Day 46 Another day of projects

Another day of projects.  Here's the picture of the steering assembly I discussed the other day.  All fixed now that I added shims to the bracket around the rudder post.  As you can see, I had help from Snowshoe.   He was very interested in what was going on down there and just had to see for himself.  Blue was sleeping or she would have been in there before he was.  With the rudder post being under the queen berth in the stern cabin, everything had to be pushed up and held there while I worked on it.  That bed can get quite heavy fast.

You'd think we were starving the kids. We brought in more dry food and just the simple sound of it getting poured into it storage bin had all the cats running to see what we had gotten for them.  Shadow wasn't waiting for it to be poured into a bowl, he just went at it in the bin.  Glad to see that he is putting on some weight after all these years.

Yesterday, all it did was blow again.  20-25 knots and still in the mid-50s.  It can cut thru you fast and chill you even if you are in the sunshine(rarity).    We have found that when it's cloudy, it is relatively calm here but on sunny days, it blows big time. At least that's the way its been for the past few weeks.

We spent another day getting things organized and ordered yesterday.  I cleaned out the Nav Station and organized the work shop area.  Brought in more tools that I got from our storage shed.  I ordered a SSB Radio(like a ham or shortwave radio) last night. This will allow us to send and receive emails and calls all over the world.  Now I will need to apply for another license from the FCC to operate it.  We will be able to get weather faxes to tell us what is coming as we sail and make contact with other boats and even people on shore with this radio. It's range can easily go over 1000 miles.  Properly set up, you may be able to actually call us when we are out cruising the world.  I'm having it installed in Port Townsend when we get there in a few weeks.  I talked to their head electrician yesterday about our boat and what to expect when we got there.  I want them to go over all the electrical systems and make sure they are all set up properly.  Can't afford to have a circuit go out when we are way off shore.

I also talked to a man that will pump out our diesel tanks so we can clean them.  They haven't been opened and inspected since the boat was built.  I'm sure there is bound to be some glop in there that needs to be gotten out. Don't want to get it stirred up and have the chance it will clog the filters and mess up the engine when we are off shore.  Do it now and avoid the problems tomorrow!  I've got precious cargo on board.

Well, I'm off to rip out the pump to the forward head tank.  Bought a new macerator(pump that not only pumps but chews up what it is pumping) for the system.  Then the forward head will be fully operational.  Got to strike while the wind is low.

More later.