Barns, Beans, and the Corn is looking good

  So, after you pass the Golden Domed WV State Capitol Building in Charleston WV. you follow I-64 over a little way past Nitro WV and pick up another one of my favorite roads.
  Actually for years it was one of my most feared roads. In years past, US-35 was a very narrow 2 lane road that ran along the beautiful Kanawa River in WV. It has since been replaced in part by a new 4 lane divided highway and it bypasses some of the scariest part.
  When I first started driving Big Trucks, one of my first trips was along this route. I was new, I was nervous, and this road was bumper to bumper with Big Trucks who were in a a very big hurry. It was dark, and to top it off this part is very prone to dense fog as well. The road runs along the Kanawa River, and I mean on places it is RIGHT NEXT to the River, and there are places where it is clear the land is shifting, and looks like it may slide away any moment. When you were going along and would hit one of these area where the road had shifted and been patched over and over the truck would rock violently sometimes launching your beloved coffee cup across the cab, covering everything with the needed caffeine juice.
  It follows the river over to where you pass what used to be the biggest Ammunition Factories in the country, several chemical plants, and a few refineries, all constantly being serviced by huge River Barges that navigate the Kanawa, and Ohio Rivers carrying anything you possibly imagine that would fit into a barge. It's a bit distracting trying to drive, and watch the big barges, being constantly amaZed at how they could possibly make these huge rafts of barges go where they want them to go. How they negotiate the constantly twisting river course, the never ending bridges, and then slide them in and out of any number of huge River Locks that make navigation on the Inland River System possible, is always so interesting  to me.
  Once you cross the the big bridge in Point Pleasant which I think is named after Chuck Yeager of "The Right Stuff" fame, you follow US-35 diagonally across southern Ohio in what I always enjoy as "the parade of barns".
  As some may know I am a huge fan of barns. I guess is comes from working in the fields as a kid in Ohio. I just love looking at all the different barn designs, and some of them are huge. It's hard to believe how they could have possibly built these giant wood structures back in the days without cranes, man lifts, and structural steel. Many of these giant beasts were raised by hand, and held together with "post and tenon" joints which basically means they are held together by hand driven wooden pegs.
  From Southeastern Ohio, to where I am not in eastern Minnesota you are treated to expansive green plains of mile after mile of corn fields, followed by bean fields, that alternate like that across a half a doZen states.
  The barn designs change as you go depending on the brand of Immigrants who were settled in that area. It also changes depending on the amount of "snow load" the structures were expected to have to support. The farther north you go the steeper the pitch of the roofs, and often the rounder the roofs would be.
  All along this route you are driving thru the Ohio Valley where the dirt is real dirt, not red clay. The dirt is dark, nearly black, very fertile, and you can smell it, because it smells like real dirt should smell.
  The rivers flow slowly, and wind in craZy snake like routes. One such river is the Scioto River which is a shallow winding river I played in, and built Tom Sawyer type rafts to float on when I was a kid. Looking back now I realiZe it was probably very polluted and it's a wonder any of us are still alive after swimming in it and probably drinking from it too.
  So the barns are looking good, the corn is very tall, and the beans are looking great.
  More later about Michigan, and the Twin Cities area of Minnesota. And by the way......I am pretty sure I have entered "Indian Country".

Driving The Dynamite Trail

One of the gifts of my truck driving trip to Minneapolis MN is that I got to drive what we refer to as  "The Dynamite Trail". Regular folks call it the West Virginia Turnpike.
  When I was a kid, my Father was an Iron Worker. He walked "tall steel" all over the Eastern U.S.
  In the beginning he worked for a company named American Bridge, and later for a company called Armstrong Construction.
  Back then the American Interstate System was being built in big sections. Some sections were completed fairly early, and some sections like I-95 thru South Carolina and Georgia were not finished until the mid 1970's.
  When I was maybe 6 or 8 the section of I-64 in WV was where Dad worked a lot and he would take me with him in the summer. The safety laws were very different back then and I would hang out on the job site  all day. The other Iron Workers would keep an eye on me, and the Crane Operator named Joe Armstrong took me under his wing and I spent a lot of time in the cab of the crane with Joe.
  When there was nothing to lift or place with the crane (between picks) Joe and I would take out fishing poles down to the river under the bridge they were building and fish until they needed something picked with the crane and then we would have to run up the steep riverbanks so Joe could operate the crane. Joe taught me how to operate a Bay City Friction Crane when I was 8 years old.
  I will never forget the sight or sound of when they would "shoot" the side of a mountain. That was when after days or weeks of drilling into solid rock they would stuff the deep narrow holes with Dynamite, tie them altogether with Det Cord (detonation cord), and then when it was all just right the sirens would go off, someone would yell over the radio FIRE IN THE HOLE!!!! and the earth under your feet would vibrate, and a whole side of a mountain would swell. Then you would hear the noise of the explosion, and the rocks, and giant cloud of dust would slide down the mountainside.
  Those Explosive Guys were almost artistic. The carved stone. They created shapes and slopes, and they did it all with TNT.
  I spent hours watching the D-9 BulldoZer Operators work on slopes so steep you would swear they somehow had figured out how to defy the Laws of Gravity with huge steel machines that weighed tons. Every now and then I would hear the Iron Workers, or maybe the State Bridge Inspectors talking quietly about how "So and so had one get away from him on the grade......the funeral would be announced after they recovered the body".
  Even now when I drive the Interstates that are carved out of mountains, I look up and I can still picture what were massive iron machines, that looked like some sort of bugs crawling up and down the grades that seemed be far too steep for anything to stick to.
  So......I have some history with The Dynamite Trail, and I love driving both I-64, and I-77 which is actually the WV Turnpike.
  West Virginia is one of the most underrated States in the Union. It is unique in geography and culture.
  We have some wonderful mountains in North Carolina, but the WV Mountains incredible. Once you cross the The Blue Ridge, and go thru the I-77 Tunnel at Big Walker Mountain you see that the mountains become much more rugged. They seem to be steeper, and more of them.
  In NC you often navigate by the names of hundreds of roads usually named after a Family, with the words CHURCH after it, Like Shiloh Church Road.
  If it is not named after a church it is probably named after a family with the word Dairy tacked on.
  In WV it seems that every road be it paved or little more than a mud path is named after the Creek it follows.
  Driving the Interstate thru WV you look out and get the feeling that if you ventured off the Big Road more than a quarter of a mile you would quite possibly be lost forever.
  The WV Turnpike is a fun road to drive. I am not sure but I may have exceeded the posted speed limit one time. It is even more fun on a Motorcycle.
  John Denver sang "almost heaven, West Virginia" and as a Motorcycle Rider, it truly is Motorcycle Heaven.
  I always talk about "taking the big motorcycle trip" by riding all the way across the country, but the reality of it is, I could spend the rest of my life riding and could not even begin to cover the range of EXCELLENT motorcycle rides just in North Carolina and West Virginia.
  So I command you........put down the controller, the mouse, turn off the computer, get in your car, your truck, get on your bike and head North on I-77, up over Fancy Gap Virginia, over the New River, thru the tunnels, and drive the Dynamite Trail, then follow I-64 West to Charleston WV and look at one of the prettiest gold leaf decorated Capital Domes in the country.
  I promise.....you will understand what John Denver was talking about.
 

A long time between posts.

I have been trying to figure out the best method to pass on info while I am delivering these yachts South to Florida.
I started out writing everything in my logbook, but that meant I would have to recopy everything into Facebook if I wanted to share it with my Friends..
SO for now I am going to enter things into this blog, which is supposed to share things on FB, and I will save the logbook for just basic details of boat details.

July 11th Britnick at Jekyll Island GA

I had dropped a shallow anchor the evening before when we were aground. The tough part was we were nearly in sight of the marina I was headed to in order to make repairs.

I dropped the anchor without much scope. Scope is the amount of anchor line (rode) you let out to allow for the boat to swing with the wind and current. More scope means the angle is lower and lets the anchor hook into the bottom better.

I had gotten lazy, and did not allow much scope because I was going to have to haul it all in again in a few hours.

When I woke up around 0730 I peaked my head up through the companionway to see how things were and...................I did not recognize a damned thing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The tide had come in, the boat had freed itself, and the short anchor line had just barely done it's job. It seems that we had drifted MORE THAN A MILE while I was sleeping!

The Crew was still alseep, and I was more than happy to them remain there until I figured out where we were, and had figured out how to ge t back to where we needed to be.

I sorted out where we were, but with no navigation charts for that area I could not be sure just how to get back without running aground again.

I identified where the channels was off in the distance, and could even see a couple of other boats running there.

There was no guarantee though that there was enough water between where we were, and where the channel was. I just had to try and read the water, and pray.....lol

Once I did get us back in the channel, I began sailing under just the jib sail, and sailed right past the spot we needed to be. When I finally figured out I needed to turn around, I was nearly a mile away again.

Once I had gotten us back to where we needed to be I woke up the Crew and radio'd the Jekyll Island Marina to let them know I was inbound under sail, with no other power.

I had thought I was a little silly to spend the extra money for a handheld VHF Marine radio, but it paid off when all the other radios and instruments went down.

By shear luck we made a very smoothing docking at5 Jekyll Island Marine, and the Crew looked like rats escaping a burning ship.....................lol

They had all had enough of that boat for a while, and I can't say I can blame them. It had not been a "wonderful" trip so far and I was very afraid I had spoiled them forever on the idea of sailing.

Miss Bonnie had been a great sport but the endless heat had taken it's toll on her. Even though she had skipped a chemo treatment she just does not have the strength it takes to participate in the actual sailing, and eventually even climbing the ladder (steps) from the salon to the cockpit became such a chore she had to combine trips. The ventilation in here bunk was not all that ggod either so even when she could get down there it was pretty hot and stuffy.

At the beginning of the trip I told the Crew that if anyone wanted to get off the trip they could. I had asked the question in St. Augustine FL and everyone wanted to stay for the next leg, which was an open ocean leg.

When I asked the question again in Jekyll Island GA everyone was more than ready to take the ride home.

The Jekyll Island marina is a great place with pool, jacuzzi, great seafood restaurant, and free loaner bicycles to use.

I figured out the problem with the boat was due to some bad connectors on the alternator which I had been a little suspect of, but it was running so I had focused on other issues.

So... the batteries were charged, the engine was running BUT........we were running out of time because Miss Bonnie had to be back for her chemo, and I needed to be back to do an event in Raleigh NC.

We decided to dock the boat at Jekyll Island Marina. I decided I would hitch-hike the 80 miles back to Jacksonville FL to get my truck. Jim Brady arranged for a friend to come from Jacksonville FL to get me and take me back to get the Suburban.

The crew spent the night at the marina, and I returned about 0500 (5am) we loaded up the suburban and took off to return Britney and Nick (BRITNICK) to their Parental Units in Hillsborough NC.

Miss Bonnie and myself finally arrived back at my house about 10pm, and my bed felt very, very good.

July 10 2011 0045 (12:45am) Leaving the ocean

So being very pleased with the first open water navigation in a long time, and with the Crew all, asleep in the cockpit, I entered the Cumberland Sound from seaward.

It was soooo quiet, and sooo clear, and there was just enough moonlight to be able to make out vague features. The water was like a flat mirror.

In the song Southern Cross, there is a line that says something about "knowing why we came this way". It was that kind of feeling, where you say to yourself "all that other junk was worth it if it got me to this moment".

The engine had been working at about half power. I was not sure just why, but we were moving, it was dark, I was very tired, and I decided not to mess with anything as long as we were moving.

Britney and Nick were out like a light, exhausted from a tough day on awkward seas. Miss Bonnie had taken her evening meds she needs to deal with the effects of the her chemo, and was sleeping sitting up in the cockpit so the kids had room to curl up on each side.

We passed the Kings Bay Naval base where the Triton Submarines live. You pass right by it, but not too near because they get pretty tense if you get too close to their "Boomers".

I had paper charts to work with up to the point where we entered Cumberland Sound, and had lots of electronic navigation stuff as well. I had intended stopping in St. Marys GA to get the other paper charts I needed to proceed, but it was late and I decided to deal with it in the morning.

I noticed that the navigation lights seemed a little dim, then saw that other instruments had gone dead, and the engine seemed to be getting weaker and weaker.

I made a bad call at this point. I needed to go below and see what was causing the electrical problem, but needed someone to steer while I did it.

I awakened Miss Bonnie out of a very deep sleep, said "take this tiller and steer for a minute" then jumped below to check things.

This was in a very narrow channel, and about a minute later I felt the boat come to a pronounced stop.........

It was totally wrong and unfair to have put Bonnie in that position, and she had not had time to wake up or focus and she strayed out of the channel, and we were aground, the engine stalled, and would not restart. The batteries were all dead, the lights were out, the navigation stuff was blank.

It was 0300, I had been at it for 17 hours, I was very tired, and told everyne to go to their bunks and get some sleep.

For the next 2 hours I did what is called "kedging". This is where you do your best to throw an anchor out as far as possible, let it set, then haul it in, hoping you can pull the whole boat in the direction you want that will get you ungrounded.

Using 2 anchors, for the next 3 hours I tossed and pulled, tossed and pulled, until I finally got us of the bottom. I was exhausted.

I decided to just anchor there, and get some much needed sleep.

3 hour later I woke up, only to see that I had NOT gotten up into deep enough water, the tide had gone out while I was sleeping, and we were now aground AGAIN!!!!!!!!

It was 0800 and there was nothing to do but wait for the tide to turn and bring back enough water for us to float off and be on our way.

At 1530 (3:30pm) I finally had enough water up me to try to get away. I began to haul in an anchor and it seemed "hung" on something. I tried the stern anchore and got the same thing. After and hour of hauling, grunting and cussing, I finally figured out that during the night, with the turning of the tide the boat had spun a couple of times and the anchor lines (rodes) had become twisted on each other.

More cussing, grunting, tugging, and with the help of the Kids, I was able to untangle the mess.

Finally we were floating free, but still in a narrow channel, with no power, now batteries, and I had NOT gotten the fresh paper charts I needed so we were really going to have to be "Real Sailors".

For the next 6 hours we sailed under just the jib sail, through narrow channels, thru salt marshes, in switchy winds, with no charts. I think it was actually one of the most enjoyable parts of the trip for the Crew. We were doing some difficult sailing, and doing it well.

At about 2330 hrs (11:30pm) with a marina where we could make repairs, eat, shower, and just plain get off the boat in sight.....I felt the all too familiar thud of the keel of the boat going into the mud AGAIN.

I had done pretty well in such shallow waters all day, but in the dark, and with only 3 hours sleep in 2 days, I had run us aground again, within sight of our goal.

I tried to kedge again for a little while and then decided to just sleep it off, and deal with it in the morning.

I dropped a shallow anchor, and layed out in the cockpit (where I like to sleep when it's nice weather) and pretty much passed out.

I woke everyone, told

July 9th We left St. Augustine

So with the repair made, we were better rested, and fed and left St. Augustine light behind us at 1100.

It was the first open ocean exposure for Miss Bonnie, Britney, and Nick and my first time "on the outside" with BRITNICK. (she is a fine sailing boat by the way)

The seas were wonderful, the wind out of the south, a clear sky and a good weather forecast.

The course from the St.Augustine sea buoy to St. Mary's Inlet GA is nearly due north, and with the south wind it should have been an easy sail.

There were some large thunder storms far to the south, and while we were not getting any of the wind, or rain, we were getting some confusing wave patterns, and in the light winds caused the boat to pitch and roll in some very awkward rhythms.

The rolly-polly motion sent poor Nick to the rail in short order, where he remained most of the next 10 hours or so.

Britney's runs for the rail were less frequent but still enough to make for a tough day. She seemed to have a little better time of it.

Miss Bonnie seemed un-phased, and I will have to admit there were a few times where I felt a little twinge of queezyness.

We sailed all day, then the afternoon t-storms began to build. We were very lucky that they seemed to move around us, but the flukey winds, and confused seas made the ride unfriendly.

Finally the wind died, though the seas retained a slight chop. We had to fire up the engine in order to make way.

They engine started very awkwardly (should have been a clue) and it never did run up to snuff the rest of the evening, and gave off more offensive exhaust fumes. The engine was weak as if only running on maybe 2 cylinders out of 4.

Once again due to my fear of the sour exhaust fumes I made everyone remain on deck. It was not a popular decision but I just could not figure out how to explain how I had let the whole crew die from carbon monoxide poisoning.

Finally about 0045 on the 10th we left the open ocean, and entered the ICW again. I was very pleased with myself that after the issues of sick crew, fluky winds, confused seas, and engine issues, we had arrived only about 1/2 mile form the St.Mary's Inlet sea buoy. Not bad for being off the water for the last 20 years.

Then it gets a little interesting. See the next post.

Getting it all caught up

So we ended up leaving the dock on the morning of the 4th of July. We sailed during the day and decided to anchor in the St. Johns River where it runs thru downtown J-ville.

They towed in 2 huge barges loaded with fireworks and we watched a great fireworks show from the boat, then slept there at anchor for the night.

As we were setting anchor, with Miss Bonnie at the tiller I heard the tone of the engine change (bad sign). When I checked it out I found that a connection in the exhaust system had blown out. It was very noisy, and releasing heat and ugly exhaust fumes below decks.

I worked up a patch from an olive can and 2 soda cans which solved the heat and noise problem a little, but the fumes were still terrible and dangerous.

We motored all day and until about 2230 (10:30pm) and I could not let anyone go below for more than a couple of minutes. Everyone had to stay on deck for the whole long day, and it was tough on them.

We got close enough to St. Augustine to see the glow from the city, and we anchored out for the rest of the night.

I was far too tired to try and pick my way into a strange harbor at night so we just went to sleep. At least we could all go down below since the engine was shut down and the fumes were not an issue for a while.

The next day (July 5th) we motored in to St. Augustine early in the morning, got a slip at the City Marina, and spent most of the day just getting well needed showers, doing a little laundry, and looking forward to dinner at the Santa Maria Restaurant which is right next to the City Marina. It was good but not great. The kids enjoyed feeding the fish thru the trap doors though. See santamariarestaurant.com

The original idea was to sail south to watch the last Space Shuttle launch. When we started hearing that there was a 76% chance of no-go due to weather we decided to just hang out in St.Augustine and enjoy it.

I removed the offending exhaust parts, did a little 4 mile round trip hike to the local muffler shop, where the guy made a PERFECT replalcement part from looking at the broken bits I had brought along. When I asked how much, expecting to really get gouged, he thought for a minute and said "$5.00 should cover it". I shoved a twenty in his hand and walked out the door. He was an Artist of the Exhaust Tube Bending Arts.

I really fell in love with St.Augustine. I see myself going back there often. I love the old feeling of the city, as well as the flavor of the ocean setting. It's also a college town so it's also a bit of a freak show, which I like too.