Mer Sea

Our lives are settling in to a kind of rhythm. Every day we try to spend some time focusing on learning more about a specific system or electronic component on the boat and any day that we can (read: if the weather is warm and calm) we take the boat out at least for a while and practice various handling skills, chart plotting skills, anchoring skills, and, of course, docking and line handling skills when we bring her back. If you think about it, driving the boat around in open water is really no challenge at all, the challenge is in close quarters with other boats, or land/docks, or both!

 

Another vehicle that we must maintain and exercise is our lovely 10’ Boss dinghy, which we took out to the harbor to watch a sailboat race last Saturday. This dinghy is shaped like an inflatable, but it’s all fiberglass. It is enormously stable (you can literally stand on one of the gunwales and it won’t tip!) and stays nice and dry. We have a 15 hp engine on her, so she will really hum!! The engine has proved to be a bit temperamental up to now, and we think part of the problem is lack of “exercise,” so we’re trying to make a point of taking her out at least once a week. Not much of a chore, really – we buzz around the marina and check out other boats – it’s lots of fun! And of course she’s a great front row seat for a sailboat race!

 

Some days, like right now, I sit in the salon, put on a CD, and do some desk or computer work for a few hours. Roy is out doing some errands in the car, so we each do have some private time, which some friends were concerned about. We also do some regular things, like going to the movies. Last Saturday night we saw “Million Dollar Baby,” and I highly recommend it. We both loved it!

 

I have spent more time than I can possibly tell you trying to get our weather satellite system up and running on this computer. We had it installed last Monday, and I’ve spent no less than 8 hours on the phone with tech support, bought and returned 3 different adaptors, and am currently waiting for the (I hope) final adaptor that will solve all the problems. In the meantime, the symptom of the problem was the complete locking up of the computer, so that I couldn’t move the mouse, turn off the computer, or anything!! So I’d unplug it, flip it over, pop out the battery, and reboot. I’ve gotten extremely good at this maneuver – I hope I have a call for it sometime in my future life, and that it pays well! All I can say is that this weather gizmo had better be really, really, great!!!

 

There’s a very nice restaurant here in the development, and they were doing a special “Super Bowl” thing, so we invited our dock neighbor and spent Sunday night there, munching munchies and watching the game. It was a fun evening and a nice opportunity to get to know our neighbor a bit more. We really like this “neighborhood” and all our neighbors are friendly, helpful, interesting people. If ever I can’t find Roy I have only to look down the dock where Darwin lives. He’s the guy who seems to “hold court” most often, and there’re almost always a couple of guys hanging out on the dock around his boat, “ Darwin’s Theory”, solving the problems of the world. It’s an interesting community to be a part of.

 

Monday we went over to Boca Grande and visited my brother and his family, about an hour ride at a very comfortable pace. This was our first outing to a “foreign” dock, and we didn’t have any idea what the configuration was going to be when we got there. Would we be docking in a slip? Alongside a dock? Which side would we need lines and fenders on? We hadn’t really asked ourselves all these questions because we assumed that we’d be docking alongside a dock and that we’d be executing a “bow spring” landing which we’d worked on last summer on the Chesapeake with Mother Goose. I was frantically reviewing in my mind the procedures for such a landing, and had set up all my lines and fenders accordingly.

 

Well, we pull into the harbor at Boca Grande and radio the marina to let them know we’re coming, and they send someone out to meet us as we’re pulling in, and he directs us to a slip (at least we can go “bow-to” which is head in!). I take a look, and my lines and fenders are all on the wrong side! I’m frantically scrambling to move them so that I’ll have something to throw the guy when Roy gets us in, and some protection for Mer Sea. We did manage, and the guy was thankfully skilled and tied us off beautifully so that we really had only two points of potential contact with the dock to protect. We got the fenders positioned and proceeded to have a lovely day with Frank and family.

 

We’ve finally developed a routine for coming back to the dock here. It took some tries, but we’ve now figured out the most important aspects that make the whole procedure flow. The keyword is SLOW, and the mantra for the lines is “it really does make a difference which lines you grab and secure first.” Once we got those two things down and figured out a system, we could work on the actual skills, which we are doing now, and we’ve begun to feel cautiously optimistic about our progress.

 

Today we decided to work on anchoring, so we took the Mer Sea out a short way and found a low traffic area in which to anchor. We talked through our hand signals and then dropped anchor and worked on the “bridle” which is a gizmo we attach to the anchor line (chain) and cleats on the boat to take the stress off the windlass. Attaching it is still a bit awkward, but it’s a pleasure to go out and practice. While anchored today we had a lovely picnic on the upper deck. It’s a picture perfect day – sunny and warm and a slight breeze to keep you from getting too hot. Then pulled up anchor and back to the dock to do whatever’s next.

 

So our days go – learning and improving stuff every day, and having fun doing it! We’re enjoying being here, enjoying each other, enjoying our new friends, and enjoying Mer Sea. We couldn’t possibly ask for more!!!