{"id":2261,"date":"2017-04-24T13:59:35","date_gmt":"2017-04-24T17:59:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/helplink.com\/CLAFC\/?p=2261"},"modified":"2017-04-24T15:50:04","modified_gmt":"2017-04-24T19:50:04","slug":"our-home-is-mobile-once-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/helplink.com\/CLAFC\/?p=2261","title":{"rendered":"Our home is mobile once again!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"IMG_1126\"<\/a>\"IMG_2233\"<\/a>We arrived home to Pachina Mia<\/em> a little over a week ago, and spent the ensuing days getting her ready for launch. As most people in the yard noted (often in surly and grumpy tones), launch day seems\u00a0way too early this year. Throughout the week winter kept trying to make a comeback as we worked to get the boat ready. So in between sub-zero temperatures, howling winds, and too many days of rain, we managed to get the cover off, get the bottom painted with new anti-foul, and get a seacock operating once more.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1135\"<\/a>
Ain\u2019t she the cutest!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Living on a boat that is on land (on “the hard\u201d as we sailors say) is, in the words of Ann\u2019s favourite sailing bardess: \u201cA hard hard life. Life hard, life on the hard.<\/a>\u201d But despite the challenges and cramped space we managed to sleep and eat some of our meals on board. And we found time to raise a glass or two (or three, or four\u2026 \ud83d\ude09 ) to our good fortune.<\/p>\n

\"IMGA0268\"<\/a>\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\"IMGA0265\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"IMG_1140\"<\/a>Timmies<\/em> and then Panera Bread<\/em>\u00a0became our morning brecky ritual, with take-out deli or the occasional finer restaurant filling in the dinner menu. Not too hard I suppose. And of course there is always time to spend chatting with fellow boaters here in our little Stillwater home. In fact, someone<\/em> claims that I spend more time chatting than working \u2026 harrumph<\/em> I say. I can\u2019t help it if everyone wants to talk to me \u2026 all the time \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n

\"IMGA0285\"<\/a>\u00a0\"IMGA0259<\/a> \"IMGA0263\"<\/a> \"IMGA0283\"<\/a><\/p>\n

[Ann here. Consider this. In the two pictures in the middle above, Mike was on his way to the bathroom on the other side of the marina. The time between the first picture and the second is 15 minutes, the distance is about 20 feet!]<\/em><\/p>\n

Just over a week since we arrived back in Belleville, the day we worked for and utterly dreaded was upon us:<\/p>\n

Launch Day!!<\/span><\/h1>\n

\"IMG_1142\"<\/a>The morning started out beautiful, calm and cool; a perfect day for \u201cdrop down\u201d as Donna put it \u2014 something we hoped wouldn\u2019t happen \ud83d\ude09\u00a0. Last year we nearly had a \u2018drop down\u2019 when the crane started tipping over while lifting us. As it was coming to our turn\u00a0I gently reminded the operator that we weigh 30,000 pounds.<\/p>\n

Not only do we weigh in as one of the heaviest boats in the yard, we also had the added challenge of keeping\u00a0our mast up over winter. To get the slings around our boat we had to remove the back-stay. No biggy \u2026 except this is the wire that keeps the mast from falling down\u00a0\"Mike\"<\/a>. I managed to rig some temporary supports though, so we were pretty sure no one would have to yell: TIMBER!<\/p>\n

Stillwater\u00a0is more like a self-help yacht club than a normal marina. There is no staff, just the owner and fellow boaters to do all the work. So we all pitch in to help everyone. Since Pachina Mia<\/em> was one of the last in line, Ann and I helped launch most of the other boats first. But it was finally our turn. Did I mention:\u00a0\"Mike\"<\/a>\u00a0\"Mike\"<\/a>\"Mike\"<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"IMGA0275\"<\/a> \"IMGA0279\"<\/a> \"IMGA0281\"<\/a>\u00a0\"IMGA0282\"<\/a><\/p>\n

In the end it all worked beautifully. No problems at all. Pachina Mia<\/em> is now happily floating back in her element, and Ann and I are breathing easy. Now the work begins to really get her, and us, ready for the big journey. We have a few projects to get done on the boat, and a lot of logistics to still work out, but it\u2019s all coming together. Most importantly, it feels SOOO GOOOD to be floating once again.<\/p>\n

\"IMGA0287\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We arrived home to Pachina Mia a little over a week ago, and spent the ensuing days getting her ready for launch. As most people in the yard noted (often in surly and grumpy tones), launch day seems\u00a0way too early this year. Throughout the week winter kept trying to make a comeback as we worked […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2261","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/helplink.com\/CLAFC\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2261","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/helplink.com\/CLAFC\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/helplink.com\/CLAFC\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helplink.com\/CLAFC\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helplink.com\/CLAFC\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2261"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/helplink.com\/CLAFC\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2261\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2293,"href":"https:\/\/helplink.com\/CLAFC\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2261\/revisions\/2293"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/helplink.com\/CLAFC\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2261"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helplink.com\/CLAFC\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2261"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helplink.com\/CLAFC\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2261"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}