A weeks worth of repairs….

May 16, 2015

A weeks worth of repairs….

By Friday evening the engine was back all together with a new crankshaft seal and the transmission reinstalled. Two new air cooled refrigeration systems have been ordered – one for the fridge and a separate unit for the freezer. With Randy’s help we pulled out the old fridge system along with the water pump and all the related wiring and plumbing. This will resolve the problems caused by the refrigeration water pump sharing the same through hull fitting with the generator. We also pulled out the windlass motor, a new one is on its way, which we will install next week.

Monday the prop shaft and new seal will be installed and we will be relaunched. They will realign the prop shaft and motor and then we will be back to St. Augustine Marina to complete the remaining tasks of fiberglassing the cutout that was made to remove the transmission as well as install the new fridge systems on Thursday. Poor Ambition will need a major clean-up inside and out – nothing like a boatyard and repair work to completely turn the boat upside down and dusty. A few days of sea trials to make sure everything is in order and we will continue our journey northward.

The antifouling paint issue will have to wait to be resolved. The paint technical rep visited the boat and was absolutely useless in explaining what happened to the boat. He did offer three gallons of paint as compensation. I will splash the boat with what is on her now even if it doesn't look very good. 

Always good to have a plan B

May 13, 2015

Always good to have a plan B

Our plan of sailing direct from Nassau to St. Augustine was rudely interrupted by a low pressure weather system that was supposed to move off to the north east, giving us a clear sail. Well that is not what happened – once we were in the gulf stream off West End Bahamas the weather forecast showed that the low had actually stalled and to make matters worse, it had developed into a tropical storm and even gave it a name – Ana. Sailing into tropical storms is never a good thing so despite the fact that we were having a great sail in 15 to 20 foot rolling seas, we were making 9 to 9.5 knots heading for Portugal. At this point we also discovered that the refrigeration system had completely stopped working and nothing I could do, would make it better. Time for plan B – we ended up sailing to Fort Pierce, Florida to tuck into the inter coastal waterway to get out of the weather and load up on ice, to try to save all the food in the freezer and fridge. We ended up motoring all the way to St. Augustine, arriving Monday morning. All the fixed bridges on the ICW are a minimum of 65 feet clearance – well our VHF radio antenna did a great job of whacking the spiders off the underside of almost every bridge. Our 63 foot tall mast just squeaked under – sure got our attention!

By Monday afternoon the folks from First Mate Yacht Services were on board to start the disassembly of the transmission from the engine to make the repairs. Well here again a plan B is also good – there is just not enough room to work between the engine and the prop shaft so they tried to slide the prop shaft backwards but that didn’t work So now with everything in pieces, Ambition was towed from the Municipal Marina to Oasis Boat Yard to get pulled out of the water.

Well since Tuesday, things have only gone from bad to worse. Pressure washing the boat bottom is standard practice when the boat is hauled out – but in our case, the pressure washing washed the anti-fouling paint off the bottom that was applied just 4 months ago …. Time to call in the paint technical rep to figure out what has gone wrong. Now we will add a new bottom paint job to the list of must do tasks once we figure out who is going to pay for it! We are now on our third service company to try to figure out what to do with our fridge system – it is now looking like a total replacement is going to be the only solution but they can’t even come look at situation until next week.

This morning with much banging and persuasion, the prop shaft finally gave up the fight and slide out the bottom of the boat. Now we discover that the shaft seal, which was supposed to have been serviced in Tampa, was just partially done – nice! So now it only makes sense to upgrade the shaft seal with a much newer and better technology so Ambition will get a new PSS dripless shaft seal this week and a new cutlass bearing as well, as it has rotted out from lack of use. But at least now we can continue with the trying to get the transmission out of the boat - that will restart this afternoon. 

The SSB radio was tested yet again and we have determined that I will need to remove it from the boat and ship to the US west coast for a repair and overhaul. Me thinks I will wait to do this later. 

On a real positive note, we have some very wonderful friends that Maryse and I met 2 years ago in the Bahamas, that live on board their motor yacht in St. Augustine – they have taken us under their wing and helped out incredibly – welcoming us with our own cabin on board their boat, lending us a Jeep to get around in and overall moral and nautical support for all that is going on here – thanks ever so much Barbara and Randy for your hospitality and support – you guys are great!

Our Bahamas time is coming to an end ......

May 6th 

After waiting for a bunch of weather systems to clear out of our path for the past 10 days, the torrential rains and squalls are behind us. Finally we have a plan - pulling out of Nassau Thursday as early as possible for St. Augustine.

Looks like we will be motoring 90% of the way (I should have bought a trawler @(*&^%^*) and hence plan at 6.5 knots for 385 miles which will put us in to St. Augustine Saturday afternoon late if the gulf stream helps us or Sunday morning first thing as I don’t want to do the entrance in the dark.  We will need to clear customs somewhere to get our Homeland Insecurity Cruising License. 

Once they figure out how much work the engine, anchor windlass and SSB radio are, then we will start to plan our trip up the east coast to NYC (800 miles).

It will feel so good to be back in deep waters again after months of sailing along with as little as a foot of water under the keel! 

Our winter adventure is starting to come to an end....

April 30, 2015

Well we knew that this wonderful winter in the Bahamas would come to an end at some point. The last 14 days have been much warmer and more humid – spring is in the air as temperatures reach the upper 80’s F / 30 C! The winds have for the most part also been getting lighter which leaves us often motor sailing to keep our destinations attainable in daylight.

We also notice that at least 50% of the boats that were here over the winter have already made there way back to Florida – the bays, anchorages and moorings are much less busy. This is nice as we have lots of room for just ourselves!

The engine oil leak continues to be an issue – not critical, as I only need add oil every few days and change the oil absorbent blankets in the bilge.  The anchor windlass motor continues to operate even if it does take a whack of a metal bar at times to wake it up – a very non-technical solution!

Unfortunately our slip neighbours in Nassau, also from Lake Champlain experienced the less appealing side of Nassau – they were robbed while asleep during the night. With the hot weather everyone has been sleeping with everything open and fans full blast. Obviously this is exactly what the thief was hoping for. Cash was the only loss but none the less it is more than disturbing to know that someone was rifling through your boat and belongings while you slept. Apparently this is not an isolated incident as it happened to a total of 3 boats this week alone here. Ambition is very fortunate to be able to close everything and have the AC keep us cool.

Plans have been made for our return northward with a stop in St. Augustine. We will make the 380 mile 2 night / 3 day trip from Nassau for St. Augustine during the week of May 4^th as there is a very nasty weather pattern that keeps us docked in Nassau until then. At this point the dinghy is at risk of sinking with all the rain squalls that have been rolling through Nassau. The next leg from St. Augustine to New York City is 800 miles or about 5 nights and 5 days sailing. If the weather is uncooperative, there are always a number of coastal cities that we can duck back into for shelter if needed.

Bahamas continue to delight us....

Wow …. Clara is such a beautiful little girl ….. we are all blessed with her arrival in the family! Got to spend time with her and Cedrick as well as my Mom – 4 generations of the family together is a very special treat! 

We also surprised Maryse’s dad by showing up with lunch in hand – he did not even know that we were in town – he was a happy man to see Maryse.

Back on board we were happy to find that the problems we have been having with the fridge have been resolved – the 12V connections to the 3/4HP compressor motor were loose causing the breaker to trip. Cold beer and ice cubes for rum is a MUST and we are now back in business!

Our last guests for the season arrived on the 10^th and we had a week of fantastic weather – some great sailing days and some with a little less wind than we wanted but hot and sunny every day. 

It is becoming very obvious that many winter cruisers have already headed home, the anchorages have less boats and even at Exuma Park there are no problems getting a mooring in the north field at Warderick Wells.

 

Well the week wouldn’t be complete without breaking something – this time it is the electric motor for the windlass that has started to act up – the old trick of tapping it with a metal bar got it to work again. Just not sure how long it will stay operational – lifting 100 feet of chain plus the anchor off the bottom by hand, is not a task Maryse and I want to do! Will try to tough it out until we get back to the US, to replace the motor with a new one and get the old one repaired, if possible to have as a spare.

Maryse had a special event this week also …. she earned her Girl Guides Achievement badge for Toilette Maintenance – I will spare you the details but she did succeed well!!! Next to having cold beer and ice cubes – a functioning toilette is a must have item!

We are heading off to wander around the Exumas for a couple of weeks on our own before turning the boat northward to St. Augustine for the engine repairs.

Spring has definitely arrived here as the daytime temperatures are getting much warmer and humid. Once I unclogged the plugged water intake, the air conditioning is back working ….. ahhhh a great relief for sleeping at night. Captain gets cranky when short on sleep!

Life is still good in the Bahamas!!!