Gloom but not doom

The news is better than expected. There is no hole on the hull. The damage was caused by the vibration on the shaft which was so violent that it dislodged the stuffing box, broke the seal and allowed water to come in. Maybe this is not the most correct of explanations but it's pretty much what I understood.
We slept last night aboard Sweet Tides and this morning bright and early we all had showers in the luxurious facilities of the marina club where Sweet Tides is docked. The marina itself is really very beautiful. Pictures will follow in future postings.
Juan went off to see Zingaro while Mike, Idette and I had breakfast on Sweet Tides and waited for the driver from the rental agency to pick us up. After we'd rented the car we came over to take a look a poor Zingaro. To be able to work on the shaft and fiber Juan had completely disassembled the aft berth. Everything went: bed, side lockers, compartments - plus everything we had inside. So it was hard work. The fiber specialist was looking at the damage.
Our super special, expensive British feathering propeller caused the damage. Juan called them but of course they were not to keen the acknowledge they could be at fault: we know two other people that have lost a blade and we ourselves had sent the propeller back to England when there was a recall. The problem obviously had not been fixed.
Later in the day, while Idette and I were driving to Miami, Juan called and explained what they had discovered. Originally he though they would replace the bearings, but in the end decided not to and are working on the fiber. Juan also called Jeanneau and complained of the bad design of the fiber casing where the bearings go. More details to follow.
The fiberglass person agreed to continue working on the boat tomorrow, so if all goes well maybe by Tuesday or Wednesday we can be on our way.
In the meantime Idette and I are sleeping in the lap of luxury in Miami Beach where we stay until Sunday afternoon on a job. Mike and Juan will continue toiling on our behalf. Juan who almost died yesterday with the stress and was very, very depressed, is still worried but much more upbeat.

Gloom and doom in the ICW

Poor proud Zingaro is hanging from a lift like limp bird. And we are really looking like something the cat dragged out of the trash. The good part is Idette and Mike are really taking care of us, feeding us and lifting our spirits And thanks to all our sexy sailors that have been sending their support!
We left Fernandina Beach at 9 :30 because the fog was very thick and we had to wait until it lifted. Two hours later we had crossed the St. Johns bridge in Jacksonville and hit some waves left by a power boat and the vibration we had been feeling before, suddenly became much worse and we just lost control and started taking water.
Sweet Tides came up to us and started towing us while we talked to tow boat US. They made . us turn back and be towed for 5 hours. We crossed downtown Jacksonville, went under bridges that only opened because we were taking water and being towed by Boat US. Sweet Tides was solidly behind us. Both literally and figuratively.
They stopped at Ortega's landing, a very posh marina and we went further so Saddle Point Yard. The lift guys were waiting for us but there was no depth and we were aground under the lift with no room to maneuver. Zingaro had to be turned around by rope, maneuvering between big power boats. The tow boat people did not lift a finger. Maybe it's a question of insurance but they just sat and watched while we suffered. But we turned it around placed it on the lift and saw it hauled.
The maxprop had lost one of its feathers and it cracked the hull of the boat. The yard is big and apparently there is somebody very good with fiberglass. But according to Juan it will be a complicated job because the shaft will have to be realigned as well.
We are now at Sweet Tides, Idette is cooking for us while I feed my addiction. Writing this blog.
Tomorrow Idette and I drive to Miami for a job. That will surely help us take our minds off the disaster!!

Arrived safey yes, but it was a miracle.

What a day!! and What a night! One of these days I will do like my daughter who once in a while writes lists of the ten most something or other and write a list of the ten lessons learned so far. But I am afraid I may be needing a longer list.
Yesterday alone would have added at least five items. It wasn't that we did not look at the weather forecast, because we did. The skippers and Tom when he arrived, spent two days poring over weather charts to decide if we could go offshore.
It is true that we were all sick of the ICW - it had been extremely shallow - and that may have colored our interpretation of the weather forecast because we grossly underestimated the conditions.
We left Isle of Palms marina at 5:50 am. We had to make the Ben Sawyer Bridge which was four miles away and closes at 7 and only re-opens at 9. And we did. As we left the harbor and cleared the breakers the waves were 4 to 6 feet, not too bad but once we left Charleston and turned into our course, we were heading straight into them and the ride was miserable. First mistake, we should have turned back right there, but the weather forecast called for a wind shift in the morning from West to North, which would have meant following seas and thus an easier ride.
So we took the pounding thinking: "Ok, we can do this, it's just a couple of hours". After the couple of hours the wind had not shifted and we continued being punished but by then we were too far ahead to think of turning back and started to consider the inlets ahead for us to come in.
The next feasible one, was Port Royal in Beaufort. We would not arrive to the entrance until 5, we still would have to do another 12 miles up the channel and then turn into the ICW to find a marina. It would be pitch dark so not good.
The next possibility was a few miles down on the other end of Hilton Head where it would just mean a sharp right turn after the channel and a shorter ride, but still arriving at night and still having to find a marina in the dark.
But as we were discussing and pondering all of these options, the wind calmed down to around 6 knots and the seas subsided. The sun came out, everything looked good so faced with two not optimal options - which we should have taken- we decided to pursue our original plan and go on to Fernandina beach.
Bad, bad, bad decision. The winds which should have shifted in the morning to the North finally did so at 4 or 5. The forecast was 5 to 10 knot winds until midnight when they would go up to 15 to 20.
By 8 pm they were 15 to 20 and up to 22. On our back it's true, and following seas. But following us with a vengeance! Really big rollers that threw you off your seat if you were not careful - and Mike can attest to that.
At about two a.m . we were fighting to stay awake. There hadn't been a lot of traffic so we could relax. Then a big container boat hailed us out of our stupor to tell us it was bearing down on us. Tom managed to extract his course and speed and we scrambled to get out of his way as fast as we could. The ship did not make it easy because instead of pursuing its course, it stopped, so we could not figure out too well where he was bearing. Any change from the course we had been heading in changed the angle from which the waves hit us and if the waves were bad when they followed, the minute you turned a little bit into them they were nasty.
That woke us up and prepared us for what we knew would be the worst: turning into the inlet, at night, with 8 to 10 foot seas at a 90 degree angle, that would most likely throw you into the breakers if you were not lucky.
As we approached shore Juan expected the waves to subside, no such luck. And it was as scary as we imagined. I could not even look back at Sweet Tides. It was bouncing from side to side like crazy and I knew I was looking in a mirror. I was half expecting we would be pushed sideways all the way into the water and even wondered whether I should close the hatch to contain the water that would go in! (yeah right!)
The option of waiting outside for an hour until sunrise was too painful to consider, but would have been perhaps more rational.
We got to the red marker at the entrance of the canal and turned. As we feared the wave action was scary and we bounced and bobbed like crazy while searching for the next marker. Finally when we were between the breakers the water calmed down and we made it through!
I was really scared! and so was Juan who kept saying whenever a wave hit us: "I can't control it, I can't control it!". Luckily he did or I would not have been writing this.
Tom and Mike were going through the same, right behind us while Idette had been blissfully asleep for the last two hours, having endured a long shift and a 360 degree turn that made her face the waves and throw Mike off his seat! That is why she still looks radiant today!
We tied to a dock and slept until now. The weather is still nasty so ICW again tomorrow. Oh how I miss your shallow waters!!!
Photos will follow.

Charleston: halfway down the way!

We left Georgetown at around 7 on a dark and dreary morning. Cold and windy, really miserable. The first part of the trip went well, the tide was high and the current helped. But its full moon, so tides are unusually high and unusually low. A few hours later the tide of course went down and it became really, really shallow.
By 1:30 we were almost arriving to Isle of Palms where we had planned to stay and saw a trawler who had been asking for directions to get into the marina, planted firmly in the sand, and desperately calling Boat US and the Coast Guard.
Just so the guy would not feel so lonely, Zingaro hit bottom by a red marker, but luckily just backed out of and went on.
Tom and Bobbie arrived as we were registering in the marina and we have had a great time since. They brought us a feast: turkey, gravy, mashed potatoes, stuffing, cookies, cheese, wine!!! We were too tired to dance though. Maybe tonight.
Right now we are sitting in Zingaro, planning our route for tomorrow. We will leave at 6 and go offshore and arrive in Fernandina Beach the following afternoon. Tom will go with Idette and Mike and Bobbie will drive and meet us there.
The party goes on... No more postings though for a couple of days, don't think we are lost at sea. Cell phones will also probably not work.

Second Week, day 1

No use making too many plans in this business! We left Myrtle Beach bright and early. It was sunny but painfully cold. We wanted to do as much as possible today so tomorrow we would have a short day so as to have more time in Charleston.

The depth was good, the current helped us and then at around 11 the engine in Sweet Tides just stopped. We turned around and threw them a line and started towing them while Mike went down to bleed the engine. That did the trick because it started immediately. We then stopped at a marina a few miles down so that he could change the diesel filters. 

We left at almost one thirty, our option then was to stop in Georgetown. The only marina which could accommodate us is old and falling apart. The town from the river does not look very inviting because it has a large coal plant and smells of sulphur. The docks look ready to fall in the river. But we met the owners of another Jeanneau just like ours on the dock who told us they always stop here because it´s a great town and they recommended a bar on the boardwalk. 

And lo and behold they were right, it´s a nice little town, very clean and the bar they recommended was excellent, it had a nice room at the back near the water which was quieter than the room in front where a band was getting ready to play.

After we had something to eat, we passed through the front room and we found that the band was about our age and played songs from about our time and they were quite good, so we stayed for a while dancing and playing the tambourine and had a great time. We stay still for so many hours on the boat that it felt good to shake our bones a bit!!

Day 7 Myrtle Beach, S.C.

We had put our winter clothes in the laundry bag so when we got up and saw it was grey, dark and miserable, I put on whatever I found that was not as warm but at least was clean. Juan and Sweet Tides were cleverer, they fished in the laundry bag and went back to their winter gear. But squeamish or not we were all more or less miserable in varying degrees.

We had planned to spend the night at an anchorage right after the dividing line between N and S Carolina, if by 4pm we had made it to a pontoon bridge that opens on the hour. If we were lucky and made it by three, we could dock for free by large outlet mall... Well, we miscalculated, the bridge had a delayed opening at 3 which we could have made: as we were approaching we could see in the distance that it was opening. We had called the bridge tender but he was adamant and said we had to sit and wait for the next opening.

The anchorage we had thought of staying at was really shallow - as was most of the ICW - it's full moon and the tide was particularly low so it was hard going at times, but except for a quick bottom kiss by Sweet Tides we managed to scrape by.

So we took the next option which was staying at the Myrtle Beach Yatch Club.

Today it's sunny but freezing again. I have gone to the dirty laundry and recovered my polars. We are planning to anchor in the Minim Creek or the Shante River so that on Sunday we arrive in Isle of Palms really early and have more time with Bobbie and Tom who are coming to meet us!

Day after Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving was a day for to be thankful we made it to a marina!! We left Beaufort on a balmy and sunny morning. Beaufort lies by the sea. The water is clear, it's full of pelicans and seagulls and dolphins and it smells fishy - in the good sense of the word. To leave it and go back to the ICW you go out to the very end of the inlet where the seas beckon. However we decided this was the song of the sirens since the forecast was for gale force winds in the afternoon, so we covered our ears, and eyes and nose and turned back into the ICW. In this area the waterway goes right by the ocean between dunes on one side and rows of houses on the other. The water is shallow and full of sand bars which shift with the currents. So one hour after we'd left Sweet Tides ran aground. Luckily after a few minutes it managed to pry itself loose. Two hours later again, this time they had to open their sail to get out. Then a couple more hours later - to make Sweet Tides feel better - we touched bottom, luckily just touched. But with all the delaying and going slowly because it was shallow we made it to Surf City half an hour before the bridge opens.
A friend of Idette's had suggested we stay at a marina before the bridge, we tried to get in but it was really, really shallow. Also we could see no sailboats, so this probably meant it was not getting any better inside.
As we idled waiting for the bridge to open, something happened to our propeller, Juan had no control of the boat and for a terrifying moment we feared we would be left drifting under the bridge.
While we were idling there, I had gone down and started to make cranberry sauce for our dinner, and while Juan was trying to put the boat in gear he smelled something burning he thought - and decided the transmission was gone and I had not even burned it the cranberry sauce!!
Luckily whatever was loose fell into place and we managed to make it through.
Six miles down there was another marina, I had called earlier but nobody had answered, Idette tried later and managed to talk to the dockmaster who told us we could come in.
As we were getting in we recognized it. It was the same marina we had stayed in on Thanksgiving in 2001!
We docked side to side and had a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner: turkey breast, the now famous cranberry sauce, stuffing, brussel sprouts and a wonderful crumb cake that Idette baked. A feast!!
Photos will follow when we get a better connection. Right now it's my blackberry.
The weather has definitely turned for the worse: wind from the North, dark clouds and colder. Fortunately no rain yet.

Docked in Beaufort

Zingaro and Sweet Tides are docked in Beaufort. The day was not too long. We arrived in Beaufort at 3pm, with temperatures on the 70s. We are down to only one layer of clothing!
No adventures on the trip, everything was nice and easy and we were greeted by dolphins that entertained us while we waited for the bridge to open.
The weather forecast is not too good though and we will probably have to continue plodding along the ICW for a few more days. Not that we have any complaints, so far depths have been OK, and the plastic enclosures really make a difference. The wind has been on our nose and we have not felt it.
Lovely to have wifi again!!!

day 4

The hardest thing this last leg was being incommunicado!!T-Mobile silent almost the whole day and Verizon also mostly mute - except for a brief moment when Joanna called and all we heard was hello? Worse than nothing because until we could get the Sat phone going, and that also took some time, when I was able to call her back and find out all was well, of course I went through every possible bad scenario!!! (my crazy mind, not her fault)
The day began very foggy and humid but as the hours went by the fog got burnt, the sun shone and our thermometer showed 74 degrees!!!
We arrived in Belle Haven at 4:30 with plenty of daylight, anchored, tied up together and had a most pleasant night.
Today we plan to arrive in Beaufort, also around the same time and tie up at the Town Marina. It's sunny and pleasant and best of all the phones are working so I am posting this entry!
Again I am trying to post photos but I am afraid with the blackberry connection it's not going to happen. Maybe tonight from Beaufort we'll find some friendly wi-fi.

Day 3

No withching hour today, we just plodded along the ICW for hours on end. The only excitement was early in the morning. We left the marina at 7:45 to make sure we made the bridge, which was about 3 miles away. It opened at 8:30, so we gave ourselves plenty of time. but we took a wrong turn and were left facing an unexpected bridge which looked taller than the one on the map but not tall enough for us to go through. Mike however said he read 65 feet on the pillar - the height at which we can go through and said he would try. We stayed back, but as they approached I could see they would not make it and closed my eyes. Luckily Idette who was at the wheel backed out. It was only 47 feet - so it could have been a disaster!
We went through the locks as you see from the pictures - practicing for Panama?? and then went on. There are several bridges along the way that open either on the hour of the half hour and we had to wait in several. There were power boats and sailboats all in line going South. We met Voila, the boat that let us have their fuel, and a couple of young Canadians with their 3 and 1 year olds on board!!!! Also going to the Bahamas.
At about 5:15 we found a nice spot just behind Buck Island, North Carolina and anchored. It was calm and humid. There was a moon but veiled under the fog. We had some wine to celebrate we had arrived in North Carolina. I won't have any more until we get to South Carolina because I woke up with a headache!!
It's 7:20 and we are under way!

Day 2

We left the anchorage at 7 am after a nice and toasty under the comforters in the anchorage. Sleeping was good, getting up in the cold was another matter. But the day was sunny, calm, glassy waters so we motored our way at a good speed, thinking we would make it past the locks in the ICW, rather than in Portsmouh as we had originally planned.

One pm for the second day in a row proved to be the witching time because, we were happily passing Salt Ponds marina with Norfolk in the distance when Sweet Tides called us, they had run out of diesel. So we turned right back and started to consider options. They called Boat US and it would take an hour at least for them to get there. Juan had seen a cruiser approaching with gallons of diesel tied around deck and asked whether he should call them and offer to buy five gallons. As if they had read our minds they called us and asked if we needed help, and we immediately asked for the diesel, which they graciously agreed to let us have.

We motored over to them and they tied a rope to the top of the bottle threw the rope at us and we fished it. We put the diesel in one of our containers and then returned the bottle with money which we put in a ziplock, we made a hole in the middle of the bag, threaded it through the rope placed it on top and threw the rope. It worked. Thanks Voila!

We then motored over to Sweet Tides and repeated the procedure, Mike not only had to put in the diesel but also bleed the engine so it would start, which it did after a few minutes.

We then motored over to Salt Ponds, filled up, filled up an extra five gallons, and made our way back to Norfolk.

By then it was almost four so we ended up arriving in Portsmouth at night - it was a quarter to six when we made it to Tidewater Marina - where if nothing else we have free wifi provided by the Holiday Inn across the road. Thank you Holiday Inn. I love open networks, never put keys in your networks, it serves no purpose but to increase the revenue of the provider!

Day 2

Day 1

We left Herrington Harbor after 7am, of course we had plans to leave earlier but Sweet Tides's alarm did not go of, but it was still early enough (by my book maybe not Juan's). Zorra, Nehalenia and Last Call were all awake to see us off, and they escorted us for a an hour or so. It was sad to see them turn back.
The wind was on our nose, temperatures on the 40s, but our enclosures kept us protected. We had planned to go all the way to Deltaville but as we got to the mouth of the Potomac the water got really rough, 4 foot waves on the bay are surprising to say the least, and were coming from every which way, the wind was hitting 20 knots, so with all of that and the current against us we were at least 2knots below our speed over water. After Smith Point it had not got much better so we ended up deciding to tuck in at the Wycomico. Idette found Mills Creek on her guide and it was absolutely perfect. We were anchored and tied at 5:37. We had dinner immediately and by 8 were fast asleep, with every intention of leaving at 6 today but - well we left at 7, although we did wake up at five.
We are now motoring down the bay, the temperature is 57.6, it's sunny and the wind is only 6 knots. It's almost warm!! Tonight we will stay at Tidewater marina past Norfolk, at least that is the plan!

Leaving one day later!!!

Zingaro and Sweet Tides are getting heavier and heavier with all the food and "stuff" we are bringing to the boat to make it our home for the next four months. Hopefully they will continue to float. We will not be able to leave on Friday but will definitely leave on Saturday, November 17th at the crack of dawn!!

12 days to go

Zingaro and Sweet Tides on countdown time making sure all systems are go. For the time being not all them are, but there are still 12 days to go! We are counting on leaving at noon on Friday the 16th weather permitting.