Northport - Chess!

Deep into a chess match

Hello there, it’s Sarah reporting from the Fleetwing on this cold night. Today we had to hunker down due to bad weather and crazy winds. We were occupied by an ongoing chess championship that has yet been declared a winner. Today I did not come in victorious and actually lost three games in a row. Along with this challenge we were further educated by the art of opening a chess match. I think my weakness to the game is that I overthink moves too much and focus on specific parts of the board too much that I allow myself to lose too many important pieces. Along with many games to play, I also modeled some clay into a cupcake. Tonight we are having pork and hopefully, tomorrow will be off! Bye. 

Water, always water...

I would hardly think that 80 could be classified as "cold." Nevertheless, it was a lot cooler than the last few days where temps were in the 90's. We had intended to sail over to Port Jefferson today but the weather would not cooperate. The storms started in the morning and didn't let up. It was lots of rain but at least no lightening. We just sat it out and figured we would wait until Saturday to move over to PJ and from there to Branford on Sunday.

Hoolie's ride back from shore.

Meanwhile, I worked on two marine heads, oh joy. My engine charging system stopped working and so the rest of the day was spent debugging that. It's the system associated with the main engine so we're charging the batteries off the genset instead for now. I have the Balmar regulator and the one great thing about Balmar is that they have excellent customer support. I called for technical help and got a person right away! After debugging, it appears that the 15-year-old alternator may be the culprit. Balmar recommends checking the brushes every 1000 to 1500 engine hours and I have 5400! I guess it's about time for a check up on the alternator.

End of the day, for Finn

Today was mostly in the boat time for the kids, given all the rain. They played chess all day and I gave an instructional course at 11:00 on openings that seemed to change their plan later that day. I used to play a lot of chess but not recently.

On Saturday, we plan on reaching Port Jefferson by the afternoon when the winds die down somewhat. I'm sure the kids will go in swimming again and we will be ready for a Sunday run to Barnford.