Still at Poughkeepsie YC

All polished an ready to go

 We haven't moved yet, waiting for a good weather window to go down the New Jersey coast. However, it's been a very busy summer. Lots of waxing and polishing for Fleetwing, new bottom paint, new zinc and two major projects.

The first one was publishing a book and ebook on Amazon on negotiating the ICW with charts on each hazard encountered and how to safely get through them. Amazon makes it easy to publish a book. All you have to do is compose your book on Microsoft Word, upload it and Amazon does the rest. Your book will appear on their site within 48 hours at no cost to you. My thought was to make the book available at a site for multiple formats in ebook and hardcopy form.

Enroute to the Hudson River

The second project is one I wish on no one. If you ever get the notion to replace the hoses on your head, sit back, relax and do something else! It can wait. There are few things more disgusting and frustrating than replacing head hoses! Several years ago I did replace hoses and swore I'd never do it again but after 9 months/year of usage over five years, the time had come. My last experience was in using Sealand Odorsafe hoses, a very good brand that guarantees these hoses for 5 years (no odor penetration)  but they are very stiff and almost impossible to install in cramped quarters with lots of bends. So I went with Raritan Santi/Flex, supposedly the most flexible - and I wanted flexibility! Unfortunately, I had to cut off the old hoses, they would not budge, a 1/2 hour procedure for each connection, being careful to not damage the nipple. A heat gun had no effect on Odorsafe (to loosen the grip). So after a week, I eventually got all the hoses installed, never again!

Water Chestnut seed

Just to make things interesting, I put bottom paint on the dinghy but in the process of turning it upside down for the painting, the dinghy encountered a water chestnut which has a devilish seed with four very sharp prongs arranged so three form a tripod with the fourth pointing straight up! Well, that fourth prong squarely impaled itself on my dinghy, ssssssss. So I spend a couple of hours yesterday repairing that adventure.

So now we're weather watchers and Saturday looks good for going down the coast. If that holds, then we're going on the boat tonight for a Thursday morning departure.