I had the benefit of nephew Mendy’s strong arms one day and we did two jobs on the boat. First was to disassemble, as best we could and only part way the problematic windless. Removing the chain from the anchor after securing the anchor took two applications of the roster numerous whacking with a hammer and Mendy’s strength. And then on the way home he help me get the outboard from the second floor locker to the dinghy on dark and placed it on the dinghy. Both are tasks that I would not have been able to do by myself.
The next day I return by myself, bought a few gallons of gasoline for the outboard, attached the hose ends to the tank and the outboard, started it up (like a brand new engine on the second pull!), drove it to the boat and hoisted the dink to it’s davits. The broken “stripper ring” on the port coach roof winch has been replaced. They sell them in pairs so I have a spare part for next time. And then, while applying lots of zipper grease, I reinstalled the three rolled up plastic enclosure sheets at the stern and on both sides.
During the day I was in communications with s/v Shearwater. The Captain had read my Points East article on favorite Maine ports, which mention the Harlem, looked up the club and found my Fleet Captain email address, and written to me as Roger, asking about moorings at our club on his way there. I told him and had the VHF on when he called the Harlem launch; and made a stop at his boat on the launch ride back to the dock. I tried to give him and his wife a ride into Manhattan, but they were not ready, more interested in doing laundry and taking showers after cruising up from Virginia. If we get ILENE to Stonington when in Maine this summer, we can get to know each other better. He has long has a summer home there and now has a boat.
The first of the two sails was aboard ILENE, with a crew of happy Old Salts. It included Harry, at the helm in the top picture, who had been a friend of Nick, whose Ashe’s we scattered a few years ago, and a couple of new Harlem Social Members, in the second picture, who told me “We have never been on a sailboat before!”
The route included passage west through what I call Kings Point Passage and under the Throggs Neck Bridge. The computer says we traversed 11 NM during our two hours underway. Several others joined us for the après activities from the other boat.
The last sail was with Bennett aboard Ohana for 2.5 hours going out past Ex Rocks and back. There was good wind of 15 to 30 knots near the beam most of the way and we rarely were below six knots. I was not dressed warmly enough for the wind chill and Bennett lent me some clothes. He has finally come up with the equipment needed to keep the gulls from using his boat as their head; always a mystery why they choose one boat over another. We untie and remove a long strip of line with metallic fringes from around the shrouds and take them up by wrapping them on storage boards, and redeploy them to the shrouds before calling for the launch. Dinner at the Club with Bennett.
A lot of my attention has been devoted to preparing for our Arctic cruise, which will be the subject of the next post — with lots of pictures.
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