Two trips to the boat, but with only five hours work. The first trip was to remove the heavy snow fall from the top of the canvas cover; but the wind had done this for me so it was only a matter of taking things from home via car to boat and others in the other direction.
The second trip involved getting ice out of the bilge by chopping a hole through the top inch with the marlinspike and using the dink bailing pump to suck out about four gallons of the water blow. I checked out the new end stopper for the small jib sheet traveler to make sure it fits and composed a text to my friend, Ed Spallina, my helper for tough tasks. I will employ him to get frozen bolts out and to fix the arm that guides the chain from the windlass to the hawse pipe.
I finally found the solution to the hand held end of the dinghy oar that lost its rubber cap. I found a large cork which, with glue, will do the job.
And I figured out a better way to keep the thumb cleats hanging inside the forward end of the boom from continuing to chew up the lines that run past them. Plan one had been to drill them out but this would be and would leave a mess. So I figured I could drill the smallest diameter holes through the sides of the boom and put in a bolt that would hold the thumb cleats up and out of the way. The problem with this solution was aligning the two holes which are 4.5 inches apart. The final solution avoids the need for alignment and involves even less weight: I will drill two holes but run a thin line through both of them with a knot on the outside of each end. The line will support the ounce of troublesome weight and solve the problem elegantly. I'll post a picture when it is done.
I also sanded down all surfaces of the largest remaining cabin sole board, and inserted a piece of wood at the bottom of the companionway ladder with a pit I drilled into it to support and lock the ladder into place.
And it was not all boat work. The first membership meeting of the year was followed by my favorite Club party: International Night. The meeting was run very efficiently, democratically and with good cheer by incoming Commodore Peter Trumfio. No rancorous issues, no dues increases or assessments and last year's income exceeded revenues by a few thousand dollars for the third year in a row. If the economy ever comes back and we get back over 100 active members like we had in 2008, we will really be sitting pretty, with funds for new improvements.
International Night is an organized pot luck with a cash bar and a $15 cash contribution. My food contribution was a large sweet brisket, the recipe I cook for Passover seders; and it was gobbled up which is satisfying too. Lots of delicious food.
Another January evening a group of six Corinthians met for dinner in a Greenwitch Village restaurant to eat and talk about our boating adventures
I was not as lazy in January as it might seem. Six days, two of them for going and coming back, were consumed on a trip to Carlsbad CA, perhaps 30 miles north of San Diego, to visit Lene's brother and his wife. We could have chartered a boat in San Diego for a few hours, but they declined my offer to do so. We did visit an inlet from the sea where migratory birds rest up, walked along the town beach and visited an organization run by the zoo where we saw two 65 pound tiger cubs playing gleefully. A restful little family vacation.
Wednesday, January 31, 2018
Monday, January 22, 2018
"At Sea in the City" by William Kornblum and "Manhattan Beach" by Jennifer Egan
I can't sail when it is this cold and the boat is winterized and on the hard, but I can read about the waters. Both of these are very well written with poetic figures of speech.
The first of them was lent to me by sailing friend Bennett. He thought I would like it and he was right. Mr. Kornblum is a professor of sociology at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. He lives on Long Island's south shore where he kept his boat, "Tradition" a 24 foot Crosby catboat built in 1910 and restored by him and his family. Quite a diametrically different craft from "ILENE," her lower boom extends aft of her stern and holds the bottom of her single quadrilateral tanbark sail. Her mast is only 26 feet high and even with a metal fixed keel that was added by a prior owner, her draft is only four feet. So she can go in shallower water and under lower fixed bridges as compared to my boat.
The book describes Tradition's last multi-day one-way cruise from the south shore, in Jamaica Bay, through New York Harbor, up the East River and out into Long Island Sound. This was at the end of her 17 years of service to his family. Some days of this cruise he was alone, while on others he was joined by, e.g., his wife, friends, and dogs. Each chapter describes a passage of the cruise and begins with a sketch chart of the area. Each contains bits of the history of New York and his personal memories of prior experiences in that place. Two of my favorites of his stops were (1) off Manhattan at 21st Street in the East River, where he worked at the cement plant located there during his summers while a Cornell undergraduate and where he anchored in ten feet of water for a late second breakfast, and (2) at Hallett's Cove, off Astoria Queens., where he anchored and dinked in to get his dogs. I had not known of either of these anchorages and believe they may be worth a try, though perhaps not suitable for an overnight stop with the changing of the tides.
Tradition suffered an engine failure and had to sail up through Hells Gate. This passage ended, when the tide changed, at a dock on North Brother Island. ILENE also suffered from an engine failure in these water, see blog posting in June 2016; neither boat suffered any damage.
I looked up the author and invited him for a sail: "your boat or mine"; it looks like I will have the pleasure of his company in May on ILENE. Any New York based cruising sailor, or even one who does not sail here, will enjoy this book.
The second selection is a very enjoyable and easy to read novel by a prize winning author that my book group selected. Though not about sailing as such, it has a very New York water theme. Set in the late depression of the 1930's and WWII, its spunky heroine becomes a diver. This was before scuba, when the suit weighed over 200 pounds and air had to be pumped down by a grinder above. She worked at the Brooklyn Navy Yard and the book has 101 characters, several of them major characters. Egan takes the reader to much of New York and tells a story about the Irish mafia of that time period. How do such diverse elements fit into the same novel? If you read it, you will enjoy finding out.
The first of them was lent to me by sailing friend Bennett. He thought I would like it and he was right. Mr. Kornblum is a professor of sociology at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. He lives on Long Island's south shore where he kept his boat, "Tradition" a 24 foot Crosby catboat built in 1910 and restored by him and his family. Quite a diametrically different craft from "ILENE," her lower boom extends aft of her stern and holds the bottom of her single quadrilateral tanbark sail. Her mast is only 26 feet high and even with a metal fixed keel that was added by a prior owner, her draft is only four feet. So she can go in shallower water and under lower fixed bridges as compared to my boat.
The book describes Tradition's last multi-day one-way cruise from the south shore, in Jamaica Bay, through New York Harbor, up the East River and out into Long Island Sound. This was at the end of her 17 years of service to his family. Some days of this cruise he was alone, while on others he was joined by, e.g., his wife, friends, and dogs. Each chapter describes a passage of the cruise and begins with a sketch chart of the area. Each contains bits of the history of New York and his personal memories of prior experiences in that place. Two of my favorites of his stops were (1) off Manhattan at 21st Street in the East River, where he worked at the cement plant located there during his summers while a Cornell undergraduate and where he anchored in ten feet of water for a late second breakfast, and (2) at Hallett's Cove, off Astoria Queens., where he anchored and dinked in to get his dogs. I had not known of either of these anchorages and believe they may be worth a try, though perhaps not suitable for an overnight stop with the changing of the tides.
Tradition suffered an engine failure and had to sail up through Hells Gate. This passage ended, when the tide changed, at a dock on North Brother Island. ILENE also suffered from an engine failure in these water, see blog posting in June 2016; neither boat suffered any damage.
I looked up the author and invited him for a sail: "your boat or mine"; it looks like I will have the pleasure of his company in May on ILENE. Any New York based cruising sailor, or even one who does not sail here, will enjoy this book.
The second selection is a very enjoyable and easy to read novel by a prize winning author that my book group selected. Though not about sailing as such, it has a very New York water theme. Set in the late depression of the 1930's and WWII, its spunky heroine becomes a diver. This was before scuba, when the suit weighed over 200 pounds and air had to be pumped down by a grinder above. She worked at the Brooklyn Navy Yard and the book has 101 characters, several of them major characters. Egan takes the reader to much of New York and tells a story about the Irish mafia of that time period. How do such diverse elements fit into the same novel? If you read it, you will enjoy finding out.
Monday, January 8, 2018
Last Two Weeks of 2017 and Recap
It took me three half days of work to take apart the two heads to solve the flowback problem (brown water, when fully pumped out, becomes tan water rather than pure clean sea water). On the first day of this project I removed the porcelain bowls that are fastened with gaskets, each atop a pump. Each bowl is held in place with four brass bolts and I broke two of the eight: One needed me to use vise grips to screw it out and as a result, the soft bronze hex head is too chewed up to be reused. The other broke off flush in the threaded hole through the top of the pump. It will have to be drilled out -- a spring project for my trusty expert friend Ed Spallina. Then the flowback, according to Groco's expert, Patrick, is caused because the two white plastic piston rings that fit into grooves on the outside of the each piston are letting fluids back in. Solution: remove them, hammer gently on the top side of each to flatten them out a bit, thereby increasing their outside diameter to get a flusher fit against the inside of the cylinder in which they ride and reinstall. I broke one ring with the hammering (not gentle enough) but the replacements have already arrived. Removing and reinstalling the pistons that are held in place with a bolt through their center into the rod that pushes them up and down when the pump's handle is used, is quite an ingenious trick involving a threaded rod. I used a bolt of the correct diameter and thread that I had on hand to pull them up and out but I will have to cut off the bolt's head to get the pistons back in. So I'm continuing to learn. Groco should do a video showing how this is to be done. If anyone wants to know more (and assuming I can get it to work) let me know and I'll try to help. When It gets warm again, I'll put them back together and hope for the best.
Rounding out the year were two delicious dinners at the home of Bennett and Harriet. For New Year's Eve they also invited, among others, Sheila, so it was five sailors in attendance and, by the way, we were all happy to end the party, though it was great fun, before midnight.
And the recap of 2017
I've divided the year into three parts and looked at my boating participation of various kinds, in each of these segments: PART ONE, Before the May 8 launch; PART TWO, May 8 to hauling on October 15; and PART THREE, October 16 to Year End.
(Some definitions are needed to understand the table below. Any day on which I sailed on any boat and/or lived on ILENE is characterized as a "sailing day", even if I worked part or all of the day as well. Any day which is not a sailing day is called a work day if I worked aboard (or, at home, for) the boat, even if part of the day was a social day with fellow boaters, a club function or a boating museum experience.
Part One Part Two Part Three Total
Total Days in
This Segment 129 159 77 360
Work Days 39 16 15 70
"Other" Days 21 13 06 40
Sail and/or
"Liveaboard" Days 0 118 01 118
Total Boat
Days 60 147 21 228
Non Boating
Related Days 69 12 56 132
What this shows is rather obvious: That boating activity during the part of the year in which the boat floats is wonderfully intense compared to the early and late parts of the year when it is more work and no play except for the "Other"
days.
Drilling down to the fun part of the year, the 118 sailing days, these included the 87 days of the Nova Scotia cruise plus 11 days before it started and 20 after we got back.
How many of the 118 were days of actual underway sailing as compared to mere living aboard while attached by the dock lines, anchor or mooring? Alas, only 78: ten before the cruise started, 63 during the cruise, and five more after we returned.
Seventy three of those 78 underway days were aboard ILENE with the remaining five on other peoples' boats: two on Ohana, and one each on Deuce of Hearts, Leeds the Way and Jazz Sail.
And how many friends sailed aboard ILENE on her 73 different sailing days?
Well four of the days were Old Salt sails, (plus three other Old Salt sails on other peoples' boats, and the folks who I sailed with on other peoples' boats are not included in this next statistic unless they also sailed aboard ILENE. Including my loyal mate, who was with me the entire 87 days of the Nova Scotia cruise plus three of the fifteen day sails, 37 different souls entrusted their lives to my hand, several of them two or three times.
So all told, another great year of sailing though only 5.3 months long.
If you conclude that I have a bit of compulsive obsessive disorder. and this posting is your evidence, well, you are right. But it is harmless, right?
Rounding out the year were two delicious dinners at the home of Bennett and Harriet. For New Year's Eve they also invited, among others, Sheila, so it was five sailors in attendance and, by the way, we were all happy to end the party, though it was great fun, before midnight.
And the recap of 2017
I've divided the year into three parts and looked at my boating participation of various kinds, in each of these segments: PART ONE, Before the May 8 launch; PART TWO, May 8 to hauling on October 15; and PART THREE, October 16 to Year End.
(Some definitions are needed to understand the table below. Any day on which I sailed on any boat and/or lived on ILENE is characterized as a "sailing day", even if I worked part or all of the day as well. Any day which is not a sailing day is called a work day if I worked aboard (or, at home, for) the boat, even if part of the day was a social day with fellow boaters, a club function or a boating museum experience.
Part One Part Two Part Three Total
Total Days in
This Segment 129 159 77 360
Work Days 39 16 15 70
"Other" Days 21 13 06 40
Sail and/or
"Liveaboard" Days 0 118 01 118
Total Boat
Days 60 147 21 228
Non Boating
Related Days 69 12 56 132
What this shows is rather obvious: That boating activity during the part of the year in which the boat floats is wonderfully intense compared to the early and late parts of the year when it is more work and no play except for the "Other"
days.
Drilling down to the fun part of the year, the 118 sailing days, these included the 87 days of the Nova Scotia cruise plus 11 days before it started and 20 after we got back.
How many of the 118 were days of actual underway sailing as compared to mere living aboard while attached by the dock lines, anchor or mooring? Alas, only 78: ten before the cruise started, 63 during the cruise, and five more after we returned.
Seventy three of those 78 underway days were aboard ILENE with the remaining five on other peoples' boats: two on Ohana, and one each on Deuce of Hearts, Leeds the Way and Jazz Sail.
And how many friends sailed aboard ILENE on her 73 different sailing days?
Well four of the days were Old Salt sails, (plus three other Old Salt sails on other peoples' boats, and the folks who I sailed with on other peoples' boats are not included in this next statistic unless they also sailed aboard ILENE. Including my loyal mate, who was with me the entire 87 days of the Nova Scotia cruise plus three of the fifteen day sails, 37 different souls entrusted their lives to my hand, several of them two or three times.
So all told, another great year of sailing though only 5.3 months long.
If you conclude that I have a bit of compulsive obsessive disorder. and this posting is your evidence, well, you are right. But it is harmless, right?
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