First leg of our trip

Well the first leg of our trip is over and we are at the dock at Bayfront Marina, Erie PA. Had a nice sail for the first half of the trip until the winds swung straight out of the East so we motor sailed the remaining way to Erie. This is the nicest marina we have ever stayed at, very clean, all new docks (composit boards) new airconditioned restrooms and showers. Our next planned stop is to be Buffalo where we will have our mast dropped and go into motorboat mode for the Erie Canal.

Bon Voyage

Fabulous night at Harpersfield Vineyards hosted by Patti and Adolph Ribic our great friends, they threw a Bon Voyage party for us as we are about to leave this weekend. We will miss all of our friends at the Best Winery in all of Ohio, and promise to return for a visit next summer. We loved the wine,food and music by The Four Kings- what great friends we have.

mrs missing link-almost ready

Less than one week to departure-the house is updated and almost empty,ready for the realtor to help us lose this baggage.I retired june 4th and spent a wonderful 2 1/2 weeks with the kids and grandkids while Mike juggled contractor work on the house. My daughter in law Katie let me hold newborn Vivien and play grandma stuff with 2 yr old Evangeline-thank you so much for the hospitality! We spent this month shedding tons of accumulated belongings via mail to kids in Seattle,a one day garage sale,Goodwill,church rummage sale, I feel free and unburdened and no sadness, of course I still somehow have too many clothes to fit here in 31 feet. We had a wonderful farewell bonfire at our marina saturday night- I will miss all the amazing friends we have made here at Geneva Marina.    Bye for now-Chris

Departure fast approaching!

Less than 2 weeks until our departure from Geneva State Park Marina. Busy with preparing the house for sale and the boat for the trip. We hope to leave about August first weather permitting. Our first planned stops are Erie and Buffalo, with a possible stop in Ashtabula to say goodbye to some friends. We will have the mast taken down in Buffalo at RCR Yachts and then head to the Erie canal. The boaters here at Geneva are having a bonfire on the beach this Sat the 24th and it will be our Bon Voyage Bonfire.

Finaly back in the water.

Well the boat is finally back in the water and we plan on sailing from Fairport, OH to Geneva State Park Marina today. Had the mast down this winter and the rigger inspected the rigging and mast. Some of the recent upgrades are; New prop, new cutless bearing, new stuffingbox hose, new shaft packing, new coax , and new anchor light.

Florida Trip

We just returned from Florida and did some scouting of some of the stops we will be making on the way down this fall. Checked out Oriental, New Bern, Elizabeth City, and St Augustine. Also stopped at Savannah, not a stop for a sailboat.

New Prop

Ordered a new 3 blade Campbell Sailer Prop and am in the middle of changing it. I decided to change the Stern tube to stuffing box hose and the cutlass bearing while everything is accessible and ran into a problem, could not get the shaft out to pull the cutlass bearing. Now I need to make a tool to remove the bearing and press the new one in without removing the shaft.