Solomons to Baltimore

—Blogpost written by Bob

Friday in Solomons

The thunderstorm last night cleared out the humidity in the air for a beautiful day today, Friday, May 11, 2018. Based on the wind forecast, we decided to leave Solomons tomorrow when we have mostly southerly winds for motor-sailing to Galesville. (We are headed to Galesville so that Hartge’s Yacht Yard can remove the autopilot’s linear actuator so that I can send it back for repairs—the area is too small for me to get into. This way, the linear actuator will be repaired before we return to Galesville in July for our annual haulout.)

Our shiny new shaft coupling on the aft end
of our v-drive transmission. (The bright
blue cable is the new transmission
cable we installed in West End.)

I checked the shaft seal for leakage this morning, both in forward and reverse gear and it is leaktight, as it should be. One thing I learned yesterday afternoon is that the shaft seal has two sets of double set screws. The inner set screw digs into the shaft and the outer set screw acts like a jam nut and locks the inner set screw in place. The shaft seal can be adjusted without removing both outer set screws.

We rode the marina’s bikes to go to lunch and then pick up some provisions. Along the way, I got the West Marine part number for the replacement coaming box (the one I burned up with the RAINMAN exhaust) and I ordered it online. We had a light dinner onboard and we relaxed and read until we retired for the day.

Solomons to Galesville

We were up and ready to leave Zahnizer’s Marina at 7 AM but I noticed there was no water coming out of the exhaust.  I shut off the engine and dug into the problem, first checking the intake seacock, then the raw water strainer, and finally, the the water pump impeller—the water pump impeller was the problem (it was missing two blades).  This is the first time I had to replace an impeller on our new engine.  The water pump is very difficult to access and then only by one (left) arm. It took me two hours to change the impeller, with a lot of swearing and cussing. (I’ve been replacing the entire water pump annually—it is due to be replaced in two months. Why did the impeller have to fail today?  Was its failure near the same time the shaft key failed merely a coincidence?)

The failed water pump impeller
with two missing blades.

However, we were on our way shortly after 9 AM and stopped by the main fuel dock before leaving Solomons. After taking on a little over 15 gallons of diesel fuel, we were on our way to the mouth of the Patuxent River. Motoring was so easy (and quiet!) today—we were moving between 6.3 and 6.5 knots (at 2300 RPM) throughout the day, with a light chop on the bay’s surface.

Captain Jack can sleep through anything.  Why
can't he learn to change water pump impellers?

It was cool on the bay, although the forecast was for 91 degrees in the afternoon. Three large ships passed us, two going south and one going north. There were a lot of sailboats on the bay, as well as lots of fishing boats, trolling for rockfish.

This is an image from our chart plotter as we
approached Galesville.  A sailboat race
was taking place to our right.

We arrived at Hartge’s Yacht Yard on Tenthouse Creek in Galesville at 3:45 PM—it was a 6-3/4 hour trip today, probably the quickest trip we’ve made between these two points and it was 100% motoring. What little wind there was was coming out of the north, the direction we were traveling.

It was nice to tie up to a dock (again) and fire up our onboard air conditioner since it got quite warm as we came in from the bay (but it only reached 80 degrees in the afternoon).

We kicked around names (again) for our new kitty as we were motoring this afternoon.  I have liked “Gypsy” best but Maggie read somewhere on line that the name is considered a racial slur—so, she is now opposed to using the name.  The best alternative we’ve both agreed is acceptable is “Lola”--it's a name made famous in an old Barry Manilow song, Cococabana and another song written by Richard Adler and Jerry Ross for the film Damn Yankees entitled “Whatever Lola wants."  We will be picking her up on Wednesday.

We went out for dinner at Pirate’s Cove, one of our favorite restaurants.  We walked nearly a mile to get there and another (nearly a mile) to get back. Needless to say, we were beat at the end of the day.  After a lot of concentration all day long and a good meal, we sleep very soundly at night.  This cruising lifestyle really makes one feel healthy--I am much more active now than when I worked full-time.

Sunday in Galesville

A thunderstorm came through Galesville late last night and into very early this morning. It is still completely overcast this Sunday morning, May 13, 2018 (Mother’s Day).  Today is a layover day at the dock here at Hartge’s Yacht Yard.  Except for a couple small boat chores (priming the auxiliary cooling pump for the fridge and cleaning the raw water strainers), we expect to have an easy day. (There is not much else we can do unless we want to walk nearly a mile to do it.)

I love the smell of coffee brewing
first thing in the morning!

----------

This morning was the first time I noticed that I can send photos from my iPad at different pixel rates.  My default was set way too low and many of my iPad pics used in this blog were fuzzy.  All I had to do was to click on the image size which opens up a selection bar as shown on the following:

A screen shot from my iPad showing
the selection for image size.

----------

Below are some photographs from around the boatyard:

Tenthouse Creek has to be one of the
most peaceful places in the world.

Beauty in a boatyard.  This is the shop area at
Hartge's Yacht Yard on a Sunday morning.

s/v Rainy Days tied to the floating dock at
Hartge's Yacht Yard on Tenthouse
Creek in Galesville.

Galesville to Baltimore

It rained (like cats and dogs) again last night. We woke early to the sound of a small tug turning a barge around near the head of Tenthouse Creek. The sky was overcast like yesterday—it looked like it was going to rain all day, despite the positive forecast for the remainder of the day.

We cleared everything out of the quarter berth including the cushions—this is where access is needed to remove the autopilot’s linear actuator. We also removed everything from the port cockpit locker in case access is needed from there (maybe to disconnect the quadrant from the linear actuator). 

The quarter berth all cleared out,
including the cushions. 

The linear actuator was removed by 8 AM and then the mechanic looked at our anchor windlass issue. All he could find was that the plastic stripper bounced out of place. He removed the chainwheel and checked everything out before reassembling the unit. We worked the anchor up and down a few times and it seems to be fine now.

We were underway by 9:15 AM, headed to out of Tenthouse Creek, into the West River, and then into the Chesapeake Bay. The entire day was overcast and foggy.

Thomas Point Lighthouse
 in the fog.

To make matters worse we battled an opposing 1-knot tidal current coming up the bay for the entire trip. We arrived at our slip in Baltimore at 3:15 PM—it took exactly 6 hours. :It was comforting to know that we will be in one place for a little awhile. This completes our 2017/2018 season. 

As if adding insult to injury, the base of the fan
in the navigation station broke and the fan
simply hangs from the power wires.

Our blog will continue as we fix everything that we broke this past season. Stay tuned...

Thanks for following our blog!