes”.  The next pictures are of our view as we made another turn up the Potomac toward our Capital Yacht Club berth.

The upper left photo is a view as the turn into the Washington channel, you can just see the top of the capital in the right background.  The building on the upper right is unknown to us but we believe is part of the Army post at the point where the Anacostia and the Potomac meet.  And finally the bottom picture covers the Haines Point, a DC park, a view of the Washington Monument to the left and the Capitol building to the right.  At this point we were almost home.  The CYC dockmaster had already stationed himself on the dock where we would tie up and we could finally say that the Misty Lady was almost home.

This next group of photos are of our final stopping place, the Capital Yacht Club.

The left most picture was taken as I brought the stern of the Lady snugged to the dock and our dock master was making her midship lines fast.  Following this, I shut down both engines and we were home!  The middle picture is a shot from our stern down the dock to the foreground.  And the right most picture is a bow on shot of the Lady finally secured to the temporary berth.  As soon as a regular slip is available to us we will move her into her “forever” home berth.

The top left picture is a shot down the fairway between the A and B docks and shows a small portion of the redevelopment that is currently being down for the Washington Waterfront.  The small building with the yellow walls is the new Yacht Club house, currently under construction.  The top right picture shows some of the yachts on the B dock and a view of the Washington Monument along side the cranes of the construction.

The bottom left picture is one of a family of Malard ducks who make the Yacht Club their home. Next is another view of the Monument, the B Dock yachts and the construction cranes.  The next view is of the bridge and a glimpse of the top of the Jefferson Memorial.  And finally the last picture is of a large yacht that arrived the next day after we did.  This yacht is 109 feet long and takes up the entire length of the B Dock “T”.

Thought you might like a couple of pictures of our views from the Misty Lady at night.  The upper left is a picture of the Washington Monument, the upper right is a shot from the maintenance barge looking down the A dock toward our berth at the end. The lower left is another view of the Washington Monument from the after deck of the Lady.  The lower right is a photo looking back down the channel to the Gangplank Marina and one of the very large tour boats that make this marina their home.  The boat to the side in this picture is a large Catamaran Sailboat.  They left the Club around noon today heading home, somewhere down south of here.  Probably Florida.

Whew!  That was a lot folks but now we are home and will have some topics to discuss of life aboard a yacht in the Washington Winter!  Oh Joy!

Stay Tuned.  It could get rocky for a while.

As you may recall in our last entry, we were resting from the preparation for departure.  Well, our plan was to cast off lines, bring in shore power cables and move the Lady from her berth at Gingerville, heading down the South River and home.  We did arise around 4:30 am to get the necessary things accomplished in readiness for the trip.  We had all the loose articles stowed (can’t have things breaking underway), and our breakfast consumed.  Time to start engines, and begin the cast off process.

Well, the starboard engine didn’t want to start, and in all truth, it was a pretty chilly morning.  After goofing around with this thing for a couple of hours, calling the original mechanic who built the engine we finally decided to spray a bit of starter fluid, lo and behold, we had engines.  Of course it was already 11:00 and we were about three hours past our planned departure……

A little side note: this fellow shared our dock and fished to his/her hearts content.

Finally we had the Lady ready for her voyage home.  Backing out of the berth, the Captain pivoted her using the two engines and pointed her bow toward the river, and we were off.  This is the bridge we sailed under.  This area is a 6 knot venue so we moved rather slowly,, BUT Stately under the Route 2 bridge.

So we motored on down the South River and eventually into the Bay.  There were a lot of boaters out by that time (what we had hoped to avoid with a very early departure.

A view of myself and Char at the helm as we motored down the Bay. We spelled each other to relieve each of us to attend to other things.

Charlotte at the helm

We were moving at a pretty good clip, enough to make wakes of impressive size. The first picture is the wake coming off the bows and the second is obviously our stern wake.

The Lady can certainly push water.

Interesting the people you meet on the Bay, these are two oil tankers headed up the Bay, probably destined for Baltimore.

As we moved down the Chesapeake, it dawned on us that because of the delays in getting out of Gingerville, we were going to have to lay by overnight and hoped to make it to Colonial Beach, VA for the layover.  Not to be, that local was more than 50 miles up the Potomac River from the Bay and it would be late afternoon by the time we reached the mouth of that river.  So we looked for another marina.  Not as easy as looking for a hotel while driving down the Interstate.  First, did they accept transient boaters, second could they take a boat our size, third the water depths at the docks and finally, how far away!  We found a site called Point Lookout and secured a berth for the evening.  We hoped to make it into the marina before nightfall.

But as you can see from these two photos, we were still about 6 miles out.  Night fell, and even with a full moon, we were depending heavily on our chart plotting GPS Nav system.  It was still nerve wracking, but old Harv made it to the marina even in the heavy darkness.  Our berth was to be in between a 120 foot mega million dollar yacht and a bulkhead.  Was I nervous about clipping the big yacht?  Nah, piece of cake ( riiightt).  Slipped the Misty Lady in and laid her along side that pier with the 1st Mate grabbing pilings with the lines.

We went to bed that evening two very tired little campers.  The transit to the marina in pitch black waters, not knowing what may be in the water ahead of us was very nerve wracking and tiring and we crashed into bed.

The marina did not have the proper power source for us, (we take two cables of 50 amps) they only had 30 amps and we only had one 30 amp conversion cable connector.  AS a result, we could not run our HVAC units and turned out that our battery banks were drained quite low because the single cable was not properly place.  In our exhausted state, we did not connect the right cable and things didn’t work as they were supposed to do.

When we awoke the next morning we discovered that the marina office did not open until after 8:00am to allow us to settle out bill for the berth and services.  We finally got the power straightened out by starting our generator set and uncoupling from shore power.  We encountered a battery problem again, but this time it turned out to be a circuit breaker had tripped (and we didn’t even know it existed), a call to the previous owner got that information for us.  Anyway, again our departure at first light was delayed.  But we did get a couple of pictures of the area…. The first is a picture of Charlotte on the dock near the Misty Lady’s bow.  The second was a picture that Char took, you can barely make out the moon near the right side of the picture.

We finally got things sorted, the engines started, the lines pulled and we moved out of Point Lookout headed up the Potomac River.  Along the way it also became obvious to us that we were not going to make the Capital Yacht Club in Washington, DC before night fall and after the previous night’s excitement, we did not wish to do another night docking.  So, we decided to take an early lay by and made a reservation for the Colonial Beach Yacht Center.  We arrived at the center at around 2:00pm and began the process of docking the Lady.  Turned out NO ONE told us about the currents in that marina.  The Lady was not cooperating with my movements to put her in a dock, we made seven passes and at long last, was able to bring the Lady to the dock and get her lines in place.  We got the power connected with both cables supplying our needed power amperage.

After eating a nice seafood meal in the restaurant located on the marina grounds, we came back to the Misty Lady to soothe the frazzled nerves of the two sea cats.  The sounds and vibrations of the engines drive them nuts.  Our hope was that they would soon adjust, but so far it is not to be.  Perhaps by next season?

Anyway, we are all squared with the marina management here, so there is no need for us to be held up for their office hours.  Our plan is to once again, depart with the first light.  Problem is around this entire area are the plethora of crab pots and fish traps.  Hard to see, those things in the waters in bright sunlight, let alone the early morning rising sun.

But those are the challenges of the “boating life” I guess.  Well, enough for tonight, we will try to snap a couple of pictures around this marina and then more as we go up the Potomac and home.

Stay Tuned

Well it is now 8:00pm on Friday evening October 14, and we have been working most of the day to complete preparations for our departure tomorrow morning.

Yep, that’s right, at first light on Saturday, October 15, we will start engines, start the generator, disconnect shore power and cast off all lines.  By approximately 6:45am (usually the breaking of dawn) we will begin the slow backing away from the Gingerville Yacht Center’s B Dock and once clear, I will turn her outbound and at long last the Misty Lady will be motoring southbound on the Chesapeake Bay to the mouth of the Potomac River.

As our voyage begins, we will move slowly out of Gingerville Creek into the South River and turn down river toward the Bay.  It is my plan that the Bride and I  (oops I meant the First Mate) will try to take a number of photos.  Some we will take with my big Canon and will use them in a later version of the blog once we are ensconced in our home berth at the Capital Yacht Club.

Our original plan was to travel as far as we felt comfortable and move into a transient slip at a marina on the Potomac, because travel in the dark is not something I would countenance.  Our thought now is that if we can make between 13 and 15 knots while underway we may be able to make it all the way to the Capital Yacht Club before nightfall.  As we move up the river, we will keep a sharp eye on the progress and may still fall back on the idea of a layover somewhere on the Potomac.

During the trip, I will try to write a blog entry as we progress on our voyage.  Photos where possible.

Wishes for a safe and successful voyage are solicited

Stay tuned, it gets better.

Well it is Sunday evening and the Hodges Mariner family is resting from our labors aboard the Misty Lady.  Many of  you already know, but we have been exposed to a constant rain storm for six days straight.  The water in the marina was less than 1 inch from flowing over the top of the dock. As a result the Misty Lady is still docked at the Gingerville Yacht Center.  Our new departure date is now Saturday, October 8.  We had hoped to be settling into a dockage at the Capital Yacht Club by now, but there you have it.

I did get a nice shot of the Misty Lady at twilight.  I was coming back from the parking lot and it was simply a Kodak Moment.  The upper doors are showing our television set going full blast and the window on the lower level is the light over our bed in the Master Stateroom.

Cleaning the Bilge: one of the more unappealing tasks on a yacht is ensuring that the bilges are clean.  We had earlier paid a local company to clean our bilge and they did a wonderful job,,, on ONE of the three bilges.  They cleaned the engine room bilge and evidently didn’t understand that there was a forward bilge and an aft bilge.  The aft bilge was, shall we say rather odiferous and the 1st Mate and I decided to clean it ourselves.  Oh what fools we might be…    When discussing the odor with the Yacht Center owner and soliciting his recommendation, he told me of several products that could be used to clean and sanitize a bilge.  Among the myriad products (mostly expensive), he strongly recommended that we use PineSol, that it would do the job just as well as the other expensive treatments and cost a fraction of the money.

So, armed with a fresh bottle of PineSol, our new water hose, a long handled brush and a new hose spray nozzle we began the not wonderful task.  Removing the hatch to open the bilge access we were greeted by the sight of really dirty, putrid water.  Some algae floating around as well.  We dosed it well with PineSol, then allowed it to sit for a while and “work” to prepare the bilge for the actual cleaning.  The float that activated the bilge pump had to be elevated manually to get the bilge pump to siphon out the standing water.  We also sprayed fresh water into the bilge to moderate the standing nasty water.

After about 45 minutes of flushing the bilge and adding more PineSol, we finally decided that we had done enough for a couple of amateurs and resolved to hire professionals to finish the bilges, check the bilge pumps and clear the residual algae.

At least when we hit our bed for sleep tonight the aroma will be much improved.

Another finding that the six days of rain brought to us was the identification of a few spots where waterproofing caulking will be required.  Funny how a constant barrage of water will point out areas where seepage is located.  Mother Nature is funny that way.  One might think that these things would sort of put us off.  Not true, we knew when we bought an older yacht that we would encounter these sort of irritants.  The fact it we love the look of our new waterborne home, and we expect that once we have accomplished the final upgrading that we had planned at the outset, our home will be comfortable and nice looking.

Speaking of upgrading, below are two pictures of the Misty Lady’s bridge.  Note the plethora of instrumentation on the left picture, this was the before picture. Now note that the picture on the right has much less, in fact one instrument shown to the left of the center is the primary control system.  It displays the course, speed, depth of water, radar overlays, and through the AIS linked with the VHF radio to the right, shows all of the other vessels around our area of interest.  This system lets us know where the boats are, how big they are, what direction they are headed and their current speed.  The primary screen is a touch screen, and interfaces with my IPad navigation and charting software.

The system is also set with a wi-fi connection that will allow me to read the primary control unit display and to update or change the settings from my IPad down in the salon, the galley or anywhere on the boat.  Oh my the Digital Age for boating is a real hoot!  Also note that the old grungy white bridge canvas’ have been replaced with new canvas using a Navy Blue color rather than the white.  The Lady simply has too much white, so we are planning on mitigating the color scheme.

Well tomorrow begins another week in beautiful downtown Edgewater, MD.  Charlotte returns to commuting into the DC metro area via Metro subway and I go back to prepping the Misty Lady for our voyage.  Sometime midweek next week I expect to receive some training on ship handling to ensure that I do not crash this big boat into a dock or fuel pier,  because that would be not nice.

We will also do some shopping for some items to make life a bit more comfortable, such as end tables and lamps.

More to come including the preparation, cast off of lines and departure of the Lady for her overnight voyage home.  I intend to post more items of possible interest and to do so more frequently.

Stay tuned!!

Thursday, September 29, 2016 Aboard the Misty Lady

It is about 8:15 am and today is the third day of our full residence aboard the MY Misty Lady.  The two Sea Cats are still adjusting to life aboard, not sure if they are enthralled yet.  Heck, just give them time, (oh wait, they may not like the sound of those two diesel engines).

I have just finished my very first breakfast aboard and am watching Mother Nature doing a lot to make the morning GREY!!  It has been raining pretty steadily for the past two and a half days, the water in the marina (just off Gingerville Creek) is up rather high and more rain is expected over the next couple of days as well.  Oh the joy of being on the water.  At least I don’t have to worry about flash floods damaging my furniture or power outages (the lady has two generator sets).  At photo of the Misty Lady tied at the dock in the Gingerville Yacht Center below.

Drove Charlotte to the New Carrolton Metro station this morning in pitch black weather, rain, mist from tires and very bright lights made for a joyous trip to set up her morning commute.

Our original plan was to cast off the lines, disconnect the shore power cables, fire up the two Cat diesels and point the Lady’s bow toward the Bay and down to the Potomac this Saturday.  Well, old Mother Nature gave us second thoughts.  Running a boat, any boat in foul weather intentionally is rather dumb so we are going to sit this weekend out.  I will do some honey do tasks aboard (always something to adjust, fix or clean) while we are biding our time.  Next week, early, I will also take some additional refresher training on ship handling (docking, turning using only the props, pulling up to a fuel dock to take on more diesel, and other close quarters handling), while still getting used to the size and handling quirks of a yacht this size.  Of course, one must also consider the idiosyncrasies of the Mother Nature gang.  The Sea Cats, the First Mate and ye old Captain are frankly tired of seeing overcast skies, rain and oh yeah, MORE RAIN.  This is the highest tide I believe I have ever witnessed though.

We expect the arrival of our marine stove either Friday or Monday.  The tale of the stove?  Here goes, we purchased a marine electric three burner stove with the glass top.  This stove also came with a set of racks that would secure pots and pans atop the range while underway (would anyone in their right mind what to do that?).  A substantial investment naturally, nothing for boating comes inexpensive!

When the yacht specialists loaded the stove on board, they removed the package of accessory items from the top and discovered,,,, you guessed it,,, the TOP WAS CRACKED!!!  From the look of the box and the point of impact, we suspect some yoyo in the manufacturer’s warehouse banged it against something with a small point of impact.

So we off loaded the stove, back into the yacht center warehouse and notified the yacht broker (who was the interface between us and the supplier), that the stove was damaged.  The yacht center owner also noted that there were gimbal fittings on the stove and in further exposure found that this was a fully GIMBALED stove (made for sail boats which can float straight in the water like a great power boat).  Not the right stove for our yacht anyway.  Yesterday, I heard from the supplier again with an update, the right stove was being shipped and would arrive either Friday or Monday.  More information from him later as he learns about the progress of the truck.  So even if Mother Nature hadn’t decided to show us love with lots of wind and rain (oh yeah, a light show in the form of lightning and thunder), we would have probably needed to remain here this weekend anyway.

The winds are playing games with the boat, she is moving in and out of the pier pilings and up and back from her original placement.  Amazing what wind and high water can to with a boat of this size.  Oh well, will most likely spend the majority of the day on board, since one never knows when the sheeting rain will return and overpower the regular rains.

As I look out at some of the other large boats tied up to the same dock, I see that they are moving about just like the Lady, so we just have to sit back and enjoy the day in peace and quiet.

More to come, stay tuned.

Well, guess WHAT!!!  I am writing this post from the bridge of the Misty Lady.  She is in the water, currently berthed at a temporary dock to facilitate the restoration of the hatches in the galley, BUT we have a floating yacht again!!!  Charlotte and I are looking forward to the possibility of moving out of the hotel and onto the Lady this week!  Are we excited?  Just a teensy bit I think.

The Misty Lady’s sea trial to evaluate the starboard and port engines went off very well.  The engines were both running strong and well within tolerances for temps, RPMs and thrust.  We brought them up to slightly over 2200 RPM which is actually higher than I would run them at cruise, but they climbed up to that level with smooth acceleration, considering they were shoving 50,000 pounds of boat through the water.  There were a couple of small anomalies but nothing that impacted the engines.  We did note that the temperature gauges on the bridge were of two different styles??  But hey as long as they work, who cares what the manufacturer was?

The Sea Trial could have been a bit smoother and things would have been a bit ahead of where we are except we received some hoses from the Cat dealer that were only 50% correct, four were the right once but four were not.  So, the mechanic who worked on the port engine will evaluate the specs sent by the Cat dealer’s rep this morning and I will hopefully get them first thing in the morning.  Then the port hatch can be closed up and the settee/table combination can be reinstalled.

Our plan is, based on the ability of the yacht center crew to complete the restoration of the galley, move our mattress and mattress box onto the boat and in place within the Master Cabin.  Then start the process of moving our personal effects, including coffee maker, of course.  Priorities you know!  Our Goal is to be fully living aboard by Friday.

I will have some  photos to share in my next posting.

Stay Tuned?