Summertime on Kent Island: 8/13 - 8/15

—Blogpost written by Bob 

Friday, August 13  

Uh oh, Friday the thirteenth!  We are in for another hot day today--the outside temperature was expected to reach 90 degrees but some expected rain late in the day should cool things off for the weekend.

Kali after her fourth night on board.  This moment
was the longest she sat still.  (She has the
run of the boat's interior but has not
been allowed outside yet.)

As I mentioned before we are switching from the KETO diet plan to the Mediterranean diet plan.  We are keeping some of the good food items we discovered while on KETO but adding the better items from the new diet.  Some of the good items we discovered on KETO was almond milk, homemade pizzas using a low-carb whole wheat (or sun dried tomato) tortilla as the crust, and almond flour (for baking).  The main things we added from the Mediterranean diet was all types of fruit  (particularly the excellent peaches available right now).  We still plan to avoid most high-carb foods.

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During mid-morning we changed out our dining table (from the folding table that came with the boat) to a round teak table that we had kept in our storage unit.

The round teak table makes a sort
of informal dinette area
within our salon.

What a huge difference in weight (the original table is much heavier) and in perceived spaciousness.  (We seem to have a lot more available space with the round table.)  Together with that change we also changed the cat’s litter box to one that has a higher lip around three sides—hopefully, this will keep more litter in the box and less on the cabin sole around the box.  (Kali is also good at spilling her dry food while playing.)

Maggie used our onboard vacuum cleaner to clean up excess litter spread all around the main salon from the old litter box.  Both cats were deathly afraid of the vacuum cleaner and this effort totally wore them out for several hours in the afternoon.  They found separate places to sleep.

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The outside temperature reached 92 degrees F at 4:30 in the afternoon.  It was hot and humid outside.  In our air-conditioned boat, it was a cool 72 degrees F as we started Happy Hour.  My drink of the day was a very healthy Bloody Mary made simply with Spicy V-8 juice, vodka, and plenty of ice.  (I should have taken a picture!)

Saturday, August 14

When I woke up this morning (about 6:15 AM), Lola and Kali were sitting on the starboard settee playing with a cat toy together.  The sun was not completely up yet.  It was cute!  For breakfast onboard a little bit later, we had an old KETO favorite, peanut butter and low-carb grape jelly on a whole wheat tortilla--it was surprising low-car and filling.

The outside temperature in the morning was very comfortable (in the 70's), headed for a high of 87 in the afternoon, according to Weather Underground.  Again, rain was expected (a 61% chance) in the afternoon, most likely starting at 3 PM.  After today's rain the weather was expected to cool off for several days.  (Wasn't that the expectation yesterday?)

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My first task of the morning was to track down a shipment of three 18-volt batteries for my new Makita sander--I expected to find them in the marina office since they were not at the Post Office yesterday afternoon.  (Amazon notified me that they were delivered yesterday.)  I found four packages in the marina office, a few more than expected.  Not only my three new batteries arrived but the two new piling guards I ordered arrived as well.  (I'll be installing the new piling guards tomorrow.)

I picked up our packages at the marina office
 at the end of "J" dock this morning.
(This is an old marina with fixed 
docks but its location
is great.)

For my second task of the day, I had to reconnect the power plug on my secondary chart plotter--the one in the navigation station.  I had somehow inadvertently removed the power plug when I was fixing the volume control knob on our satellite radio about a week ago.  Of course, this meant removing the chart plotter for access to the back side, reinserting the plug, and then reinstalling the chart plotter.  (At this point we don't know if we will be cruising in the future and even needing our secondary chart plotter but I wanted to keep everything in working order and available for service.)

My latest read: This is What America
Looks Like by Ilhan Omar.

The latest book I'm reading was written by Ilhan Omar, the Somali-born congresswoman representing a district in Minnesota.  She is so much more patriotic (and socially conservative!) than the Trump-following idiots who stormed the Capital on January 6!  She fled war-torn Somalia as a child with her family and resettled in America.  This book was her impressive story of how all that happened.  As an immigrant, she was the target of many nasty Trump tweets during his tenure (I refuse to call it a "presidency" because it really wasn't one in my opinion.).

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It was very hot (90 degrees F) and humid again this afternoon.  I did a lot of reading.

Sunday, August 15

It rained pretty steady last night.  The morning was cool (low 70's) and windy (8 to 13 knots out of the northeast).  We certainly didn't need the A/C running in the morning!  The afternoon temperature was expected to reach a very tolerable 81 degrees.  (More rain was expected very late tonight and into tomorrow.)

Our two cats played for about two hours this morning until they were both completely worn out.  It was nice seeing them adjusting to one another.  (At first I was worried that Lola would not adjust to Kali.)

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With cooler weather this morning came our heightened interest in working outside.  We were still settling in to our slip in this marina and we wanted to make it more like home.  Today, we took down a satellite dish that belonged to the previous slip holder--the cable was simply cut off when the slip holder left.  

We removed the old unused satellite dish
that was fastened to the top of this piling.

Then, we removed some roofing nails from the pilings that were holding remnants of carpet previously used as a cushion against abrasion.  We also pulled out miscellaneous cables and wires that were drooping under the dock--they were no longer connected to anything.

We had been using our boat fenders to keep our
boat from rubbing against the pilings but
their positioning was always
somewhat haphazard.

We waited until nearly low tide (which occurred at 12:45 PM today) to install the piling guards. We installed the two 2-foot long piling guards (purchased from Overton's), one above the other to get protection from one piling through four feet of tidal range.  (Our normal tidal range is less than 3 feet.)  

Each 24-inch long piling guard was fastened to the piling with six supplied stainless steel wood screws and fender washers.  (I drilled small holes in the piling to make the screw installation go smoother but it was still rough going because of the cheap screws supplied--the socket would not fit on them completely.  The screws had a slotted head as well as a semi-flanged hex head.)

The piling guards were installed but used
with a single boat fender to obtain
more standoff distance
 from the piling.

I have to changeout the suppled screws in the piling guards to proper lag screws--the suppled screws were simply too cheap to work properly.  (I can most likely change one at a time from the deck of our boat.)  If the piling guards work as expected, I may order two more for the second piling involved.  In the meantime I will keep two boat fenders in their haphazard position on the second piling.

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We went out for a delicious lunch at the Fisherman's Inn Crab Deck in Kent Narrows.

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