Work Detail

We were back down on the boat last week for our Wed-Sun long weekend. Obviously there's not much fun to report since the boat is buttoned up for the winter but I want to keep up with the occasional posts in case anyone is interested. We did get a bunch of projects crossed off our to do list but still managed to have a bit of fun as well.

First thing we found was that they had taken out some decking that was preventing us from backing the boat all the way into the slip. We spent Wednesday afternoon pulling the boat back and re-adjusting all our dock lines, fenders, power cord and steps. It is a much nicer fit and we don't have to worry about losing our bow pulpit to an errant boat. Thursday was spent doing a bunch of small projects with the exception of the water tank repair. This was a BIG win for me as I have been trying to figure out a way to fix a broken fitting all summer. Finally went full MacGyver on it and found that with enough epoxy you can fix anything! Friday was another big work day for me with several hours spent in the "doghouse" (the area under the upper helm). This place was a rat's nest of wires when we bought the boat. I cleaned out a bunch of wires this spring that didn't go to anything. After installing the new electronics this year I had left everything loosely tied up until I was sure it was all the way I wanted it. Friday was the day to finally secure everything and put that project to bed. Here is a before picture, sorry, no after.

I shouldn't say it was just a work day for me, Jill was assisting me as needed and spent some more time decorating the boat for Christmas. She was even able to get a few hours of real work (the kind you get paid for) via the computer...maybe she's on to something! Here is some of her handiwork.

Rodney the Reindeer 

Friday evening we went back to Patti's for dinner and to check out their Christmas lights, very impressive for such a small town. Had some fun taking pictures but most aren't worth posting.

The water wheel

Also got a few shots around the marina. Proved again that sailboats are a good photo op.

Not to be outdone by the blow boaters we added a few lights on the bow to let them know we mean business.

Saturday we went into "town" (Paducah) and Best Buy to get an early Christmas present, a real TV and Google Chromecast so we can watch movies and the like. Still some learning to do but it looks like a cool gadget. Saturday night was the club Christmas party and we got to meet some of the other folks from our dock. No pictures taken, something about the witness protection program.  They seem really fun, we should have a good time next summer. Don't worry E-Dockers...I'm sure they won't hold a candle to your antics!!

That's about it for this trip. Next time down will be Christmas. Not much work planned for that trip but I'll post something because I know you (both) want to know.

  

What Polar Vortex??

We went back to the boat last week with the forecast of bitter cold temps. Not sure about bitter, it was in the low 40's during the day and upper 20's at night. The boat was plenty comfortable and the water temps warm enough for the reverse cycle heat to work just fine, not sure how long that will last. We don't really winterize the boat but keep the block heaters plugged in on both engines which keeps everything below deck nice and warm. In fact, when we left Sunday morning the ER temp was reading 82. Wednesday through Sunday every 3 weeks will be our MO for the next few months until we can move in full time.

We spent last Thursday doing a bit more exploring of the area to find hardware stores, Wal-Mart, liquor stores etc. We made it as far as Paducah and found a really good BBQ joint also.

Friday we took the boat over to the fuel dock to top off for the winter and found we only used 126 gallons since Evansville, very happy!! We went out on Lake Barkley for an hour to warm everything up and get ready for the oil change. It was sunny and in the low 40's but the full enclosure on the fly bridge kept us nice and toasty.

The duck hunters here take their shelter very seriously. Funny thing was, just to the left of this camp were about 30 ducks in the water...they must know the hunters schedule!

After our short cruise it was time to get to work in the engine room. We have a pump plumbed into each engine and the generator so getting the old oil out goes pretty quick. The pain is adding the the new oil into the engines. The fill port is at an odd angle so you can only add a small gulp at a time before it overflows, At 7.5 gallons per engine and 10 minutes for each gallon it takes a loooooong time in cramped quarters. Jill was a great helper from up above bringing me new oil and hauling the jugs of old oil to the dock but there's not much room for both of us to work in the ER. I'm going to have to come up with a better way of adding the new oil in the future. Here's a view of the holy place where I spent about 3 hours....

That evening after a couple of docktails to get the feeling back in my legs we headed over to Patti's to check out their Christmas lights. Boy do they do it up right! It wasn't fully dark while we were there so we didn't get the full effect, we'll save that for our next time down when we're more in the spirit. Hard to do when it's still before Thanksgiving. Jill did get to spend some time in Santas throne before he showed up.

The view toward Kentucky Lake from Patti's

Also on this trip we hauled down a trailer full of stuff from home to make our stay here a bit more comfortable. The marina is going to remove one of the extra wings on the dock to allow us to get the boat all the way in. This will still give us plenty of deck space for our outdoor living. We plan to be here for about a year and will have a "dock" sale to get rid of the stull when we leave.

Note the Christmas lights (on a timer)

Next trip down is early December and the marina's Christmas party. Looking forward to meeting some of the folks here. The docks are pretty empty this time of year.

Oh yeah...about that polar vortex...at least it waited until we got home. This was my view heading to work Monday morning!! I was not at all happy to still be in Cincinnati and working. The boys at work said I had my grouchy pants on...they were right.

Settling in

As I said earlier we are settling into our new marina at Green Turtle Bay .After looking at a slip on Pier 7 we decided to go with one on Pier 5. This gives us a bit more elbow room in the slip and puts us steps from the restaurant and indoor pool. If you go to the map at the bottom of the link above you can see the resort lay-out.

Last time down we spent a day getting the boat set up in her new slip. It's really convenient with the uprights on the covered slip as we have all the dock lines adjusted to just drop onto cleats as we back in so no one has to step off the boat until we're secure. I spent some time Friday exploring the marina in our kayak. Plenty of room here to paddle around without going out on the lake. Note: we've replaced the Commodores Club burgee with one for our new marina...next up ALGCA burgee for next fall.

Saturday we took the boat out to Kentucky Lake and did some more exploring. The leaves here are just starting to really change so I hope there is some more fall color next week when we go back down. The 2 lakes here are huge compared to our time on the Ohio river and we are looking forward to seeing more next season.

Thats about it for this post. Our plan for next week is to do a few more boat projects, top off the fuel tanks for the winter and change the oil on both engines and gen-set. We'll take another trip out on the lake to warm everything up. Hope this Polar Vortex isn't too bad!  We already have a trailer loaded up with a patio set and grill to make out home away from home more comfortable. We have an open house tomorrow so who knows...it may become our real home!! Wish us luck.

 I'll leave you with a couple more pics from the front deck as we enjoy evening "docktails". The sailboats make for a good photo op if nothing else...

Trip Recap

Trying to be a better blogger I thought I'd run down a brief recap of the trip. 

We covered a total of 487 miles over 6 days and put 48.5 hours on the port engine and 51.7 on the starboard. Not sure why the difference in engine hours but it's something I want to look into and happens on a regular basis. We took on a total of 373 gallons of fuel which included the fuel burned all summer. By adding up the engine hours for all season we're getting a burn of about 3 gph average. We were about 2.5 gph over the summer and the 1st day of the trip and a bit over 4 gph by mid-week as we were running at a higher rpm to make time. I'm pretty pleased with this and figure we'll be closer to the 2.5 number in the future when we're running slower. We still need to top off before the end of the season but I'm not expecting more than 100 gallons used.

We spent every night tied to a dock so no anchoring this trip. The first 2 nights were free, Turtle Creek because we took on fuel and Louisville because that city embraces the river!
Rocky Point Marina charged $0.75 a foot and Inland Marina and Golconda were $1.00 a foot for a total of $126.50. Inland Marina surprised me in the fact that they charged for a slip after we bought 151 gallons of fuel, most marinas don't do this (in my short history).

Overall a really great trip with no issues on the boat other than the house batteries. A couple of weeks after and even the weather doesn't strike me as being too bad...

In an earlier post I promised some pictures of the updated electronics so here they are

In this picture you see the new chartplotter, a Raymarine e7D and one of the stereo speakers. The chartplotter shows our position, radar overlay, AIS targets, depth and speed.

The starboard side has the new VHF radio with DSC and a 1 touch mayday button that is tied into our GPS. Also in the picture is the remote control for the Fusion stereo, USB charging port, speaker and autopilot which is tied into the e7D. Overall a pretty good setup in my opinion. I added a wireless router that allows me to control the stereo from an app on my iPhone anywhere on the boat (geek).The e7D has it's own wireless that allows me to use my iPad on the lower helm with the full functions of the chartplotter.

That's about it for now. We went back to the boat the following week and got settled into our new slip at Green Turtle Bay and did a bit of exploring, but that's for another post...stay tuned!

OK…So I’m a bad blogger…

I know, I know, I promised to keep you updated as we traveled down the Ohio in search of warmer weather on Lake Barkley…it didn't happen. After Louisville we ran some long days in some pretty crappy weather and the last thing I wanted to do after getting tied up for the night was blog, sorry. I’ll try and make it up a bit by including a bunch of pictures.

We’ll start where we left off, Louisville. Downtown has 2 free marinas with electric, Cincinnati could learn a thing or two. It was a very nice evening when we got in so we all went for a walk along the riverfront before dinner. Tumbleweed had 99 cent Margarita Monday so we couldn't pass that up (along with the fact it was right next to the boat). Once back at the boat I decided to add a couple of extra dock lines as severe weather was predicted overnight. It didn't happen but better safe than sorry.

Tuesday morning we were up early and underway as soon as it was light enough. We had a 120 mile day scheduled and at 10 mph that’s a long day. We were in and out of McAlpin lock with no delay and only a bit of rain to keep the crew on their toes. There was misty rain for the first few hours and then a bit of a break which we hoped would last…it didn’t. During the break though we did get our first eagle sighting of what ended up being about a dozen.

The cool mist and rain came back too soon and hung around the rest of the day. Thanks to a nice push for the first few hours below the dam we made it into Cannelton IN. before dark where we found we were now on Central time and would be for the rest of the trip.

We got under way a bit later on Wednesday as it was a shorter day mile wise. Just like the previous two mornings we were at a lock right away and, of course, it was raining.

The rest of the day was horrible as far as the weather went. I had to spend a couple of hours driving from the lower helm using the wipers to see the ½ mile of visibility we had. We also had about an hour’s delay on our second lock of the day with 20-30 mph winds to boot. Going in circles in those conditions is not fun. To add to the misery the house batteries began to draw down due to the increased load…good news is we had the heat on while running the generator to keep up the charge.

See the barge?

Upper helm while waiting for the lock.

Got safely into Inland Marine in Evansville about 5:30 and had a few (too many) stiff drinks. Took advantage of the free shuttle to the casino downtown and had a very nice dinner at the Irish pub. Kinda fitting on a cold damp night.

Thursday morning was another early start with 110 miles to travel. The weather was overcast but expected to clear by noon(ish). They were a little optimistic in the forecast but we did finally get the sun by about 3:00.

We only had one lock today and it wasn't raining so we all took that as a sign of better things to come. As we were pulling out of the lock a fuel barge was pushing into the other chamber…makes any issues I have pulling in seem kinda petty.

We made it into Golconda IL. before dark and after dinner at the Diver Down enjoyed a nightcap on the front deck under a gazillion stars, that’s what I’m talking about! Jill even spotted the International Space Station going over!!

Friday was the shortest day of the trip at 53 miles and 2 locks so I gave the crew an extra 15 minutes of sleep. I took a couple of shots before we got underway of the sunrise and our slip at Golconda Marina.

I had figured on 2 more hours down the Ohio and 3 hours up the Cumberland with one lock on each. I didn't take into account that they we drawing down the lakes above Barkley dam and we would be bucking a strong current headed up river. We were only able to make about 6 mph to cover the 30 miles. Luckily the lock master saw us on the AIS and held the lock for us to get there. We were through the lock and tied up in our new (temporary) home by 4:00 so it wasn't such a bad day. I never should have given that extra 15 minutes though. 

Here are a couple of pictures at Green Turtle Bay. We are in a transient slip until our regular slip is ready later this week. Most people here on the transient dock are on their way south for the winter starting or ending the loop. That will be us this time next year!!

Day 1 & 2, 2014…

Well we have begun the next leg of our boating adventure. We got underway about 1100 Sunday from Manhattan Harbour headed SW toward Florence Indiana. A pretty short 63 mile day. It was a bit overcast and cool but the crew seemed to make the most of it.

Speaking of the crew, Jill and I have Vickie and Brian on board for their honeymoon cruise and Dan as an extra deckhand until he decides to jump ship. We’re hoping he decides to stay…what difference is 2 days when you’re retired!

We passed the Belle of Cincinnati above Warsaw, KY as she was assisting another paddle wheel down river, pretty interesting. Seems there is a big riverboat festival in Louisville that we're going to miss by a day or two.

We awoke this morning to rain and thunder but it let up enough for us to get underway by about 0800. It was a short trip to our first lock which was open and waiting for us. In and out in less than 30 minutes to resume the trip to Louisville for the night. A bit above Madison IN we passed an interesting river camp…you never know what you’ll find along the waterways.

Speaking of Madison we passed under the new bridge you may remember being under construction last year.

Well, that’s about it for now. We are a few hours out of Louisville and Margarita Monday…Woo Woop!!

Most likely no blog tomorrow, it’s going to be a long 120 run and we hope to get in before dark.

We’re Still Here!!

Well it’s been over a year since our last update so I thought it was time to let all our followers (both of you) know what’s been going on in the past year and our plans are for the future.

After an enjoyable fall season winter came early and with a vengeance…remember? We decided not to shrink wrap the boat since we intended to spend time on it over the winter and begin working on our to-do list. All the snow and ice was pretty hard on the exterior woodwork but overall she came through without too much wear and tear. We kept the flybridge heated which kept the canvas ice free all year. We also have block heaters which kept the engine room about 50 degrees all winter so the boat was pretty comfortable overall.

One of the first gadgets I added last fall was a device that sends us a text if the boat looses power, has high water or senses a temperature that’s too high or low. This really helped our piece of mind when we were away from the boat during the bitter cold snaps. The next project was removing the turbos and having them rebuilt by a shop up in Indy. We knew from the survey that this would need to be done and winter seemed like a good time.

The major projects started after the New Year when Defender (my favorite boating store) has their major spring sales. We completely updated the upper and lower helms with new chart plotter, radar, AIS (a device that allows us to “see” commercial traffic before we actually see them…more on that later) VHF radio, killer sound system, USB charging stations and a router so the boat has wifi everywhere we go and replaced 2 of the older AC units. We also got a Zodiac dingy with a propane powered outboard and added a mounting system for it on the swim platform. While I was spending money I also ordered an inflatable paddle board….a guys gotta get his exercise right? One of the last major things we did was have the carpet replaced in the boat. Wow…it made a huge improvement in the look and feel of the boat! About the only big project left is to replace the dishwasher with a stand-alone freezer. This makes much more sense for our future plans than a dishwasher.

About the future…

I read a good quote on someone’s boat blog that said “boaters don’t have plans, we have intentions”. Good words to live by. Our “plan” had been to sell the house and all our stuff this summer, retire and start our cruising adventure this fall. I thought it was a great plan, but, the house didn't sell (yet). So…..we are moving on to alternate “plan” B. Now our intention is to move the boat a bit farther south to a warmer climate and a covered slip at Green Turtle Bay Marina on Lake Barkley. This is only about a 4 hour drive from home so we plan on spending lots of time on the boat doing exterior maintenance and exploring the area. We will be leaving Cincinnati on Sunday October 12^th and “intend” on getting there on the 17^th. This is where the AIS comes into play for you followers. If you go to Marinetraffic.com and search for Chasing 80 you should be able to follow along on our trip…pretty exciting huh? If you go there now you can see the boat in her slip here at home, I always keep the AIS on unless we’re being chased by pirates. I also intend to post along the way and will add some pictures of the updates to the boat. I’m not sure how good the coverage is along the portion of the Ohio river we will be covering but it’s worth a look-see if you’re interested.

So, that’s about it for now. Check back in next week to see how the trip is going.