Poco a Poco

April 19, 2012

That means “little by little” to those of you with worse Spanish than me. Well, Chris is 4 – make that 3 days into “Spring Cleaning 2012” and I’m reminded of that old saying “Two steps forward, one step back”. Monday started off with a step back after Chris’s flight to D.C. was cancelled.  Tuesday

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Coming to America

April 15, 2012

Tomorrow Chris flies to D.C., rents a car and heads over to Annapolis.  She’ll spend the next 2 weeks working on Shearwater.  I’ll fly over in about 2 weeks to review her work.  Err, I mean to help her finish things up.  Actually, I’m just flying over to go sailing!  That’s right, after almost 6

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Retrofit: Project 1.5 complete!

March 6, 2012

The fine folks at Yacht Canvas in Annapolis finished up replacing the curtains that will give us a bit of privacy while at the dock, as well as a couple of coordinating pillows.  All of the interior cushion work is now done, and if the pictures are a good reproduction of what the inside now

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Wind, sun, and dinosaurs

March 5, 2012

You may have noticed that we have a lot of decisions to make regarding equipment on Shearwater.  For every decision, there are usually a number of possible solutions, and each solution comes with a few compromises such that the choice is rarely clear.  I take the opportunity when I can to write about the options. 

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There’s a hole in the boat, dear Liza, dear Liza, a hole!

February 29, 2012

There’s a hole in boat (bucket), dear Liza, dear Liza.  There’s a hole in the boat, dear Liza, a hole.  Then fix it dear Henry, dear Henry, dear Henry.  Then fix it, dear Henry, the hole…   You know the song, but seriously what do you do if there is a hole in the boat

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Contingencies and doomsday scenarios

February 26, 2012

Like anything in life, things can go wrong.  Since we have more time to think (and less time to do projects) being approximately 3,278 nautical miles away from the boat right now, one of the projects on our plate is to do thought exercises on 1) what could go wrong on a boat, and 2)

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If we must use the motor…

February 25, 2012

I dislike motoring a lot.  I don’t like the noise, it is boring, and I don’t like the pollution.  While there have been numerous boats that have circumnavigated without a motor, to go without now requires the utmost patience, and really you have to not need to be anywhere ALL the time, no exceptions.  That

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Retrofit: Project #1 complete!

February 24, 2012

There is no denying that Shearwater could use some TLC and some upgrades, but we knew that going in, and the upside is that when we are done (Ha!  Who are we kidding, we’ll never be done with projects), she will be much more new than the typical 1997 J/120.  One of the biggest projects

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Reading material nowadays

February 23, 2012

I think that living abroad really does make you think differently about things and expand your horizons a bit, in all aspects of your life.  Consider magazine subscriptions… Ten years ago, I don’t think it would have ever occurred to us to consider getting a subscription to a non-US magazine to stay up to speed

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Water, water, everywhere, and not a drop to drink

February 22, 2012

It’s a funny thing being on a boat surrounded by water and having to wonder if we have enough freshwater to get by.  Alas, it is a concern, particularly if one plans to spends days away from shoreside facilities like while crossing an ocean, for instance.  For our purposes we have some decisions to make

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