Carrabelle and holding

Kerm here, 

It's been awhile since I last posted but we have been moving from dawn to dusk trying to get to Carrabelle, Fl to set up for our overnight crossing to Tarpon Springs.  So here is the recap from Dog River to where we are now.  70 miles from dog river to Sabine Marina.  91 miles from Sabine to Burnt Mill Creek anchorage where we just beat sundown and were rewarded with a beautiful sunset plus dolphins greeting us as we pulled anchor the next morning.  Next we pushed on to Appalachicola for a 75 mile day and celebrated Chris's birthday.  From Appalachicola we got up at o dark thirty for a 31 mile push to Carabelle as to beat a new cold front coming in with 25 to 35 mile winds.  After we got settled in I actually took a nap for the first time in probably years. So now you can see that there hasn't been much time to sit down in front of a computer for the last week.

So now we sit and wait for this cold front to pass.  The waves are predicted for 11 to 13 feet today and will improve slightly each day over the next 5 to 6 days.  It now appears that there may be another cold front behind this one with a slight chance for a crossing on Tuesday but it's not looking good. We'll probably get to know Carrabelle quite well over the next few days.  We also have a few loopers here at the marina also waiting for a crossing so I'm sure that happy hours will be filled with stories, bs and a few beers so life ain't all bad.

Chris woke up at about 3:30 this morning and said something isn't right with the boat.  That it was listing to the port.  We went out and found that the low tide was much lower than normal and one line was too tight.  The lower tide was probably from the high winds pushing more water out of this area.  The line had to be cut which was a shame as it was brand new. Ouch.  Anyway, cut and back to bed.  All this was after the Dockmaster admired my tie ups yesterday saying that few people know how to do it correctly.  Double ouch.

The boat is a mess but at 39 degrees and 25 mile an hour winds I'm not sure a lot of outside work will be done today.  Salt residue is everywhere, dirt is everywhere (yes, dirt, I don't know where it comes from) and when we pulled anchor at Burnt Mill Creek anchorage we pulled up half the mud in the ICW.  It's on my list to put a water hose at the front of the boat to wash the anchor and chain as its coming up.  I'll get to it.

Mechanically and electrically I do have projects that I will be attending to during our wait here.  The house water pump is rumbling like its loose in its mounting.  Its a real bugger to get at now that the generator is back in the same area.  The pump also goes on from time to time on its own which generally means that there is a leak somewhere or maybe the accumulator needs recharging.  When I remounted the accumulator a couple of years ago I mounted it poorly as its a bugger to recharge without removing it from the mountings.  That's what I get for form over function. 

After on of our hard runs the other day I put my hand on the transmission and it was hot.  Real hot.  Today I'm going to probably pull the heat exchanger for the trany and see if there might be some sort of blockage.  I think I'll also try to find a pyrometer in town to check temps.  I'll also check the internet and see what pearls of wisdom I can find there.  Maybe it's nothing...

At Dog River I changed all the fluids and added a slick little deal to speed up changing the fluid in the injector pump.  Now instead of making a mess and taking an hour I should be able to do it in 10 minutes or less.  Some books say I should do a change every 50 hours of running so now I will have one less reason to procrastinate and stick with the schedule.

At some point over the next few days I will post on just boat stuff.  Some of you gear heads have said that you like it so keep tuned.

Lastly,  our new camera took a dump so until we find a Walmart there will be no pictures.  Sorry.