So, I’ve been in Oriental for one month now. It took me almost three weeks to really start getting my strength back. And then the heat started setting in. That made me finally decide that I did not want to spend August at anchor in the Chesapeake (where it’s supposed to be very hot and humid and windless). But instead of trying to find a marina up there somewhere, I decided to ride it out right here in Oriental where everything is known and convenient. So, I’ve paid for another month here, and unless a storm chases me out sooner, I’ll be here through the end of August.
The plans after that are to proceed north via the ICW to Norfolk, then spend September and October exploring the Chesapeake. It is possible that I may go further north, depending on how interesting I find the Chesapeake, but doubtful since it starts to cool off by November. I don’t like the cold and if I went further north, I’d not be able to spend any meaningful time there before having to turn around and head back south again. November will be the wild card. The Chesapeake sounds too cold, but it’s still hurricane season, and so don’t want to head too far south. I’m not yet sure if I will come back to Oriental to hang out for a few weeks, or just roll the dice and head slowly back south. That’s really too far away to decide, as is where I’m going to go for the winter.
I’m also planning to meeting with an old friend, Nicole, in Norfolk who is going to join me in exploring the Chesapeake for awhile. It will be fun to have someone to share the experience with!
In the meantime, I’ve been mostly getting my strength back, meeting a lot of my neighbors here at the marina, and knocking out some small projects on the boat.
One of the first things I wanted to do on the boat was change the oil again. It had been 50 engine hours since I had done it at anchorage back in Florida (but forgot to warm up the engine first), so it was due. If you remember from the blog back then, I had gotten oil all over the cabin, but this time I was determined to learn from that experience and accomplish a nice, clean oil change. (Ha!)
I took my time and carefully sucked all the oil out of the sump as before, but this time, instead of letting the end of the pump’s suck-out tube fly around, flicking oil all over the cabin, I made sure to grab it as soon as it excited the dipstick tube and controlled it as I raised it up vertically to drain the remaining oil into the hand pump. But, as I was doing that, it pulled out from the pump, spraying even more oil than before all over me and the cabin. (I didn’t realize it until about two hours later when I looked at a mirror, that I had somehow even gotten oil spray on the top of my head!)
The last time I had also spilled some oil when removing the oil filter which was attached to the engine compartment side wall. This time I was determined to also not let that happen again, so was very careful to keep the plastic bag in place until all the oil had finished dripping out of the connection. Then, I pulled myself out of the engine compartment, dragging the plastic bag containing the old filter and about 1/2 quart of oil behind me…and proceeded to snag it on a sharp corner of an engine mount, splitting the bag, and dumping most of the oil all over the engine and into the bilge! It was so incredibly frustrating that all I could do was laugh. It took me a good hour and a half to clean up everything, including treating the bilge with a special enzyme to literally eat up the oil over the next few days. I also changed the zinc in my heat exchanger, so now my engine is ready to go again for another 100 hours or about 600 miles.
Another thing I’ve been wanting to do since getting here was to lubricate my mast slots. My sails have been getting progressively more difficult to raise and especially lower. In fact, they’d gotten so bad that I installed a make-shift downhaul by tying a line to the top of the sail and running it down the mast so that I could pull the sails down from the cockpit. This friction has made me reluctant to set the sails at times, especially if there was a chance of the winds increasing, requiring me to reef or take the sails down completely. It was hard enough when I was pointed into the wind to get the main and mizzen down, but when off the wind (as I’ve learned is sometimes the only thing the sea state will allow) they were almost impossible to douse.
So, I finally felt I was rested enough to don my mast ascending equipment and climb the masts with a rag and a can of McLube Sailkote dry lubricant to see if it would do any good in the mast tracks.
I chose two different days because of how tiring it can be. I picked a very calm day for the taller, main mast and had no issues, although it took about two hours to coat the entire track. I wasn’t as judicious on the day I chose for the mizzen, and the boat was rocking a bit (and the top of the mizzen a lot) as I was trying to pour the lubricant from the can onto the rag while holding on to the swaying mast. In fact, one time I got a face full of Sailkote, including in my mouth! But, I got it done in the end, and it worked great! This is something I plan to do about every six months moving forward to keep the sails friction-free.
The live-aboard residents of the marina recently decided to make Wednesday evening a weekly potluck sunset gathering with music and a campfire. It’s been awesome meeting such an interesting group of people with such wide backgrounds, talents, and experiences. It’s part of the week I look most forward to.
The two homeschooling cruising families that I had met in Beaufort (one Australian and the other Danish) ended up here in Oriental for a few days before proceeding further north. (The former heading to Maine and the latter to the Chesapeake.) It was great seeing all six kids again! One of the Danish boys, George, was having his 11th birthday while they were here, so the Australian kids planned out an entire treasure hunt for him around downtown with little gifts along the way. It was very cute and Georg enjoyed it very much.
I also scammed a new cover for my CruisAir hatch air conditioning unit! One of the other sailors at the marina (Jonathan, the one playing the bagpipes) had been given the exact model that I had. The outside looked brand new, but despite our best efforts, we couldn’t get the unit itself running; the insides were very corroded. He didn’t want to mess with it and was just going to throw the entire unit in the dumpster. My unit runs great, but is cracked in various places (because I tripped and fell while carrying it in my cockpit). It also has some ugly purple foam insulation on it that was helpful in the Florida heat, but probably isn’t necessary anymore. So, I took the cover off of his and put it on mine, and voila! The unit looks like new again!
I also had a very nice visit for a couple of day from fellow DIYC-er’s, Dana and Ray Dunn, who were passing by on their way further north in their beautiful Javelina. They had departed DIYC about a month before I did. We had unknowingly passed each other in Fernandina Beach where Javelina was on the hard for a rudder issue. We all shared a lot of stories over beers and dinner about the joys and difficulties of our voyage from Tampa. I’m sure I’ll run into them again down the road.
I also got a visit from my dear friend, Dan, from Tampa. He was in nearby Morehead City visiting a sick friend and was gracious enough to drive up here to Oriental for a day so we could hang out. I see him all the time on Zoom, but it was great to see him in person for a change!
Speaking of Morehead City, I got a chance to visit there myself this last week for a doctor’s appointment. Simon and Lara were nice enough to let me borrow their car for the day. That meant taking one of the many ferries that inhabit this Outer Banks region of the country. It was a fun (and free!) experience.
There’s been another visitor to my boat, this one uninvited: a fly. Well, it actually hasn’t been the same fly, but it’s always one fly. Just a single fly. Always on my boat. I can kill it, but another will immediately appear. But never more than one fly. It’s been bizarre and irritating (especially as it tends to dive bomb me whenever I’m trying to eat). So, I broke down and ordered some fly tape from Amazon to hang in the boat, but of course, as soon as I placed the order, the fly(s) disappeared and haven’t come back. (Maybe it’s the heat?)
And, the last thing I’ve been working on occasionally is an inventory of the boat. As I think I mentioned, I was in such a hurry to depart back in May that I just stuffed things wherever I could fit them in about a dozen different compartments on the boat. In the last few weeks I’ve been going through each of them in detail, recording on a spreadsheet what is where. It should make things easier to find when I need them.
So, for the next month I’ll be here knocking out boat projects, working out to get some strength back, and just enjoying the retired life! I’ve also decided to start a long-overdue water fast, so we’ll see how that goes. Hopefully, this developing storm won’t interfere with that!