Two feet from the dock … and stuck on the boat

 Two feet from the dock … and stuck on the boat

Tuesday 17th October 2023

The title describes my current situation. It’s 6.15 pm and I couldn’t get off the boat if I wanted to. If I had half a brain I’d blame this on government overreach, but thankfully I have a full brain and realize that this is my own fault. I just finished putting a coat of varnish on the cap-rail, which I must say is looking really good, but this means I can’t stand on the rail to step onto the dock, and I can’t reach the dock without stepping on the rail … so I’m stuck! 

It’ been a busy day, mostly spent sanding the aforementioned teak cap rail and the pencil rails on the side of the cabin top, then taping around them, and finally applying a coat of varnish. I can’t say I did a brilliant job with the preparation, I just lack the patience for these attention-to-detail jobs, but I figure they must have been really bad to look so much better after one coat! My goal, over the next few days, is to get three or four coats applied.

Yesterday, I was chatting to a couple of young guys from a marine electronics company who were replacing a radar unit on a power boat along the dock. Apparently it got hit by lightening, which destroyed not only the navigational electronics, but the air conditioner units and engine control board as well. Lightening is one of those things that worries us a lot, but there is very little you can really do to eliminate the risk. Our boat is well grounded, so that should help, but if we were hit we would expect to lose all our navigational electronics, radar and Iridium Go! satellite system. Consequently, my first job this morning was to order a 100-minute pre-paid sim card for our old satellite phone. If we lose our Iridium Go! satellite system, our fall back plan will be to call Gloria and get verbal updates on weather. We also have paper charts, electronic charts on an iPad, and independent GPS units to fall back on.

Whilst drinking my morning coffee I was working with the PredictWind weather forecasting and routing tools. I learned that I could create a “boundary” defined by coordinates that are 250 nm from shore, that limits the proposed routes to meet our insurance restrictions. You can see the boundary area on screenshot shown below. This particular visualization is showing ocean currents, including the gulf Stream, which I think is really cool. Whilst we are too far away from our proposed departure time, it is fun too play around and learn how best too use the tools. 

Mike

A screen shot of a Predict Wind routing model, with the exclusion boundary that limits the proposed routes to <250 nm offshore. In this depiction you are seeing predictions of the ocean currents as well as some a warning for vertical acceleration (i.e. very bumpy!)

The view towards the front of the boat in Morehead City Yacht Basin

The view towards the stern