THAT HUGE SCARY LEAP FORWARD ...................

So came the day when we were more or less done in the boatyard in VIRGIN GORDA and we needed to put "SOUTHERN COMFORT" in the water, having left "ARITA" safely tied to a mooring back in CULEBRA, P.R. ....... Four or five skin fittings had been changed and all of them checked ........ "SC" has 26 through-hull fittings ..... That's enough to scare anybody .......The travel-lift arrived and gently lowered her in to the salt water with some excited yelling from me " Get her up, get her up!" ....... The stern-gland was leaking like a fire-hose and one fitting weeping nicely ...... An hour later, we were good to go and in the morning made the epic journey of 100 yards from the drop-in spot to the dock ......



This part was the nervous part, when you suddenly realize how big "SOUTHERN COMFORT" really is .............



And then she touches the water ........... Notice the swim platform that we have made while in the boat-yard .... All made from a South American hardwood called 'Purple-heart' ..... Or at least the pieces came from Guyana in South America .......



Yes, we've made the break from land ..... We're floating and on the water .....



A week later we let the dock lines go and we sailed back to PUERTO RICO, a distance of about 80 miles, and not without its moments, but by late afternoon with only the genoa up, we sail into the safe bay at CULEBRA .....



The "Queen of Florida" is now in her element ....... Great views, nice seat, easy motion, wind on the quarter ...... Doesn't get any better than that ........ The seat's too high and the step stool has to go ...... We'll take care of that later .....



We pass 'Sail Rock' and hit the Virgin Channel that separates the Spanish Virgins from the U.S. Virgins ..... A stretch of turbulent water with criss-crossing waves and things go flying, as they always do ........ The big dinghy that comes with "SC" suddenly makes "ARITA's" beemer look pathetically small .....



Being back in CULEBRA we raft up to ARITA and go ashore to be once again face to face with bougainvillea everywhere and in all colours ........ Wonderful to be back on "ARITA" too, with all the finished home comforts ...... She really is beautiful, cozy and so homey .... Perhaps one day "SOUTHERN COMFORT" will be the same ......



Now, whereas we should have updated the blog at that point, we got stuck into the work program immediately ......... Firstly, go to town with the new workboat and start bringing all the 'goodies' out of the crate that we had shipped from Florida ...... It takes four trips to get it all, including the solar panels and the new Yanmar generator ......



Somewhere in the island crossing, the old Northern Lights generator had slid off its platform and ended up in the bottom of the lazarette (the aft compartment) and in removing it we had to separate it into three separate parts, then haul it out using the mizzen boom and take it to town in the dinghy ....... Clean the room out, put in a new fibre-glassed base and spray the whole room in sound-reducing foam ...... A whole new chamber and un-recognizable from the past .... Laurie and I dropped the new 9KVA Yanmar generator into place with silky smoothness .... Awesome .....



We get word that there's a yacht "JOANA" in the anchorage, with two ladies on board who do TIG welding ....... By morning they have brought their steel yacht alongside, ready to transfer their welding gear on board ....... We have about a dozen broken stainless steel welds that definitely need attention ...... Mostly on the stanchion bases ....... That's "LIAHONA", our sister-ship in the background, with Mark and Willie who have arrived and immediately jumped in to help us ....... Champions, that couple .....



The swim platform again comes into its own, and by now we have removed the satellite phone dome and mounted the new solar panels ....... Talk about wonderful free power from the sun .......... 45amps when we first switched it on ..... You probably remember that 'paper-clip' that we had made in CURACAO that is now part of the support frame for the solar panels ......



With the construction project now in full swing, we make numerous trips to town to get the small stuff ........ Hard to resist a photo of a baby iguana climbing the bamboo fence ....... Or the flowers for that matter, and the new work-horse even gets a topside coat of vinyl dinghy paint to hide all the patches ....... With the 30HP motor it has become the perfect fast-dinghy for this stage of re-construction ..... But way too big to lift or to tow ...... That cloth I'm holding prevents the wind from blowing the inert gas away while Marie does the welding ...... Now who would have thought you could get such specialized welding done in a remote place like CULEBRA and on the water too ....... Miracles never cease .... Try to get that done in Ft. Lauderdale without tearing your hair out .....



The CULEBRA anchorage is great ...... A perfect place to do this renovation ..... Town is a mere 10 minute dinghy ride away with small restaurants including this one called "Dinghy Dock" ......... And 'Big Town'(SAN JUAN) on the big island is a ferry ride and a car rental away, but necessary for the 'Home Depot' stuff .......



Still, in between the massive work-load now in front of us, we do just great with the local economy ....... Every Friday there's a fresh vegetable truck that comes from the mainland and there's a couple of supermarkets on the island that cater to everything from chewing gum to fiber-glass resin .....



Photos will follow of all the jobs completed ...... Work before pictures (WBP)..... But here's a whole new bank of golf-cart batteries and the hot water tank is being replaced with new instant tankless hotwater heaters ..... All the deck fittings have been installed ...... We'll just show you later ....... But this you've got to see .....



The black unit, the 'OUTBACK', is the MPPT controller, which converts the 130 volt input from the four solar panels and converts it into 12v DC at whatever amps are required to keep the battery bank full ...... The blue ones are the two 'Victron' inverters, that turn the 12v DC battery power into 110v AC to power all the outlets on board so that microwave, coffeemaker, the future watermaker , future washer/dryer and all my power tools, like the circular saw and grinder, work flawlessly ...... Now, should the batteries ever reach a low point of 11.9v DC, the diesel generator automatically switches on, and the inverters now become battery chargers ....... The good news is that the solar panels normally keep things full with the batteries at 13.6 volts .... That's 13.6 volts and that, folks, is the ultimate ...... More later ....... Later, meaning after I get through sorting out the wiring problems on board "SOUTHERN COMFORT"..... At the moment, the navigation lights come on when I connect the anchor windlass ..... We'll take care of that in due course ..... But if truth be told, and I mean the real truth, I can only describe it like this ......... "I'm like a kid in a sand-box" ..... And lovin it. " ..... Just don't tell Mc Donalds .....