Some Good/ Some Bad!!!!!!

SHIP'S LOG:

     As I write this, I am safely ensconced in the Club House at TYC and can look out at ABISHAG as she bobs gentle in a slip. Yes, we have made the long and arduous trip from Yankee Boatyard to TYC and have lived to tell the tale. The we is "friend Fred", his car battery, ABISHAG and I. We journeyed this past Sunday and it was a wonderful trip. The weather was perfect and considering what it could have been, it was a joy.

     I went to the boatyard on Saturday after  I got a call From "ABE the yard guy" who informed me that he had launched ABISHAG . . . only 3 days late. That was no big deal, they have been behind because of the winter, what has passed for a SPRING and the fact that the Connecticut River has come all over a ragin' rapid. I bent on the Genoa, the Main and the Mizzen and we were set to sail over the horizon. Truth be told, I had screwed myself. On Friday, I had mistakenly uncoiled the furling line from the drum, for some reason thinking that this was necessary before bending on the Genoa.  I could not have been more wrong. Having bent on the Genoa, hoisted to the top, I discovered that to furl it properly, I either had to drop it, pull the furling line onto the drum, raise the Genoa and furl it, or laboriously wrap the furling line around the drum by had and then furl the sail. I don't need to tell which I did, just imagine the worst way to do it, and you will have your answer. Of course, since the sail is just back from the sail-maker, who had put on a new UV cover, it did not furl correctly the first time. Nor the second! Nor the third, after which I said "The hell with it" and left it.I chalked it up to the fact that it is an old furling system and that the boat needs to be dead into the wind for it to work properly and the fact that the UV Cover was new and need to "be taught" how to lay when furled. This proved to be true as it furled perfectly at the end of the journey.

     I got a call from "Josh," the electrical guy at the boatyard. He said that my batteries were all "bad." Actually, it wasn't much of a surprise as he disparaged them last spring and the only thing that kept them semi-functional was the wind generator. But after a winter sitting  in storage, even hooked up regularly to a charge, they wouldn't light he light you'd find inside a refrigerator.we had to take the battery out of Fred's car to jump start ABISHAG and less we get caught in a dire situation, carries the battery with us on the trip. Once the engine was going, the was no real need for electricity as a diesel engine doesn't need electricity to run, though it is nice to have to make the radios and the GPS function. The alternator "charged the batteries"during the 8 hour trip, but it was like pouring water into a bucket with a large hole it it. If you waited too long, the "juice" would all disappear ad there would be nothing to crank the engine, which on ABISHAG takes a lot of "oomph!"

   We got down the river with no problems in about 4 hours, got out into Long Island Sound, set the sails and screamed along for all of 15 minutes, when the wind decided to take a holiday and go "somewhere?". We tried sailing in the zephyrs. The rolling was awful. We tried motor sail but what wind there was would not co-operate. So eventually we simply motored. Thank goodness we had enough juice in the batteries to get the engine running!

     We got in about 6pm and after securing ABISHAG in a slip, jumped in the car so that i could get Fred back up to Portland where his car was. His was the second of the "Two-car-Samba," leave one car at TYC, drive the "crew" to Portland, leave the car, sail the boat to TYC, get in the car left behind, and drive back to Portland. We grabbed a couple of grinders for the trip and Fred probably got home about 9pm!

    Monday for me was a day spent hauling "boat stuff" down from Roland's and Russ' ad dumping it into ABISHAG. I had hoped to spend today putting everlasting in order but I had to clean TYC . I also had to see a doctor for my knee(s). They have been seriously bugging me for two weeks now   and I finally decided to get then checked out. The young Doctor who did my hip four years ago, poked and prodded and x-rayed and finally decide that there was nothing skeletal that was causing the pain. He shot me up with cortisone and scheduled an MRI to see if we are looking at a cartilage problem. I'll have to wait until then to give a definite answer. Until then, I'll hobble along. Hopefully the cortisone will kick in a day or so and I'll be right as rain.  The last thing I need is surgery.