2021 – Wrap-Up

November 25, 2021 / John / 2 Comments

Wow, it’s already November and not all the repairs are finished. Getting vendors to the marina proved difficult this summer, as well as finding knowledgeable persons to speak to.

I called a caterpillar dealer about the tachometer, and he said that it wasn’t a Cat issue. The electronics guy I called said that it wasn’t an indication issue. This was weeks on the phone trying to chase the answer and being transferred from one person to another.

It was all very frustrating, we eventually turned to the internet and the Defever Cruisers forum. Finally, some useful information. It turns out someone had a similar issue and it was Glendening (throttle control) related. After much head scratching, a new tach cable and some repaired broken control wire, we were back up and operational. Success!. What a great feeling.

We also had a hard time coordinating with the tech about our autopilot (which was installed prior to us heading south last year). It stopped working in Virginia. BOE Marine, who installed the autopilot, assured us that they were going to figure out the issue. Their tech was so busy he didn’t make it to the marina until the end of September. After several trips to the boat, a few calls to the manufacturer and a new software upload, the problem was solved. Thank you, Vance!

The summer wasn’t without some adventure and good times. Living on the boat has some great advantages. You always know the weather, you don’t carry a lot of junk with you that you don’t really need, you always have waterfront property and the sunsets are always beautiful.

We got to take a road trip to visit Robert and Stacy at their home in Horse Shoe Bay, Texas. Right on the water (again) with a beautiful view and even got to go out and do some shooting. (what else does one do in Texas?)

I did get to do some boat deliveries and charters for C&C Charter group. We even had a movie producer charter a boat to shoot some scenes for his movie. Be sure to be on the watch for “Trophy Wife” coming out in March 2022.

We were also lucky to survive the latest flood at the marina. We had a Northeaster come through that pushed water up into the bay. We wound up with over two foot of water over the docks and had to shut off the electric for a few days. It’s the first time I had to run the generator while still tied up to the dock.

But more than anything else, I got to spend time with my beautiful wife. The best part about this adventure has been our time together. I’m going to pull the boat for the winter to finish the bow thruster and install a new stern thruster (stay tuned to that one. It promises to be entertaining). Therefore, we’ll be back on the dirt for a while. I sure am going to miss, just us, on the boat.

Looking forward to April!

PS: Robert and Stacy went home to Texas for the winter. When Robert left, he told me that his stern thruster was not working. I told him that I’d be here when they pulled the boats and let him know if I saw anything unusual. Well, I found the problem Robert. Lol

Summer 2021 – Care and Feeding of an Older Boat

June 22, 2021 / John / 1 Comment

Well, we’ve been back on the Chesapeake in our home port for about a month now. I figured that it was time for an update. First, it’s good to be back home again. (Finally able to get some great seafood for a change.) However, we’ve found that these trips sure do take a toll on an older boat.

We calculated that our total trip was around 3,000 miles on the boat this winter. It took 28 days to make the trip down to Florida, but only 19 days to make it back up home. On the way south we had to deal with bad weather, holding up at several marinas while storms passed. On the way back north, we had to deal with wind. We had some rough wind and weather to try and pass through; we made one ocean run around Georgia, had high winds at Mile Hammock bay and drug anchor during the night and dealt with 40 knot winds in Virginia. All in all the boat did well, especially during the storm we hit in the Bahamas. It was apparent that the boat systems were really taxed on the trip.

We decided to pull back into Safe Harbor Narrows Point Marina (formerly Mears Point Marina) and have Rick Nissen at Atlantic Yacht Works do some repairs. We had another stabilizer ram develop a leak resulting in oil in the bilge and the loss of the use of the stabilizers. One of the tachometers on the engines went out on us, and we still haven’t fixed the auto pilot (it’s a real treat to hand steer this big boat for a thousand miles), and the bow thruster still isn’t fully repaired.

We had to pull the boat to get the ‘out of the water’ work done. So, what do you do when you have to pull the boat you live on? You hook it up to electric while you sit on the hard and do your best. It’s not really too bad, except you have to climb a ladder in and out of your house and you can’t run any AC without water to the system, so when it’s hot, it’s hot. Robin opted to drive back to New Jersey for a couple of those evenings.

First things first, clean the bottom of the boat and inspect it. It didn’t look to bad but a new paint job and zincs would be in order. I took this time to disconnect and remove the old washer and dryer (It had seen better days and was beyond repair). We loaded up new Splendide washer and dryer and installed them, new present for Robin. (Just Kidding)

Next, the nasty swim platform had to be addressed. I priced out a new one but quickly changed my mind when I found that it was the price of a new vehicle. I decided to tackle the job myself. After all, how hard could it be?

Robin and I pulled the platform off, broke almost every bolt in the process, and sanded it back down. After several really hot days and a couple quarts of Cetol, some metal polish and new bolts, we were able to get the job done. Not professional but good enough for my shallow pockets.

Then, on to the bow thruster. I replaced almost every part in my attempt to fix it while we were in Florida, and still it wasn’t running right.. The only thing left was to replace the drive unit. Turns out that the seal on the drive unit was leaking and allowing water to back into the drive unit and forced its way up and into the oiler, displacing the oil (water isn’t the best lubricant). Unfortunately, Vetus has all of their material on back order and the new drive unit wouldn’t be available until August. We used some creative MacGyver-like hacks to temporarily repair and lubricated the drive and seal the drive unit off so no water can intrude (it should work until the new drive unit arrives).

Another job was the stabilizer fins. We removed the fins with help from Hild Marine and replaced the seals on the shafts (3 year pm). We still need to address the leaking ram on the port side, but that has to wait until we’re back in the water.

A new paint job on the bottom, change out the zincs and polish the boat. After two weeks of dry-dock, she was ready to splash and go back into the water.

We didn’t get everything done. The stabilizer ram still has to be fixed, the auto pilot needs to be calibrated and the engines need to be inspected but that’s it for now. Time to wax the top of the boat and relax for a couple of days. It won’t be long before Robin catches me sitting on the back deck relaxing and says ‘so, what are your doing today?’ LOL

It’s been almost a year on the boat and she still hasn’t thrown me overboard yet, so…..

Get a boat they said, you’ll love it they said, it’s so relaxing they said…….

Northbound 2021 – #17: Solomans, MD to Kent Narrows, MD

May 13, 2021 / Robin / 1 Comment

Travel Summary

Chilly, Cloudy, Breezy, 52° to start, Partly Sunny, 64° to finish. Winds North 5 -10 kts, gusts to 20 kts in the morning. Waves 1 ft.

Distance traveled: 47.1 nautical miles

Time underway: 5 hours 50 minutes

Average Speed: 8.1 kts

Max Speed: 9.9 kts

This is it, our last run for a while. We decided not to leave too early to give the winds a chance to die down.

Pulled out of Solomons about 9 am. The winds gusts were supposed to diminish by about 1pm. We hugged the coastline going north as much as possible to cut down on the effect of wind and waves on the boats. The ride wasn’t bad, we had the wind and current on our nose. When the tide turned, the wind died and we had another nice calm ride, on a beautiful but chilly day.

About an hour out of Kent Narrows our starboard engine tac went down to 0 rpm. John asked me to run up to the upper helm and check the gauges us there. Yup! 0 rpm, What the hell! We just need to get to dock at this point.

We pulled in to Safe Harbor Narrows Point Marina at about 3 pm and tied up. SAFE! Thank goodness!

Champagne toast with Robert and Stacy, to a successful journey!

Northbound 2021 – #16: Deltaville, VA to Solomans, MD

May 11, 2021 / Robin / Leave a comment

Travel Summary

Chilly, Clear & Bright, 55° to start, Partly Sunny, Breezy, 64° to finish. Winds North 5 -10 kts, becoming West 5-10. Waves 1-2 ft.

Distance traveled: 54.5 nautical miles

Time underway: 5 hours 50 minutes

Average Speed: 9.3 kts

Max Speed: 10.2 kts

We ended up staying two nights at Deltaville due to the weather. The winds picked up as the day went on Sunday and continued, through the evening and into Monday. It rained most of Monday morning. Not good trawler weather although we saw many sailboats coming and going all day Sunday and Monday.

We had planned to go for a bike ride to explore, but the weather just didn’t allow us to do that. It was, however a perfect day to make some Maryland Crab soup!

We decided to leave Deltaville at 8 am on Tuesday morning. We had to cross the head of the Potomac River, the Captains’ research into tides, waves and wind said this was the best time to get us to the Potomac with minimal (boat tossing)??

The Captains did a great job! I’ve never seen the Chesapeake Bay as calm and crossing the Potomac was a breeze. We were able to ride the current all the way up to the Potomac and time it so we hit the Potomac just as the winds calmed down. It was a perfect ride.

Our stop for the evening, Solomons, MD! Woo hoo! We finally made it back to Maryland. What a cool historic town. We walked a bit and then had dinner.

It was an early night because everyone was ready for our next stop tomorrow, the end game – Kent Narrows, MD.

Northbound 2021 – #15: Hampton, VA to Deltaville, VA

May 9, 2021 / Robin / Leave a comment

Travel Summary

Cold, Partly Cloudy 54° to start, Mostly Cloudy, Breezy, 61° to finish. Winds Northwest 5 kts, becoming 10-15 kts with gusts to 25 kts in the afternoon. Seas Calm, becoming Choppy.

Distance traveled: 41.3 nautical miles

Time underway: 4 hours 30minutes

Average Speed: 9.1 kts

Max Speed: 10.3 kts

Weather dictates how and when you move more than most people realize. With the winds light in the morning and picking up to possible gale force by afternoon, we decided to do another short hop today to Deltaville. Since the weather forecast was for winds to increase during the day, we were on the move by 6:30 am. (it doesn’t sound too bad until you realize that you have to get up by 5:30 am to do that.)

As much as I do not like getting up early anymore, I so love the sunrises!

Since we left the ICW and were in the Chesapeake Bay, we were hoping to not have to deal with too much wind, waves and chop. As usual, we had to have some mechanical malfunction. The stabilizer is leaking oil on the port side. We already had this happen on the starboard stabilizer and had to replace the ram. Filling the oil doesn’t work because it immediately leaks back out. Oh joy!

In addition, John informed me last night that the engines are using more oil than normal. He can not seem to figure that one out. We already have the Caterpillar specialist scheduled to look at the engines when we return to Maryland, we just need to get there!

Mother Nature was looking down favorably on us, the Chesapeake Bay today was nice and calm and the winds held off until after we were safely docked in Deltaville. Then, as if on clockwork, the winds started to pick up. Now that we’ve tied off, winds are blowing steady 15 knots out of the southeast and forecast to increase during the night. If we’re lucky, we’ll be able to get out of here and move on up to Solomons Island. We’ll see in the morning.

John ran from inside today cause it’s cold

Northbound 2021 – #14: Coinjock, NC to Hampton, VA

May 8, 2021 / Robin / 3 Comments

Travel Summary

Cold, 46° to start, Mostly Sunny, 64° to finish. Winds West 5–10 kts, becoming 15-20 kts with gusts to 30 kts in the afternoon. Calm on the ICW, becoming Choppy.

Distance traveled: 48.4 nautical miles

Time underway: 7 hours

Average Speed: 7.9 kts

Max Speed: 10.5 kts

Today, truly we left at the ass crack of dawn. We decided to throw off lines by 6 am due to the weather. The forecast was calling for winds to pick up during the day and gusts are expected to be in the 30 knot range. We hoped to get to our destination before that happened,

We weren’t the only ones with this thought. There was a steady line of boats leaving the marina at the same time as us.

There were a couple bridges that we needed to time for the hour and ½ hour openings. We had to slow for the first bridge (North Landing Swing Bridge) to hit it on the hour, the next (Centerville Turnpike Swing Bridge) would be on the ½ hour and then the last (Great Bridge) on the hour followed by the Great Bridge Lock, which times it’s openings with the Great Bridge.

The closer we got to Norfolk the more commercial the landscape was and the more the winds picked up.

Going through the Elizabeth River and the Norfolk area was really choppy, the waves were on our beam so we had generous use of the wipers on the windshield to be able to see.

Our destination was the Bluewater Yachting Center on the Hampton River. Coming into the marina was a bit tricky with the wind. Ideally, we would have backed into the slip but due to the winds, we went bow in. Bow in would have been great if their finger piers were full length, however this marina had half length finger piers so we could not easily get off our boat. Our rail opening is on the stern of the boat.

The nice dockhands found a high step to bring to the finger pier and tied us up tight to it. To get off the boat we had to climb over our rail and step down onto the borrowed step. We always find ourselves in interesting situations.

Tomorrow’s weather is forecast to be similar, so no telling what we are in for.

Northbound 2021 – #13: Belhaven, NC to Coinjock, NC

May 7, 2021 / Robin / Leave a comment

Travel Summary

Sunny, Chilly, 54° to start, Clouds and some sun, 64° to finish. Winds East 5 – 10 kts. Calm on the ICW, Waves 1 ft or less on the Albemarle Sound.

Distance traveled: 67.4 nautical miles

Time underway: 7 hours 40 minutes

Average Speed: 8.8 kts

Max Speed: 9.4 kts

Normally, we make a plan the night before as to when we will leave in the morning. Without fail, Robert will text John earlier than planned and say “I’m up, let’s go!” This morning our new friends on Aries pulled out at 6:30 am. John helped them with lines and I took a couple of pictures for them. So, John decided to text Robert and tell him we were up! LOL! No answer! HA!

We pulled out of the marina at 7:30 am, a half hour before our planned departure, with flat calm seas. It was a beautiful day on the water.

We left Dowry Creek Marina (great marina if you ever get the chance to stop there.) and pulled into the Pungo River. Once up in the river, we entered the Alligator/ Pungo River Canal. The canal is long and straight for the most part. It is a little intimidating since there are broken off trees on each side of the canal for a good portion of the 21 mile length of it.

We left the canal and entered into the Alligator River on our way to Albemarle Sound. We passed a catamaran with the name “Go Float Yourself”. I can’t imagine having to hail the Coast Guard with that name, but it was funny nonetheless!

To cross the Albemarle Sound, you definitely want to check the weather for this crossing since waves can be bad here. The sound is relatively shallow with a long fetch for the waves to build. The forecast was for 1 foot or less waves. Perfect day for crossing! We’ve lucked out twice on the sound. North and South we’ve had a pretty good crossing.

We pulled into Coinjock Marina about 3:30 pm, an icon, apparently the restaurant is famous for its Prime Rib. Since John and I do not eat meat, it wasn’t a thing for us. However, it is a convenient stop on the way north or south.

The restaurant does pour a mean Gin & Tonic (John) and they have decent Chardonnay (Me). So, everything on the menu is really pretty good after that.

Tomorrow is another day. Wind is supposed to build over the next couple of days, so, this should be interesting. The good news is that we should make it to Norfolk or Hampton Roads tomorrow, which means, we’re almost in our own backyard.

Northbound 2021 – #12: Beaufort, NC to Belhaven, NC

May 6, 2021 / Robin / Leave a comment

Travel Summary

Conditions: Cool, Cloudy 60° to start, Cloudy with Some Sun, 66° to finish. Winds Northeast 15 – 20 kts diminishing to 10–15 kts in the afternoon. Moderate Chop on the ICW.

Distance traveled: 60.8 nautical miles

Time underway: 7 hours 5 minutes

Average Speed: 8.7 kts

Max Speed: 10.1 kts

It was nice to spend a couple days in Beaufort, even in the wind, but it’s was time to get moving. Since the wind died down a bit overnight, we were up and out of the marina at 7:40 am.

We had a long run to Belhaven, NC. On our southbound journey, we stopped at this same marina. Dowry Creek Marina is a family owned and operated marina. The family are the ones that do everything from dockhand to office management. When we were here in October, they had started construction on a restaurant, due to Covid and construction material shortage and price, the restaurant is not yet complete. We can’t wait for our next southbound adventure to be able to stop at the restaurant.

Earlier in our trip north, we had met up with a nice couple named Peter and Anne. They owned a beautiful Flemming “Aries”. We met them when we were at Southport. Today, on our way through the Neuse River, we saw them off our port bow. Turns out that they were heading to Belhaven (Dowry Creek Marina) also.

We all got in about the same time and tied up and secured the boats. After checking in and straightening up the boats, we had a wonderful cocktail hour with our new friends (well maybe two hours). Turns out that we’ll all be heading to Coinjock tomorrow, so we’ll get to see more of our new friends. Can’t wait.

Northbound 2021 – #11: Mile Hammock Bay, NC to Beaufort, NC

May 5, 2021May 5, 2021 / Robin / Leave a comment

Travel Summary

Conditions: Partly Cloudy, Warm, Humid, 69° to start, Partly Sunny, Windy & Humid 82° to finish. Winds South 10–15 kts, Gusts to 20 kts, with forecast to increase as the day went on. Moderate Chop on the ICW.

Distance traveled: 38 nautical miles

Time underway: 4 hours 17 minutes

Average Speed: 8.9 kts

Max Speed: 11.9 kts

So, after dragging anchor and resetting at Mile Hammock Bay anchorage, of course, we did not sleep. John kept anchor watch in the pilot house and I camped in the salon with the anchor alarm on my iPad. Thankfully, the night was calm and we did not drag anchor again.

Robert’s original plan was to try to move as the tide came up sometime after low tide at 8 pm. Due to us dragging and trying to reset in the pitch black, Robert decided to sit still until daybreak which should be about 3 hours after high tide.

Status check at 5:40 am with Robert, he was floating! Anchors up and we were both on our way at 6 am.

Our next challenge was going to be the Onslow Bridge. They had a barge doing maintenance on the bridge, leaving a 20-foot opening for boat traffic. We found out that the barge wouldn’t be in place until 8 am, so we took off for the bridge early. The Onslow Bridge opened for us at 6:30 am, the barge was safely out of our way.

We had a short trip to Beaufort, thank goodness for all of us because we were tired! After pulling into the marina, we checked in and grabbed an early lunch at the marina restaurant.

I walked through town and the shops for a bit and John washed the boat. Everyone decided to turn in early. Since we planned to spend two nights due to increasing winds, we had time to walk around the next day.

Wednesday, we grabbed a marina courtesy car and headed to the grocery store. We then walked around town and were going to make dinner reservations. There were several restaurants but unfortunately for us, many were closed. Speaking to one of the shop owners, her take was that businesses were suffering from not enough help, apparently, they could not get people to work because unemployment was paying more than the shops and restaurants could pay in wages.

I won’t get into the politics of the situation, but I had to feel sorry for these business owners who couldn’t seem to get the help they needed to stay in business. So, we gave them what business we could to help out. We had a nice lunch at a local restaurant and then an early evening on the boat. Tomorrow we are headed to Belhaven. Almost back to the bay. Let’s hope the weather cooperates.

Northbound 2021 – #10: Southport, NC to Miles Hammock Bay, NC

May 3, 2021May 4, 2021 / Robin / Leave a comment

Travel Summary

Conditions: Mostly Cloudy, Humid, 71° to start, Rain showers, Clouds & Humid 84° to finish. Winds South 10–15 kts. Moderate chop on the ICW

Distance traveled: 55.4 nautical miles

Time underway: 6 hours 40 minutes

Average Speed: 8.2 kts

Max Speed: 10.6 kts

Today we had an interesting day! After we left South Harbour Village Marina in Southport we had to cross the Cape Fear River to Snow’s Cut (a notoriously difficult area to transit, due to currents and shoaling). Pulling out of the marina at 8 am, we tried to time our arrival there for a slack tide and we did just that. Sometimes a plan does come together!

Coming into Snow’s Cut, April Fools was third behind another trawler and Stacy Lynn. We were able to zig zag around some of the trickier spots without a big current or winds.

We then had another 30+ miles of the ICW with shallow water, strong currents and shoaling due to the many inlets. Luckily, we were on a rising tide, so although exercising caution around the worst shoaling spots we did not have an issue. This was of particular concern to us because this is the same area that we ran aground on the way south. Fortunately, with the tide in our favor, and our Aqua Maps app, we made it without any problems.

Benign looking inlets, who knew they could cause so much trouble!

There were some pretty heavy showers during the day but we had good visibility during the rough spots.

There was certainly had less boat traffic today but did see several dredges and a few sailboats under sail (always good to see). A couple jet skiers were trying to be Evil Knievel jumping out wake.

Me steering past a huge tug towing a barge

We pulled into the Miles Hammock Bay anchorage, just past Sneads Ferry, NC just before 3 pm. We chose this anchorage because there is a bridge (Onslow Beach Swing Bridge) about 4 miles north of here that is having maintenance done. A barge is parked under the bridge from 8am – noon and 1pm to 5pm and unless you want to try to squeeze your boat through a 20 ft opening, you wait until the barge is not there. We opted for trying to scoot through in the morning before the barge shows up.

Our anchorage is popular tonight (10 counting us)

Unfortunately, Robert anchored a little too close to shallow water. About 5:30 pm he radioed over than he was sitting on bottom??? Low tide here wasn’t until 8 pm. He tried to start the engines and use the thruster to move the boat but no go. The next option was to wait until after low tide and as the tide comes up enough to float him, move to a better (deeper) place in the anchorage.

Well, we couldn’t let Robert have the only issue. About 9:30 pm a big gust of wind hit us and our anchor alarm went off. The anchor was dragging. John donned his head light & head set and went out on the bow to pull in the anchor (I was at the helm). IN THE PITCH BLACK!

We managed to get the anchor up and moved the boat without hitting another anchored boat to drop the anchor again. Anchor watch is going to happen for the rest of the night.

Stay tuned…..

Life Aboard April Fools

The Adventures and Ordeals of Life Aboard a Trawler

2021 – Wrap-Up

Summer 2021 – Care and Feeding of an Older Boat

Northbound 2021 – #17: Solomans, MD to Kent Narrows, MD

Northbound 2021 – #16: Deltaville, VA to Solomans, MD

Northbound 2021 – #15: Hampton, VA to Deltaville, VA

Northbound 2021 – #14: Coinjock, NC to Hampton, VA

Northbound 2021 – #13: Belhaven, NC to Coinjock, NC

Northbound 2021 – #12: Beaufort, NC to Belhaven, NC

Northbound 2021 – #11: Mile Hammock Bay, NC to Beaufort, NC

Northbound 2021 – #10: Southport, NC to Miles Hammock Bay, NC