Wednesday, March 28, 2018

Key West - More Getting Ready and a sunset

Hindu is more of the more traditional schooners, $90 for a two hour ride
The weather has become the number one topic now. We watch the ebb and flow of the winds on a daily basis across six major apps. Some seriously diverge beyond two days even. Most agree on tomorrow but they start to squabble after that. Then the question becomes, who do you believe? Since they usually come together on tomorrow and our time horizon is not beyond one day, then it's no big deal for us. However, if you were going to take a five day crossing, then it's another story. I'm going to be comparing forecasts for the apps I have and I'll report on what I find later on in the cruise.

So that's stainless steel?!
Our air conditioning started up again after I replaced the screen on the intake to the pump. It's supposed to be made out of stainless steel but it sure didn't look very corrosion resistant! I ordered four from Fisheries Supply at 6:00 pm last night and they arrived at 1:30 am that same night! Well, they arrived at the dockhouse and I picked them up the next morning. The screens were nickel and dime but the shipping cost for overnight was something else! Nevertheless, it's what I asked for and they delivered, a top notch outfit! I would highly recommend them.

Actually, a "close to sunset" sunset
I took Hoolie over to see the sunset at Mallory Square but we left before the sun went down, too crowded. It's funny how cars arrive right at sunset and expect to get a parking place - of course they don't and they just circle and circle the parking lot. Hoolie and I walked back and we expect to get the rest of the boat work done Thursday in case Friday turns out to be a better day than forecasted.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hello, Bob!
Funny that you mention 6 weather apps! We've lived for 2.5 years in Florida and are yet to find a reliable weather service. Weather.com and Weather Underground get it wrong all the time. Last March, we were at the Bahamas, and the best service was Windy. It shows pretty calm weather both Friday and Saturday, with a little rain at 3 pm on Saturday. Good luck!
Natalia

Bob423 said...

Hi Natalia. I have Weather.com, NOAA, PocketGrib, SwellInfo, Marine Forecasts (text), Windy, Ventusky, PredictWind, and a couple others. They each have several models within them to choose from. I’ve used PocketGrib the longest and it’s been pretty good. SwellInfo is good for going along the coast. The NOAA marine forecasts seem to over do the wind, PredictWind was good for the Chesapeake, Windy and Ventusky were good in general terms but you can change models within them and wind up with different forecasts. They are all good one day in advance, after that they all diverge rapidly.

The one I’ve stuck with is PocketGrib, it’s simple and I’ve had good experiences with it. But I’m not a good weather person, it’s not my field. However, I look at all and then decide.

Mary Minard said...

I have really enjoyed hearing about your Key West days; are you sure we have to leave?!
We have stayed at Galleon several years but the resort part that you have to walk through is very dog unfriendly. Have you seen any trawlers in your marina able to manage dogs/ old people getting on and off their boats; that 5' drop from dock to water sounds daunting..
Have a safe trip north, drop all those bread crumbs for us to follow down next Fall.

Bob423 said...

Mary, We have five grandkids waiting for us up north that all want to spend two weeks on Fleetwing in the summer cruising to Long Island Sound and environs. They would be sorely disappointed if we didn't show up. As you know from the photos, we get off our boat over the bow and it's within a foot of the dock walkway so it's only a step across. Hoolie can't manage that with the jib in the way so I still have to carry him across although he's been looking at that crossing very intently recently. Brittany's are avid puzzle solvers but I'm not sure I want him to solve that puzzle! I accept the compliment that you don't think we're old since you asked us to look out for "old people" getting on and off their boat to see how they do... On Fleetwing and trawlers, the swim platform is at water level so getting into a dinghy is no problem.

We have plans to once again go south next fall, tag along.