Day 170 Bill's Post --Two for the price of one!!

I spent the day in the mountains. After almost 6 months at sea level, I was surprised that the altitude didn't affect me. I know Tracy had problems while she was here but that may be because she was in Winter Park for several days and I was there for only a few hours.

I had to put Sloop to Nuts(1982 Laguna 26 footer) to bed for the Winter. We've kept her at Lake Granby for years. The lake is just outside Rocky Mountain National Park at over 8,000 feet so the backdrop is wonderful. The drawback is that the sailing season is quite limited. Early May, if your are lucky, to October 15 at the outside. The months outside that bracket can be quite tough as the lake freezes to a depth of 8 inches or greater.

With all the snow that the area can get, covers need to be applied to stop any possibility of melted snow getting inside the boat. There is lots of teak and the floors are carpeted. When we bought "Sloop", she had ugly carpet so we put in a nice wool carpet custom cut and fitted to the floor. There were no nice teak/holly floor boards on her, just white fiberglass. We've had one instance of the snow/water getting inside the boat and it can make a real mess to clean up.

I put the canvas cover that we made 2 years ago back on and tied it down. Then another smaller tarp to cover just the main cabin area. Over that went a really big tarp. Tracy had purchased a 49 foot by 36 foot tarp. Sloop is only 26 feet long so there was much to much tarp for the boat. There was no place to anchor the bungee cords that hold it on to the trailer. It blows really well up there and you have to fix the tarp down well or it won't last long. After trying for two hours to get it to fit--of course the wind was blowing just enough to take the tarp off the boat just as I was about to get it fitted, I gave up and drove into Granby and purchased another tarp. It only took about an hour to get it attached. I attached the trailer lights and used strips of velcro to hold down the wire that hold the mast up.  Some rope tying and I was done.  Got out of there by 5:30 for the 2 1/2 hour drive home.  

I'd "borrowed" a bolt cutter from Home Depot to use on Sloop.  They don't rent them in their tool rental area so they just "loaned" me theirs.  I need to cut the BIG Master Lock off the outboard motor bracket so I can bring it back to Denver for storage over the winter.   Since it is only three years old(beautiful 9.9hp with electric start Honda motor), we try to protect it as much as possible.  Tracy got tired of pulling the rope on the old 7.5hp motor to start it and I was advised to "go get a motor and make sure it has electric start"!  Try as I might, the bolt cutter wouldn't cut through the steel of that lock.  It's a BIG tough Master Lock.  It dented the edges of the cutters blades.  With all the moving we have been doing, we misplaced(insert "lost" here)the keys to get it off the boat.  I guess it will just have to stay there till Spring.

Finally got back to Aurora about 8:00 and had a nice greasy dinner at "Long John Silvers".  After living and eating in the "healthy"and "organic" state of Washington, my body wasn't used to stuff prepared like that.  It sure tasted great going down though.

Tomorrow,  more things to get finalized while I'm here.  Errands, errands, errands!!