Sunday, August 24, 2008

aug. 27 - back on the hard






back on land in pt. townsend, wa friday, aug. 22 at 12:40am. the highlights (not necessarily positive) from my journal are:
wild ride leaving napali coastline
hitting the whale
the boobie hitching a ride
boat rocking me to sleep
jim caught an albacore tuna (yuk)
wild vivid dreams/nightmares
porpoise at the bow
moon watching
late night visits with the ocean at midnight watch
lost all our power
learning to play bridge
blue skies between so much grey
conversations with myself
reading "3 cups of tea"
journaling (the routine & finishing volume one)
baked potato dinner on deck

more to come but wanted to put that out before going into more detail when i have time. good grief you'd think with 18 days at sea i'd have plenty of time to prepare a detailed description but malaise set in, along with fatigue, the blahs and so much time reading. we're next to the boat yard now in pt. townsend and at this very minute jim is on deck drilling something that makes me feel like i'm at the dentist and consequently makes my teeth hurt. we've had a wonderful couple of days in this beautiful little town but we're scrambling to get ready to leave tomorrow morning (monday aug. something) to sail over to friday harbor and a couple of other stops along the way. we'll be back here to haul the boat to see if there's any hull damage from the whale--that takes place sept. 3. somewhere between sept. 6 and 9 we'll leave again for more sailing in the area.

saturday i went to the farmers market here (one of the best so far) and we've discovered some cute little cafes, great restaurants and a really nice independent bookstore that we helped support. separate post on the reading material. i've been to pt. townsend twice before for artfest but this time it's very different. not sure if it's the time of year, august vs. march or what but this is a darling little town.

time to go finish cleaning out the forward head which is used as our major storage locker not as a head. we had some water issues in there and everything is drying on deck but it looks like rain outside. then i have a whole list of things to do, one of which is to walk up to the bakery for more parmesan breadsticks. which reminds me, after 18 days of no walking i've walked miles and miles in the past few days around town. my body aches from the calves down. that's not to say we didn't move around the boat. we did the grab and crawl while underway. it was impossible to do anything on the boat w/o grabbing a handrail and pulling yourself along in any direction.

okay gotta go. post will be spotty for a week or so. bear with me. i'd love to hear what you thought we'd be doing.

Sunday, August 3, 2008

sunday aug. 3 - beat the clock





i feel like i'm in that old game show "beat the clock" trying to get so much accomplished in such a short amount of time. my head is spinning, i'm making huge typos in the blog and, well, i'm tense as all get out. my shoulders are strung tight and i think everyone is on edge as we're about to leave. i've spent the bulk of the day here in the condo cleaning, doing laundry, making hard boiled eggs, packing things up, and i can't even remember what else. jim was at the boat and the crew (rachel, lori and bob) drove and shuttled things back and forth. i've had no breakfast or lunch (i'm not counting the potato chips) and am not even hungry. perhaps i've invented a new diet, the potato chip diet. results divulged at a later date.


the plan is vacate the condo, and my precious computer hook-up, return my rental car (w/o them noticing the bumper), meet briefly with jim's ex-ceo and see his fabulous house, then return to the boat to sleep tonight. i hope dinner is in there somewhere as i'm sure once i'm sitting in the car my stomach will realize the lack of attention.


tomorrow morning we leave bright at early at 06:30. we shall see. we plan on sailing around the island a bit to take in a bit of the napali coastline before we turn northeast toward canada or seattle area. we're still not quite sure which it will be but we have plenty of time to figure it out.


i'd be lying if i said i wasn't a little unsettled about this whole thing. i'm keeping a positive attitude that it will be fun, relaxing, spectacular and i'll learn a lot. i can't wait to see the sunrises, sunsets, moon rises, night skies with lavish stars and galaxies. i've never seen a whale and hope to see one. once we've gotten back on land i'll be in blog frenzy mode downloading all kinds of stories and pictures. in the meantime, you'll just have to let your own imagination fill in the empty spaces of the blog.


yes i'll put on my scopolamine and wear my harness when on deck.

saturday aug. 2 - bacon banquets and such




now it's saturday morning and i need to plan my time carefully. i'm just about through baking 2+ lbs of bacon which will go in the fridge on the boat for sandwiches etc. no breakfast so I could repackage another trunk plus full of food and supplies to take onboard. We all scrambled to get things in dry bags to put on the kayak and dinghy for transport. Bob, Rachel and Jim headed off to the boat while I went to the farmers market and Lori stayed to finish laundry and baking the last lasagna. Farmers market was very crowded and I found no basil (can you tell I have basil obsession?). Instead I got huge avocadoes for $1.50 each. Picked up Lori and stopped to buy lunch for everyone.

Accidentally backed into and destroyed a planter and crushed in the back bumper of the car. Yikes. And how embarrassing as so many stood around and gawked. The manager was extremely kind in accepting my apology AND he even pushed out the plastic bumper on the car. Whew, that was a close call.

Three hours later got everything stowed away on the boat and we actually left earlier than expected. Back at the condo we had time for a leisurely shower before heading out to the awards dinner. It was beautifully set up and I was the first in line at the buffet! Jim got second in his division of big boats but the trophy hasn’t arrived yet so we’ll get it when we get home. Just as well since we’d have no place onboard for it. He also got a great picture of him at the starting line and that will get displayed someplace.

It was a fun evening with everyone in high spirits and looking quite relaxed. We all wandered out to watch the sunset and take pictures which I’ve posted here.

friday aug. 1 - wild pigs at wal-mart & key fiasco



well i survived yet another day of overwhelming shopping, this time with jim along. he had sticker shock when we were through and was surprised how exhausting it is…..We all were up early with a lot of commotion and discussion about food provisions. We discussed eating preferences and meal plans and such and finally Jim and I were off to Kapa’a and Lihue for the big shopping spree. Fabulous health food store, Papaya’s for sprouting seeds then on to Borders’s books in Lihue. We spent way too much time there and I can’t believe how many books we bought and I’m thinkin’ where are they going to go on the boat.

Costco was a trip seeing so many unfamiliar foods in bulk. In the scramble to get out of there the keys got locked in the trunk and thus began the tension of trying to get phone numbers to call. AAA card phone number (which I had with me, ha!) was for California and it took forever to get transferred to Kauai. I couldn’t remember the name of the car rental (dead brain by this point) but finally got them on the phone and they sent a very nice elderly gentleman to unlock the car and it only cost $25!

Wal-Mart and Safeway were the last two stops and needless to say we were exhausted when we got back, just in time for dinner at Postcards in Hanalei. Wonderful food and a big thanks to Bob, Lori and Rachel who picked up the tab.

Surprise of the day, aside from the key incident, was spotting a wild pig (boar?) with it’s babies foraging in the bushes at Wal-Mart.
by the way, there are very few pictures because of the high level of frustration and it's not a pretty sight. the pigs, on the other hands, too bad we couldn't get a better shot, but really really really they are there in that awful picture.

thursday july 31 - dinghy launched









it's a slow morning. jim and i shared a cigar mango and then a rosario (i think that's the name of it). and we also tried a cream apple which is creamy inside.

later in the day...this is been an exhausting day. we raised and wrapped the jib which is a big sail that needed to be wrapped around its pole instead of laying on the deck. just as we started to work on it the wind came up and while jim was doing something rachel and i tried to pull in the lines so help the wrapping process. then we decided to unpack and inflate the dinghy to make sure it was okay and the motor worked. we planned on it being a half day job but it was more like all day. inflating it wasn't so hard or time consuming just a lot of pumping with the foot on the foot pump. tossing it in the water wasn't so difficult either, but getting the motor hoisted out of it's storage place and onto the dinghy took some time. fortunately jim had designed the process into canvas roof cover called a biminey. when the biminey is unsnapped and the solar panels are rotated slightly the whole cover tips forward giving him enough room the hoist the motor out of the cubby hole on a pulley system. the snafu came when he discovered the plug from the gas canister to the boat didn't fit the motor. that meant we had to drive into kapaa to the marine store and back (over an hour roundtrip). with all the trips back and forth in the kayaks, hosing them off and inflating then deflating them the day flew by. rachel is picking lori up now.

wednesday july 30 - kayak pratfalls




it's about 7am and we have to get moving early today to try and get to the boat early before the wind kicks up. we need to take care of the big jib sail and continue with food inventory and a little more cleanup.

we got stranged on the boat! mitchell took us out in his dinghy but he was really busy with other people and then had to pull the dinghy for repairs. another sailor said he'd come by and pick us up in his dinghy on the way to shore but we saw him go by. guess he forgot. after much discussion about what to do we decided to inflate jim's kayak. then i inflated my kayak. what ensured was pure slap stick comedy as we tried to figure out the best approach for getting into them. we laughed so hard our sides hurt. but we made it, paddled around and finally loaded up everything and rowed to shore.

tuesday july 29 - farmers market














i woke up early and couldn't go back to bed. it's 4am here. yikes i know that means i'll be tired later in the day. but it's quiet and cool here and only a lone rooster has crowed once or twice. not the usual cacaphony of bird sounds.

we went to the farmers market with jim and rachel (one of our crew), and had a great time. bought more basil.

went swimming in the ocean twice but i still need to buy a mask and snorkle. will get them at longs drugs hopefully and then i can see the fish.