Inch By Inch...

...the refit keeps moving on. We lost a full week due to Mark having to be out of town but hey, they pay him for these little jaunts so we try to take it all in stride. We like the refit to keep moving forward but a paycheck is necessary for this to happen right now so a week behind schedule? Schedules are for airlines and even they aren't capable of sticking to one. Keep on keeping on...

We've reached a point where we can start whipping the engine compartment into shape. It, like every other hidden bit of the boat was a mass of poorly routed hoses and random add ons taking up twice as much space as necessary. Since Ceol Mor is an aft cockpit boat, we do not have the luxury of a big engine compartment so making this area as tidy as we can is a priority. We have an old faithful Perkins which should out live all of us but in order to make that happen, we have to be able to tweak and coax her into chugging along with early and often maintenance. Having the engine be as accessible as possible will be appreciated the first time we have to do some engine trouble shooting and repair at sea. Notice I did not say 'if', I said 'when'. It's inevitable so it makes sense to plan ahead.

Before

So the old hoses which ran every which way, were unsupported and had mismatched hose and bar sizes have been replaced, rerouted, clamped, checked and organized. The old filter installation which compounded the clutter due to having separate sea water and fuel filters for the engine and generator have been replaced by a single seawater filter and manifold which supplies both the engine and generator.A dual fuel filter and manifold has been installed to supply the engine and generator. Mark designed and built the fuel filter assembly which includes valves for fuel polishing and online filter replacement and selection. Everything is labeled to identify valve function and position for various operating modes (no guessing!).We have installed new sound insulation through out the compartment.

After

If we ever do have to repower, it will seem like a piece of cake after all of this!

Kitty loves nothing more than helping with the boat. She is our quality control inspector.

How Does Your Garden Grow?

While Mark continues to build a new copper  manifold and finish up the plumbing, Maura has been in Indiana for her yearly visit with the grandparents and a week at Survivor! camp. She tells me that what she learned at camp is to make fires and walk without making any sound. I think these skills will come in handy should she ever wish to have a promising career as a pyromaniac ninja or a Chicago "insurance adjuster".

This means Kitty and I have been pretty much kicking it in the burbs. Rather than get down about the fact that we are surrounded by concrete, cars and drive through services I decided to be upbeat about the benefits one can get from living on land. In an attempt to teach Kitty about the world, I decided we would start a little container garden and learn about food- where it comes from, how it grows you know, basic preschool age stuff.

I was encouraged by the beautiful photos of my blog buddy Amanda's garden shots. She has a daughter just a little bit younger than Kitty who seems to be loving playing in the dirt, harvesting vegetables and just generally enjoying her garden. I thought back to my early post college days as a preschool teacher and remembered what worked for a container garden or my classes.

With the memory of successful container gardens in mind, I procured a small plastic wading pool. Drain holes were cut and screen patches were installed over them to keep the dirt in but allow proper drainage. Kitty was ecstatic once we had it raised up on bricks and began filling it with organic soil. This girl seriously loves to dig in the dirt. Then we got to planting and Kitty happily tucked strawberry plants, tomatoes, rosemary, basil,cilantro and squash plants into their beds. Every day we go out and check the moisture levels, water when necessary, talk to the plants and just generally potter around her tiny garden. It looked amazing. The plants took off and looked full and healthy and I promised Kitty it would just be a few weeks before we could begin harvesting the fruits of her labor.

Then, the sun came. With a vengeance. Despite our careful attention the plants started looking, crispy. I may or may not have resorted to putting up shade in a futile attempt to keep the scorching rays from turning our little garden into a burnt wasteland. Amanda posted new photos of her impressive haul. With every viewing of "Brie's garden" Kitty would lament the lack of edibles from her garden and would ask "when my berries gonna grow?". I began to curse Amanda and her green thumb and perfect Pacific Northwest climate.

We got a bell pepper big enough to harvest, but the sun had literally burnt it beyond being edible. Imagine a green pepper with half of it burned black. Kitty was not impressed. The rosemary is hanging in there because it is impossible to screw up rosemary but herbs do not give little kids the same excitement at harvest time that a real fruit or vegetable does. The basil and cilantro was cooked beyond saving. The squash plants are hanging in there but they have not produced ONE piece of fruit. Flowers yes, but nothing to eat much to the consternation of Kitty. 3 months, no fruit. And then, there were the strawberries.

The one bright spot in my sad little attempt to give Kitty the experience of a garden were the strawberries. The plants look good and they are actually bearing fruit. Harvest time should be right around the corner, right? Kitty would look every day at her little tiny berries and would be excited at the prospect of picking them and eating them. Yes, except for the lizards. We have a large lizard population in our garden and would you believe that every single time we would spot a likely candidate berry for harvesting in a day or two, those damned lizards would nick them the night before harvest leaving only a cluster of leaves and remnant of well chewed red fruit clinging to the vine. Kitty was pretty annoyed with her lizard friends and was decidedly over her time as a farmer.

Finally, we had one little strawberry that was close enough to ripe to harvest and because I knew we had to get it before the lizards did, I encouraged Kitty to go ahead and pick it. You would have thought we had given her a pony. She was beside herself with excitement. She carefully picked it, examined it, delighted in the fact that she had grown it. She danced around holding her tiny berry, extolling the virtues of said berry. Finally, she washed it carefully and popped it in her mouth and in 10 seconds it was gone. That was the most expensive, time consuming berry ever known to man.

So now we know what works, berries and rosemary and so long as it keeps Kitty happily digging in the garden we will keep playing at gardening but I am really thankful that we have lots of fresh produce available for purchase near by. If we had to grow our own food, we would starve. Perhaps it is time to teach Kitty how to roast lizards. I hear it is all the rage in South America.

What's That Saying?

Busier than a one legged man at a butt kicking contest? Yeah. That would be Mark. A butt kicking contest in Sub Sahara Africa with 80% humidity. The man deserves accolades not just for keeping the refit moving forward, but doing it in extreme weather conditions. Man, it has just been stupid hot and poor Northern European Mark has been sweltering in the belly of the boat making daily progress, though that progress can be measured in inches a day. Did I mention it has been really hot? Ok, there is my yearly complaining about the heat done.

After our mini-cruise last summer, Mark decided to rip out the plumbing and rectify what can only be described as a huge freaking mess topped with a bit of random chaos. So you want to check the fuel level in the tanks? Grab that handy dowel rod, maneuver your way through THIS :

open an inspection port, thread dowel into the opening and guess. Even better, try to do it while the boat rolls and pitches. Seems a something a bit less like "yachting" and more like something from Bobby Ray's Redneck Yacht Club*. ( I am from the South. My Dad actually has a cousin named Bobby Ray and while he is not a Redneck he comes from a long line of them. It is my heritage, I know Redneck Engineering when I see it and this is a fine example of it).

Its not just trying to discern the fuel levels that was a challenge. Doing any kind of troubleshooting or maintenance was just about impossible. We had no schematics, 12 diesel lines for each supply configuration from the 2 tanks to the engine and generator, 4 selector valves for engine and generator supply and return, unidentified and unsecured lines running here and there, multiple electrical cables running every which way, an water drain line with a gate valve whose purpose was a mystery, water and drain lines and air conditioning tubing just sort of shoved in there and even better, the condensation line from the ac was allowed to just drain into the boat interior which caused water to pool in various low lying areas as it meandered to the bilge which caused the teak and holly sole to swell and bow. Seriously. A HUGE FREAKING MESS.

Nice labeling, huh? So yes, it has taken almost an entire year to get this sorted. To be fair, we had other projects (such as the master cabin) that distracted a bit but finally, finally it looks as if we are ready to hook the diesel lines up to the fuel filter system Mark completed at Christmas. Christmas. The man deserves a medal.

No Mark project would be complete with out a schematic. I tease him about his obsession with them, but honestly I do not know how people manage to troubleshoot systems without them. If it all goes pear shaped and I need to track down an electrical or plumbing problem, even I- a bear of little brain can do it. All I need to do is open up the handy boat book and voila! There is the schematic I need for whatever system needs attention. We are never going to sell Ceol Mor but if we did, I would tack on another 5k just for the schematics. :) A first time boat buyer would scoff, an experienced one would say "What a bargain!".

And so after months and months of careful and painstaking work. This is what the under sole area now looks like.

Everything is labeled and has a diagram to show which direction is open, which is closed. The 12 diesel lines have been reduced to 7 and are labeled. 4 valves have been replaced with one 6 port valve. We have added a fuel pump. The dowel rod has been retired and we now have THESE tank level sensors installed. All the water lines have been replaced and secured as well as the AC lines. The electrical runs have been routed through ducting.The diesel fill and vent lines have been rerouted to give greater access and for the finishing touch, a light has been mounted so that when you need to work in this area, you can actually see what you are doing/ Phew.

Let us once again admire Mark's handywork. Its not just a refit, its ART.

Now if you will excuse me, I think I really owe Mark a beer. Or 3. Seriously.

Highs and Lows of Marine Retailers.

I have been holding out on you for purely selfish reasons. I waited to tell you about the best darned marine book selection until I found the last book I really, really wanted. Yes, West Marine will carry a few books and you can always order books online but if you are like me and kind of enjoy hunting for a bargain then these options will not satisfy as much as hunting and gathering in person. Maybe its a girl thing, this need to seek and find an object and bring it home.

The best darned marine book selection ever is at the Half Price Books store in Clear Lake. While they don't get everything in stock and you do have to be willing to wait and to dig a bit, the selection of sailing related books at bargain prices is pretty darned amazing. While they say that the books will be sold at half off the retail price, they run sales fairly often. So often that I've picked up excellent books- both helpful and just entertaining such as Chapman's Piloting brand new for around $8.00, The Motion of the Ocean for about $6.00, Nigel Calder's Cruising Handbook for around $20 and so many others. (I've included links for those impatient folks who just want to order them, will happily pay shipping and get on with it.)

The one, last book that I have been searching for for literally months finally appeared, I snapped it up happily and paid around $16 plus tax. I scored what I consider to be the best overall, comprehensive book for  long distance sailors- Beth Leonard's Voyager's Handbook.  Yes, I know that time and money I spent on gas searching for it is probably greater than the shipping costs from Amazon but again, thrill of the chase. Girl Thing. Move on.

HPB only had one copy and its now mine and since I no longer have any books I feel like I need to have, I can tell you about the treasure trove that is Half Price Books. Seriously, a really great selection of books that is ever changing and at great prices. A bigger selection than I have seen even at dedicated marine stores.I have to ding Half Price a little though because I think every great book store must have a cat in residence. They used to have a cat but he has not been seen in a year or two. No cat, no 5 stars from me so if you want to get bumped back up to 5 star status get a cat. Preferably a really fat orange one who likes to lounge on the sales counter and really doesn't like anyone but stoically endures everyone lavishing him with praise and affection.

And now for the latest round of marine retail low points. I try to keep my complaints to a minimum but sometimes I get overwhelmed by the sheer lack of business savvy displayed by marine suppliers. I guess maybe they figure since the customer doesn't exactly have a ton of choices that they can strive for mediocrity and we will all just suck it up because again, how many choices do you actually have?

My nominee for the Marketing Genius of the year award goes to Porta-Bote. Mark and I wrestle with what dinghy to purchase and after speaking with folks who have lived with one, seeing them in person at the Annapolis Boat show almost 2 years ago we thought this was the way for us to go. It wouldn't be ideal, but it would allow us to skip davits which we really want to do and if we decided later we needed an inflatable, well those are available pretty much anywhere you find boats. Porta-Botes aren't perfect, but they are tough as nails, easy to stow and have many other attractive attributes but there are some trade offs that are less than desirable.

Then I saw the Porta Bote Crib and low, it appeared that all of the drawbacks I thought we would have to accept would be just washed away. This could be the answer for us! I in my naivete, contacted Porta Bote telling them that I had gotten the information on the Porta Bote, had seen it in person but was really interested in the Porta Crib and could they send me the pricing information and would they have one at the Houston show they would be attending?

Now, I am not going to point out that a company that has sold over 90,000 boats should be able to hire a web designer to put together a real web page that does not look it was originally hosted on Geocities. What I am going to point out is how desperately they need to hire someone with some kind of marketing background. Any Girl Scout who  has served as a cookie pusher would do a better job. When Porta Bote replied to me, they promised to send me the information I requested. They then went on to tell me that no, they would NOT be bringing a CRIB to the Houston Boat Show because IT IS OVER 3 TIMES THE COST OF THE PORTA BOAT AND AT $6000 ITS TOO EXPENSIVE TO BRING TO A BOAT SHOW.

What kind of intellectual giants are they employing? Anyone with even the tiniest bit of marketing savvy would understand that if you are offering a product that is much more expensive than your usual offerings you probably want to, I don't know let people see why its more expensive and to be able to show the value. I could be wrong...no. I am not wrong. People wonder why they don't see more Porta Botes out and about and I think we have the answer. No one there has a clue about marketing.

Oh and when I finally got my information package in the mail it contained the price list for the Porta Bote, which I had explained I already had but absolutely zero information or pricing for the CRIB. So now I have to rethink the whole dinghy option because I am seriously wondering if perhaps they are just too dense to do business with.

So, I am off to go do yet more dinghy research and yacht tender navel gazing. I still think the Portland Pudgy is pretty darned nifty...if only it were just a little bit bigger. *sigh*

Rites of Passage

Its summer. Despite the fact that the calendar says its is not yet officially summer, the fact that the daily temperatures are flirting with the notion of spiking upwards towards the 100 Farenheit mark means its summer no matter what the calendar says.

Maura has indulged in the American teen rite of passage of running around with friends, swimming and catching up on all the tv she missed during the school year. Kitty enjoys the summer rite of passage of dancing in the sprinklers as they make a vain attempt to keep the green stuff from turning a crispy brown. Sailors have rites of passage too.

The first rite of passage is for your surveyor, no matter how good and how thorough to miss something big on your pre-purchase survey. This will be monumentally time consuming, or expensive or both. Happens to everyone. Expensive miss? Check.

Another sailing rite of passage is to have your engine fail at a time when it would be a really good thing to have your engine. Like when coming into a narrow, busy marina lane and no, boats do not have brakes. Check.

Then there is the first time overnight at anchor when you hear the weird bacon sizzling noise of tiny crustaceans doing god knows what around your hull.Check. Running aground. Check. Ripping a sail. Check. Anchor refusing to set/dragging. Check. See? These are all rites of passage that everyone who sails will encounter eventually. We are no more cursed or blessed than anyone else. I just figure its all part of it and make a check list to count down the inevitable.

With the heat coming on gang busters, we had the opportunity to experience yet another rite of passage. In order to keep the refit moving forward, it is an absolute necessity to run the ac while sitting in a windless marina. An ac that requires an intake through hull. An intake through hull that will eventually, suck up some poor unsuspecting sea creature to its demise. I was hoping we would get a squid because they tend to be squishy and a little easier to extract but no. Our sea creature is of course an over achiever so what did we get? A big, fat  fish. That sucker was seriously wedged in there.

Mark tried everything he could to get the fish out without resorting to cutting the lines. He tried working on it from the outside, the inside, from every conceivable angle but in the end- due to a 90 degree angle, the lines had to be cut in order to remove the now very dead fish. Mark was annoyed that the intake was designed in such a way that he could not rod out the intake. You know what that means. he is busy redesigning the intake/strainer set up to avoid this. Ceol Mor will be getting a completely redesigned ac system that will allow rodding of any and all through hulls.

Refit project list expanding project by project despite your best efforts to whittle it down? Check.

Its Just Never Easy

Ever have one of those days where despite your best attempts, despite your careful attention to  precise execution, nothing seems to go as planned? We have a lot of those days on Ceol Mor.

Kitty's most recent frustration was do to her desire build a drum kit which kept slipping on the slick table causing her to drop her groove. Some days, we feel exactly the same way kid.

My most recent frustrations were due to the wind picking up after being dead calm as I laid out painted panels to dry and my never ending on going battle with my sewing machine which I am pretty convinced is intelligent, cognizant  and for some reason is very, very angry with me. Mark's frustration of the day (he gets daily ones) is the routing of hot and cold pressurized water lines.

It seems the industry standard for plumbing runs is to just shove the hose in any available space and call it good. Since we want to maximize the space in the boat, keeping everything tidy so we can utilize every single centimeter of space and since Mark is Captain Perfecto and therefore can not sleep until he manages to execute a complete redesign of all the systems to a level of perfection never before seen except on nuclear class subs, its slow going. Just planning out and beginning the install of the hot and cold pressurized lines ate up a good 2 days and its still ongoing.

Our pace is also slowing down a bit due to the heat. Whether you call it 32c or 94f its essentially the same thing. Freaking hot and its only going to get worse.In a vain attempt to keep the boat at a tolerable level while we work, we have installed our awesome boom tent. By awesome, I mean completely Red Neck fabulous. I would love to have one of these Ronstan Air Arch or one of these Shade Tree but at around $700 for either of them, our $50 TP version starts to look really good. If I just can learn to play Dueling Banjos on the banjo, I think I can convince the marina neighbors its a stylistic themed choice. All we lack are old tires for fenders and an old green sofa on the foredeck and we are good to go.

In other news of progress, the "varnish lady" has been hard at work applying the varnish to the new teak and holly sole in the master cabin. Due to that particular piece of mill work being on the spendy side, we opted to hire someone who does varnish every single day to finish it. Mark will let me varnish exterior stuff because it doesn't matter how perfect or imperfect it is, you are going to have to redo it sooner rather than later anyway but interior stuff requiring a bit more control and finesse? Best to hire it out. I figure I will post a photo when its done, instead of taking shot after shot as each layer is applied. That would be sort of like watching paint dry. No actually, it would be EXACTLY like watching paint dry.

Nothing Says 'I Love You' Like Sharing Your Power Tools

We continue to creep forward on the complete and total transformation if the master cabin formerly known as "the dark, cramped and icky vee berth".

Mark spent a few days meticulously cutting the cabinetry openings in the master cabin and carefully cleaning up the teak trim rings to reinstall them in the new cabinet. The biggest reason he was so methodical in sizing the openings to reuse the teak trim rings from the former forward head? The bid from the good and talented boat wright was well right at $2,000. For ONE trim ring. Yes, we want beautiful but we would like to not go broke while attaining beautiful. Fortunately, the slow but jolly boatwright was very careful when taking out the forward head so the trim rings that were in the head are all in good shape. After a few hours of careful scraping, sanding and general fine tuning they are now in perfect shape. Its time consuming to be sure, but when you weigh the time needed against the extraordinary cost of teak it becomes a very worthwhile investment.

The beautiful teak and holly sole by Superior Marine, ready for varnish

While Mark was working on items requiring fine detail, I got busy with some painting. Happily, Mark let me tackle the sanding with his honking big sander. That thing is the bomb. I only had one instance where I had it cranked up a little too high but quickly got the hang of it and got busy sanding the boards that go under the cushions in the salon and master cabin. Due to the fact that Murphy is my middle name, of course the wind picked up after I had laid the boards out carefully on raised blocks to dry. You guessed it, specks of dust, a couple of bugs and some leaves are now imbedded in my carefully applied enamel paint. No worries, it was just the first coat and I have big ole power sander to take care of it.

Maura helped out by entertaining Kitty long enough for us to get some work done until Kitty could stand it no longer. If we are doing anything resembling building, painting or construction of any sort she wants to be included. We are happy to let her "help" (knowing we will have to redo whatever it is she has put her hand to) but the difficulty is in her stubbornness.

Striding with purpose. This girl is ALWAYS on a mission

You can see the dilemma she found herself in...

While Maura was a very chilled out toddler, Kitty is the polar opposite. She wants to do what she wants to do and once she has made a decision, she will not waiver from it, no matter what. This will be a wonderful quality for her to have as an adult but in a 3 year old, it can be tough. She desperately wanted to help paint. Mark and I both told her that was not a problem so long as she changed out of her new and much beloved "Olivia" t-shirt. She did not want to remove said t-shirt. She refused. She crossed her arms. She was steadfast. In the end, she refused to change her t-shirt and did not get to paint. The next morning, she lamented the fact that she did not get to paint. I told her next time she could paint to her hearts content so long as she wore appropriate work clothes. You could see the wheels turning in her head. Life lessons...these are life lessons.

This was taken a little over a month ago, but it pretty much sums up Kitty's personality. I have to say one of the really great things about having a teen and a toddler is getting to hear the toddler's renditions of the teen's favorite songs. You have not lived until you have seen and heard Kitty singing "Single Ladies".