Year: 2015

…Departing Beaufort, Adams Creek Sunrise….

We are pushing hard to get north! Once you start running for the barn, it seems like you just hit it and go for it like a Captain Blaine Parks Delivery! Now that man can really get it done!

Here are the legs we ran from Beaufort.

#1. Beaufort, to Dowry Creek Marina, 54 nm fuel, water, pump out, dock for AC and storms.
#2. Dowry Creek to Elizabeth City, 71 nm! Dock, no AC, no power, dine out.

Shrimp Boat heading to work

#3. Elizabeth City to Dismal Swamp to Portsmouth VA 46 nm, 2 locks, dock, no AC, no power, go to Commodore Theater for dinner and Jurassic World to cool off.

This section of the ICW, the Alligator River Pungo River Canal, Albemarle Sound, Elizabeth City, Pasquotank River, South Mills Lock, Dismal Swamp, Deep Creek Lock, and Portsmouth are by FAR the most interesting section. I never get tired of running this part of the waterway. I capture the most interesting photos and reflections here. So, please allow me to share the best 30 photos of the hundreds that I shot. You, too, will see the beauty of this portion of the ICW.

Radeen at the helm

Alligator River Pungo Canal Fly

My favorite Bridge Tender is at Alligator River Swing Bridge This man is so kind and friendly and does a great job!

Crossing the mighty Albemarle Sound

The placid Pasquotank River, leading up to the South Mills Lock

Radeen enjoying the reflections

Too beautiful to not take lots of photos

Morning reflections

My Favorite reflection

Baldcypress Trees

Anchored at South Mills Lock waiting for the opening

Radeen is a great line handler in the lock as the water rushes into the lock

We are being lifted up 8 feet to the Dismal Swamp level

Ahhhh…now for some Dismal Swamp reflections

LOOK AT THIS, 22 statute miles of canal

The canal was completed in 1805 and is on the National Register of Historic Places

The heat index is degrees and we are running with the sunshade up

It is JUNE and the biting flies almost killed us. This fly swatter is a gift  from the Elizabeth City Chamber of Commerce.

Welcome to Virginia, the VA-NC State Line in the swamp

The Deep Creek Bridge prior to entering the lock

Entering the Deep Creek Lock, our favorite,

Radeen under the shade and tending her bos line

We have run EVERY MILE on this sign, except the last 50 to Eastport, Maine

Line handler, Radeen

Radeen lets the line out as the boat drops 8 feet

Welcome to Portsmouth, bridges, tugs, barges, ships, crazy boat traffic

WE DID IT, we made it to the Commodore Theater for the movies! A 9 hour day of only 46 nautical miles, with time spent waiting for locks and bridges.

The South Ferry Basin, Portsmouth VA, a must stop town

This is the route from Elizabeth City into the Swamp and up to Portsmouth VA. Click to make larger.

There you have it, 30 photos of our last few days of running north. Today, we enter our HOME waters of the Chesapeake Bay with a 105 degree heat index and zero winds. We will head out and power on north. Thank you for sailing along, it is great to share this wonderful adventure.

There are a few places we travel along the ICW that really feel like home, and Greg and Kate’s home is one of these places. They make us feel so welcome. Kate always spoils us with the best home cooked Italian meal and Greg always spoils us with the wine cellar. Then, to top it off, we have a Doodle Love Fest with “the kids” Lucy and Gracie. Home this is to us. We snack, drink, eat, laugh, catch up on our last year of travels, lounge on the sofas, and simply enjoy our time together. After being on the boat for so long, it is great to go to a house and stretch out and relax and play with the doodles. Greg and Kate are former Island Packet 350 owners who now have switched over to land yachting in a 40 foot “Party Bus!”

First, we up anchored out at Cape Lookout Bight after our ocean run of 2.5 days and came through the Beaufort Inlet and then up the ICW to their home.

We had a safe and wonderful ocean passage from Florida to Cape Lookout North Carolina. This was a 330 nm leg and we finished this in 58 hours. We sailed half of it but needed to motor sail half due to winds under 10 knots from dead astern. The sailing was great with the winds 20-25. Here is a 3 minute video of the passage, plus some photos.

Here are some photoclick images for larger full screen images

Departing St. Mary’s Inlet, Florida

YAHOO, our loaner radar antenna is working

Librarian Radeen working the log book

Beam reaching to start in 8-10 knots

Our course is 055, 330 nm to the Cape

Sunset and lighting up the red nav lights

The helm view at dusk

Wing on Wing in 20 knots

Fantastic sailing. We really enjoy wing on wing

Boat speed is not bad in 20+ knots

Hayden at the helm

Dawn is always exciting

Our SPOT map points at 0600, 1200, 1800, 2400

…Good friends Jeanne, Bob, Radeen and Hayden…

Returning from the BVIs and meeting good friends Bob W. IP-380 JUDITH III and his crew, Jeanne, for a fine dinner at the Chart House in Melbourne was a great way to come back to the boat. Thank you, Bob, for being such a great friend. It was a very fun evening. The next day, we did laundry, provisioned, fueled up and prepared to depart. Once we left, we  spent that next 5 days running the ICW from Vero Beach, FL, to Fernandina Beach FL because of NE winds on the ocean.

Home from BVIs time for a quick turnaround

The course we planned to run was offshore and was 040 magnetic which is NE. This would have been directly into the wind, plus the NE wind would have been opposing the Gulf Stream. creating steep waves. Both not a good situation. So, we ran the ICW inside and we did this 8-10 hours each day. Our runs were: Day 1: Vero to Titusville. Day 2: Titusville to Daytona. Day 3: Daytona to St. Augustine. Day 4: St. Augustine to Fort George (ran aground!) Day 5: Fort George to Fernandina Beach. (only 3 hours)

Buy a few provisions, we are good to go

While in St. Augustine, we met Mike and Kathy of IP-350 SHRUG for the first time. After wine onboard with lively conversation, we went out for a great dinner at A1A downtown. Sorry, no photos of the fun we had!

Now, we have reached the Florida Georgia Border. We plan to head to sea Monday June 8 at 0600 and run a course of 050 for 330 nm to Cape Lookout, North Carolina. This will take us about 60 hours, so we plan to be anchored in Cape Lookout Bight Wednesday night. Then we will stop in Beaufort at our favorite “HOME away from HOME” with our good friends, Greg and Kate. We will visit with these great travelers and enjoy catching up and simply relaxing & spending time with such wonderful friends.

From there, we will either sail out and around Cape Hatteras or run the ICW north to the Chesapeake Bay and home to Rock Hall, Maryland. So, we will be off the grid for the next three days. Our SPOT map will be updating as we press the SPOT transmitter, so you can see our latest position on our home page.

Here are some photos of the past 5 days.

Good bye Vero, what a great town!

Heading north on the ICW, easy

Radeen dealing with the AM sun rise on her face

NE winds and thermals create cloud banks over the land

Island Spirit St Augustine Moorings

International Speedway Bridge, Daytona Beach, FL

Bridge, Bridge, Bridge

Daytona Beach dondos in the morning sun reflect beautifully

Island Spirit ATV up on land. Follow the markers, not the charts!

Tall Ship “El Galeon” in St. Augustine

A walk over the Bridge of Lions

The Bridge of Lions

Old School ICW home

The New School ICW, this is the nearby neighbor to the last photo

Crossing the St. Johns River, Radeen off duty

Sunrise at low tide at Ft. George Island, near the remains of the ‘Kingsley Plantation, once the largest sugar cane plantation in the country

Sunrise near Fort George, FL

Birds fishing the low tide

Channel marker at the low tide slope

Amelia Research Vessel in Fernandina Beach, so interesting

Sharon’s beautiful car returned to storage. She loaned itto us while in Vero. We really miss this!! Here is our plan Follow our SPOT map here

..The plan…the actual…

We stayed in the Bahamas longer this year, and then we stayed in Florida while we enjoyed a family vacation to the British Virgin Islands last week. Now, it is June and we are trying to push the boat home to Maryland ASAP. We have come very close to storing the boat here in Florida and simply driving home. That would be far easier and take a lot less time and effort, but we want the boat at home for some work, so here we are pushing north 10+ hours a day.

Our plan was originally to go offshore directly from Fort Pierce, FL to Cape Lookout, NC, a 500 nm run. As we prepared for two days, the forecast was perfect for this with South and Southwest winds. Then on Wednesday, departure day, our weather router, Chris Parker, suggested we not go offshore unless we like pushing into a 15-20 knot head winds with seas of 4-6 feet. Our other weather tools were saying calm seas and light S SW winds. We were confused. But we took his advice and stayed inside the ICW. We found the winds really were 15-20 N NE, just like he said! With our ocean passage course of 040 degrees, we would have been sailing directly into it. These N NE winds have been here for 4 days!

We will reach Fernandina tomorrow, Sunday, and will wait there until the winds go S or SW, which is supposed to happen Monday or Tuesday. If so, we will make a 330 nm run for Cape Lookout. If you click the picture, you will see our original plan and now our actual plan. The NO leg we could not do because of head winds blowing against the Gulf Stream. The 1, 2, 3 plan shows our day hops up the ICW to the FL/GA line. We can wait there for S or SW or W winds to make the direct run to the Outer Banks. Thanks for sailing along.

Two years in the planning, we enjoyed our boating vacation with our family from Arizona. Planning this for when Tanner graduated from 8th grade and before Taelor entered her Junior year was the ideal time for this trip. We booked a Moorings 474 Power Catamaran with a captain and a chef in the British Virgin Islands out of Road Town. The boat had 4 cabins and 4 bathrooms, two engines, a generator and air conditioning. It was three stories tall and ran at 15+ knots, so nothing was much more than an hour trip. This speed allowed us to visit many places in one day and see all the territory. We swam, snorkeled, walked beaches and salt flats, climbed trails with overlooks and observed many tropical fish. I shot three cameras, taking 1,900 photos. Of these, I selected 100 of the best and built this 4 minute slideshow with a soundtrack by Bob Marley. The photos show the fun and joy we shared together. This was our 7th trip to the BVIs and our family’s first. It was wonderful to re-explore these islands for the first time since 2005, they are so beautiful.

BVIs 2015 Family Slide Show

Here is a Map of our trip, and the route we ran. This is unusual but we ran clockwise due to 300 MIT boats that book this week and we ran the opposite of them.

….new Balmar installed…

This has been a full week of repair work on Island Spirit as we repaired and installed a new alternator, fixed the windlass by installing new brushes on the motor, and removed our radar antenna and installed another one given to us by very good friends. As of yesterday, Monday, May 18, 2015, we have all systems fixed and running and we feel much better about heading north offshore for Rock Hall, Maryland. We always try to do all our own repair work and our own installs. That way, we know the systems very well and when they break down or do not work, then we have a good idea of how to take them apart and possibly fix them. On this boat, we have modified nearly every system, either by installing a new one or fixing an existing installation. It is great to know the boat and all systems as well as we do. We think this knowledge is an asset and that is why we do it.

Walking 3 miles to get the car

During this week in Vero Beach, Florida, we had another good IP friend loan us her car. WHAT? Yes, a car to use while we are here. We rode the bus to the shopping mall and then walked the last 3 miles to pick up the car from storage. This has really been a fantastic help as we have been running around, getting parts and repair items to fix our systems. Yes, we also have used the car to go to Panera Bread, our favorite lunch stop, with their half salads and half sandwiches, WOW, what a treat! Thank you, Sharon, for the use of your beautiful car. It is a BMW so I named it Britney My (other) Woman for B.M.W.! She is beautiful with my favorite color scheme, blue with tan leather, (perfect!) and a 6 speed stick to enjoy as well. Fun, Fun, Fun!

Climbing the mast to install another radar antenna

After fixing the windlass by installing the new brushes, my next challenge was to climb up the mast for the 4th time and bring down the broken radar antenna. Then, I lifted up and installed the antenna my buddies gave us. WHAT? Yes, our other IP friends in Fort Pierce, Sam and Carolyn, had an old analog radar antenna that they removed when their display head unit failed. They then installed a new digital radar, so they had an old antenna. Sam and Carolyn gave us this antenna to get us home to Rock Hall. We lifted it up to the mount and installed it and wired it into the existing network and, sure enough, it worked! We now have a working radar system and we really appreciate this gift from them. Thank you so much!

Hoist the flags, the office is open!

Once all the repairs were finished, we hoisted our Island Packet Yachts flag and our Whiteaker Yacht Sales flag and the “office” was open for business! We have a great spot in the harbor and, as you all know, we love flying these flags. You can’t miss us. So now with the convenience of a car and the great shopping at Vero Beach, we are restocking a few depleted items and also replacing some well worn out clothing. When you live on a boat as we have been for the past 9 months, your clothing becomes well worn and you get tired of the same old outfits. So, it is off to the outlets for some new clothes.

Here are some photos of the days….

A BMW loaned to us by Sharon, thank you!

Remove the windlass motor, Lofrans Tigress Windlass

Remove the brushes, install new brushes

The old brushes look just fine, go figure

3 mile walks around Vero Beach, this is Date Palm, a beautiful street

Another beautiful road in Vero Beach, Florida

My 48nm radar antenna brought down from the mast

My radar system up and running with my old antenna on the seat Thank you, Sam and Carolyn!

Taking a break at Panera Bread, one of our favorite lunch places

Island Spirit on mooring ball 20 in front of the office

Radeen under the shade of an umbrella walking to the beach

Check out the cute dolphin park bench

Hayden with a new sun hat and his Marsh Harbor Marina/Jib Room Shirt

Radeen modeling a new sundress.

Living in Vero Beach, with a car, is sure E A S Y and F U N. Driving a BMW is a really special treat! With all systems running and repaired, life is good. Now we can focus on our next adventure and prepare for that.

…Melted Alternator wires…

There is nothing as frightening as an electrical fire onboard a boat at sea while underway! Nothing. This happened to us as we were heading to the Bahama Banks from Crab Cay via Grand Cay. Luckily, we have a procedure taught to us by Tom Tursi of The Maryland School of Sailing and Seamanship.  We check our engine room and bilges upon first starting and then check them every hour, yes, every hour, while we are running. This procedure just saved us from a full out electrical fire onboard.

When doing our first engine room check underway, by looking into the engine space, we saw sparks arcing from the back of the alternator! WHAT? SPARKS? OH NO. SHUT DOWN THE ENGINE NOW! This stopped the outflow of the amps being produced by the 120 amp alternator, but it did not stop the sparks and amps flowing FROM the 600 amp hour battery bank.

The positive post on the alternator was failing and it was shorting to the alternator case. This arcing and sparking was generating enough heat to melt the wiring harness and the wires attached to the alternator at the positive post.

To stop the electrical current flow, I had to drop the battery 1-2-All switch panel and then disconnect the positive wire connected to the alternator. Once this was disconnected, the alternator circuit was now open and the current and shorting stopped! WHEW, SAFE at last, NO FIRE. Close to a fire, but Tom Tursi engine room checks saved our boat once again! Now at this point, Sunday morning, we have no more alternator so we continued on with Wind and Solar for our electrical needs. Little did we know, it would be 5+ days without an alternator until we resolved this problem.

We sailed on and reached the Bahama Banks where we anchored all by ourselves in the middle of no where. The night was to be relatively calm with 10 knots of winds, but as usual, the winds came up to 20 knots and we spent our worst night on a boat we have ever had in 25 years! Cabinet doors were flying open, the boat was rolling side to side, deck to deck, and the bow was going up and down so much the anchor pulpit would hit the water. The anchor bridle was tugging at the bridle so hard, I thought it might break or rip the deck cleats out. We had 150 feet of chain out and our 55 lb ROCNA anchor and our windlass is broken. So, there was no way we could recover the anchor in these conditions by hand at night. It was too dangerous. We talked about it but decided we would need to wait until daybreak. The sun finally came up and we hauled the anchor in by hand and set sail for Fort Pierce, 62 nm miles away.

We arrived Fort Pierce by 1700 and headed directly to the anchorage where we popped a bottle of bubbly (it was Cava sailed from Spain by good friends, Ed and Sue) and celebrated our successful trip. That night, we crashed at 2000 and did not wake until 0700! Now, it was time to replace this alternator. We ordered a new Balmar, available the next day, and we walked the 1.5 miles to West Marine to pick it up. While there, I made all new wires and and a new wiring harness.

Of course, during this three day on-anchor repair job, it took us three trips to West Marine and one UBER car ($28 round trip) to NAPA for parts to complete the installation. The job seemed to take a lot more effort than expected because the new alternator has the positive post on the wrong side of the alternator. Guess what? When first installed, this positive post grounded out against the engine block, so it would have had a shorting problem as well. I needed to solve this!

After several calls to Balmar, we removed engine room insulation to give the alternator more pivot room and then we went to NAPA for three belts, one 1/2″ longer, one 1″ longer and one 1 1/2″ longer. The longer alternator belt allowed us to pivot the alternator more outboard, getting the positive post away from the engine block. The one inch belt would have been best, but it put the alternator case against the engine room box, so we had to use the extra 1/2″ belt. This only gives about 3/8″ clearance of the positive post off the engine block. If these two touch, we will have a short and the same problem all over again! Very frustrating situation. I need to add a rubber boot over this positive post for protection from this potential problem. Balmar needs to move this positive post to centerline or outboard.

Here is a photo of the new alternator with the post nearly touching the block as installed now.

When inspecting the old alternator, I originally thought the short happened due to the insulator breaking down under the positive wire connection. Later I discovered the break down was inside the alternator case and the positive post was shorting out against the case at the connection. Here you can see the old alternator positive post and all the erosion from the arcing. Overall, we are very lucky we caught this early, before we had a full out electrical fire. Thank you, Tom Tursi and the Maryland School for teaching us safety procedures at sea.

We wheeled the new alternator home in a cooler

The Balmar Marine Alternator, 60 Series, 100 amp

Easy connections, but #1, the positive post, becomes a new problem! This post is inboard and touches the engine block!

The mounting feet are different widths. I needed new bolts and new spacers. Another dinghy trip to shore and another walk.

The beautiful mural at the Ace hardware store, Fort Pierce, Florida

Working out the new wiring and connecting the new alternator.

Installed….but we have a new problem. The positive post hits the block! So, we bought a 1/2′ longer alternator belt and pivoted the alternator outboard.

This is the positive post and how close it is to the engine block!

New wiring to the Balmar regulator in the battery box.

This waterspout was an indication of the troubles to come!

Lucky for us, the sailing was great and our Gulf Stream crossing was calm. 15-20 knots beam reach

Team Island Spirit enjoying a sail in the Abacos in beautiful Blue Water. Beautiful and it is why we do this!

…Our plan for day trips Abaco to Florida…

With our radar system still not working after several tries to repair it, we have decided to NOT run overnight like we usually do. Instead, we will make day trips back to Florida. Running at night, without a radar system seems unsafe to us as we would be going full steam ahead in the black of night with no security of knowing there is nothing in front of us. We have a difference of opinion on this, but we have decided to day trip home. For us, this would need to be 3 to 4 days, so we have decided to see some islands we have not seen before and maybe skip Great Sale Cay. Our plan is as such: Day 1, Green Turtle to Fox Town, Well, we stopped short at Crab Cay off Little Abaco due to weather and unforecasted higher WEST winds. Day 2, Grand Cay because there is a small town there. Grand Cay is northwest of Great Sale Cay. Day 3, Mantanilla Shoals at the end of the Banks where we will anchor and sleep in the middle of nowhere! We hope it will be calm seas. Day 4, Cross the Gulf Stream 62 miles, 9 hours, to Fort Pierce, Florida.

Waterspout, OH NO

Of course the weather is a bit stirred up due to the outflow of bands from the tropical storm ANA that is heading from here to Charleston, SC. This first storm of the 2015 hurricane season is early but it is also large and yesterday we had a thunderstorm that dropped a waterspout down to the water about 2 miles or more away from us. Too close for us. We could see the water flying up from the surface, a very scary sight to see when you are on anchor. Lucky for us, it passed us by as we were securing the boat for the worst possible situation. Today some forecasts are calling for more of the same and we hope no storms develop.

Eric Patricia Greg Sharon Radeen and Hayden

Before departing Leeward Yacht Club, after spending a week there waiting out this ANA storm to move north, we had fun with boat buddies and being at a dock. This was the first dock we have been at since leaving Marathon on Jan 15, 2015. Jan, Feb, March, April on anchor, so being at a dock with water and power was a real joy. Boat buddies IP460 CUTTER LOOSE with Eric and Patricia and IP40 DREAM CATCHER with Greg and Sharon were docked along with us. Other boats included IP40 ZIPPITY DOO DAH, IP38 TATTOO II, IP40 TINTEAN and Spring Cove Marina friends, NEVERLAND, SYLESTIAL STAR. we all had good times catching up on our travels and our future plans. Cruising is so much fun and the people you share it with make the adventures all the more memorable!

Here are some photos of the fun…

Walking every day 3+ miles

Radeen with her Junkanoo Necklace for Date Night 🙂

Walking around New Plymouth, Green Turtle

Heading to sea, the Life Raft comes out, Thank you Greg!

Radeen swimming her 30+ laps

Radeen with our buddy who directed us to LYC. Thank you, Sara!

Radeen at the helm as we depart Green Turtle

The start of a waterspout off Crab Cay

A waterspout is a tornado over water and this one is too close

Sunset after the storm

Beautiful clouds after the waterspout