Cruising to Nowhere

Life has really slowed down...

We spend our time working on boat projects and walking around town like all the other old-timers. Sue got so bored, she actually took up running again.

Meanwhile, my latest project on the boat has, predictably, turned into another surprise nightmare. I had the brilliant idea to upgrade our battery charger with a new charger/inverter. When I started to work on the A/C side of the circuits, it came to my attention that the entire original A/C wiring had been done improperly, black is white and vice-versa. To make matters worse, when I started to try and correct the situation, some of the existing cables started to crumble to dust in my hands. Apparently perfectly supple rubber insulation can turn into a kind of brittle hard plastic after 30 years (strangely not all of it though). To make a long story short, 3 long days of labour have brought me basically back to where I started. Just another typical chapter in the saga of boat ownership.

With fall arriving soon, the harbour is looking very empty - lots of room for visiting yachts now.

Most of the time it is very quiet and peaceful there, a nice place to sit and have a designer coffee.

But fall also brings the cruise ships. So far we have seen a couple of big ships (one from Princess and one from Celebrity) anchored out at the mouth of the harbour, with people being ferried in via their tenders.

There was also a small cruise ship the was able to use the large dock at the inner harbour. We noticed that while they roll out the red carpet for the biggies, no-one takes much notice of the smaller boats. Not sure which would be better, from the point of view of the cruisers.

So far, the weather has been holding up well; very nice for September in Nanaimo (nothing like as warm as it apparently got back in Edmonton). But now the predictions are for more normal fall conditions - a little cooler and some sporadic rain showers.

So maybe it is time for us to start thinking about what we want to do for the next few months before we find ourselves cruising to nowhere...

Seattle Boats Afloat

Quick trip to Seattle to see the Lake Union Boats Afloat show.

First time we have driven over the border since 911 - not as bad as we feared - took about an hour to cross at the Peace Arch south of Vancouver (about half that coming the other way).

The boat show was interesting although the emphasis was on big (read expensive) boats, and they were mostly power boats. The few sailboats they did have included a few real offshore type boats though, so we were able to get some good ideas from them. Mostly out of our price range.

Check out our new yacht (We can just about afford to fill the gas tank once).

And here is a picture of our new apartment in the sky.

Seattle was fun. Saw a lot of downtown, went out to a movie, rode the monorail, and eat a great seafood supper at Ivars in the harbour.

Otherwise the trip was quite uneventful until we were pulling into Nanaimo on the ferry at Duke Point. We were treated to a sighting of a pod of killer whales just cruising by - a nice welcome back.

Plans Changing

It has been an exciting month.

Our assets have now been reduced to one car, one sea container and a boat. we have visited with friends and relatives to let them know what we are up to and hopefully have not burned too many bridges in the process. While we are now officially living in Sue's mom's basement in Edmonton, our principal location is now the boat.
Even after having a month to deal with it, we still have not figured out where to put our few meager possessions on said boat - but we are getting closer.

We decided, after the first week on the boat that we had to get away for a few days just to calm down and try to figure out what we are going to do for the immediate future. To that end, we spent 10 days at a few of our favorite anchorages in the Gulf islands, and did some shakedown testing of the new autopilot and other miscellaneous systems on board. We visited Clam Bay and Maple Bay on the way south and Clam Bay again on the way back.

Much of our time was spent in Montague harbour, one of the easiest spots to just live the laid-back lifestyle to which we would like to become accustomed.

We did spend a night in Ganges harbour as well, and did the standard touristy things in the town, lingering over a morning coffee at a trendy bistro and dining out at the local pub in the evening.

But mostly we just hung out on the boat, getting a tan when the sun was out and watching DVDs in the evening, with the diesel heater running when the weather turned cold and nasty. Generally we were pretty happy with the whole experience and would like to do more of this before we head south. I don't think we have really spent enough time exploring all that the west coast has to offer and it would be a pity to leave it before we have had our fill.

We had to beat a hasty retreat back to Nanaimo, via Dodd Narrows, so Sue could, after years of study, finally get her Boaters card and VHF radio license. She is now legal!

Meanwhile, I have take on some of the boat projects that we have been putting off for so long, as well some new projects that have sprung up. (Like redesigning one of the hanging lockers, converting it to shelves to make better use of the space - in which I could finally stow the remainder of my clothes).

So, what exactly are our plans?

Well, we have decided that we are just not eager to go south this year. We have many things we would like to do to the boat; we would like to spend more time in the northern waters, especially next spring during the long, warm days that we have never had the opportunity to use before. And, with some of the final details of the house sale still not put to bed, etc., we just don't see any reason to rush. While we are not really enthusiastic about just spending the winter on the boat in the marina, we believe the boat would make a wonderful base for us to possibly spend more time doing some overland, fly, bus, whatever, travel this winter.

On that note, we are driving down to Seattle tomorrow for the Lake Union Boats Afloat show. Maybe we will see something there that will completely change our minds. Stranger things have happened.

Oh Boy, Things are Happening!

Another month has gone by but, finally, things are actually progressing.
We have managed to rid ourselves of most of our worldly possessions, selling or giving away all of the big items and storing those few valued items we just cannot seem to part with. We are down to one car and an empty house. Much cleaning and painting, etc has been taking place.
Our house went up for sale last Monday and we accepted an offer 3 days later. So now we are scrambling to get all the paperwork done to meet the requested August 15th possession date.
The good news is that we are able to do all of this from the boat.
Anticipating a long wait for the house to sell, we had packed up what we thought was the minimal collection of junk that we had to take to the boat. Food (we couldn't just throw it away now could we?), clothing (we need stuff for both cold and hot weather because we don't know where we will be), computers (we now have 4 on-board - because again, you cannot just throw them away when there is nothing wrong with them), printers (since we have them, we have to use them right?), books, tools (you need at least two of each don't you?), etc. The resulting load to go to the boat had mushroomed to the point that it would not fit in the car. Fortunately, we have very good friends who were quick to lend us their minivan so we would not have to leave anything behind.
So now, we are sitting on the boat, carrying out the necessary steps in the sale of the house via lawyers, emails and faxes, and trying to figure out where to store a minivan load of belongings on an already fully loaded vessel.
The weather here in Nanaimo has been unusually hot and humid, hitting the mid 30s every day for a week. We were not very well acclimatized yet and had a hard time getting up the energy to do much of anything. The last couple of days it has been cooling off a bit, so we have managed to get out for one day-sail to check out some of the new equipment and try and re-acquaint ourselves with the operation of the boat. Of course we cannot let ourselves get out of cell-phone range until all the house stuff is settled. We will have to get back to Edmonton before the 15th to remove the last of the remnants of our former life from the house before letting complete strangers have their way with it. Mixed feelings here.

Progress Report

It has been a while since I updated this blog. This is mostly because nothing much was happening fast. It has taken a lot longer than we ever thought possible to get our house ready to sell or rent. Lots of maintenance items to be taken care of, like re-shingling, a new fence, painting the interior, etc, etc, etc. Sue has been working pretty steady throughout this time in an effort to build up the cruising kitty (or at least try to keep up with expenses).

We have finally managed to sort through and get rid of a lot of junk but it became obvious that we cannot part with it all. So, we are now the proud owners of a 20' sea container, which our good friends have generously allowed us to place on their property for an indefinite period of time.

We have started the task of transporting boxes of stuff to the container, which has only reinforced the feeling that we are never going to be able to see the end of it all - the amount of stuff two people can collect in the span of 25 years is staggering.

Last week, we paid a visit to the boat for the first time in two months. This was part of a brief driving holiday with Sue's mother, who had not as yet seen the boat or, as it turns out, been to the island for many years. We spent 5 nights in Nanaimo, showing her around our favorite spots and managing to get in one short day sail (with no wind to speak of).

Then we drove to Victoria where we did all of those touristy things that we never usually get around to, staying in a fancy hotel overlooking the harbour, taking a city tour and visiting Butchart gardens.

We had actually been to the gardens once before, on our honeymoon 26 years ago, and it was quite amazing to see it all again.

Now, we are back in Edmonton to try and wrap up this house stuff once and for all. Still no idea of how long this is all going to take...