A Recap of the Winter of 2015-16 and Changed Plans for Summer 2016

I could have called this post: "How I Spent My Winter." It was a rather mild one here in the New York area, but a long one. ILENE was hauled on October 16 and relaunched on May 17.  I worked on her during 57 of the 214 days she was on the hard, almost 25 percent of them. Two of them were spent working at home and two shopping, leaving 53 actually working at the boat. And I had help on six days from Ed, Bob and Jorge, making it 59 man days of labor. Averaging five hours of work per day this meant 295 manhours, or almost 7.5 forty hour weeks.
In addition, I had the bottom soda blasted, the bootstripe spray painted, the propeller rehabilitated and the chain galvanized using the labor of experts with the equipment needed.

Part of the big workload came from the fact that last winter the boat was in the water and her bottom could not be tended to. And part of it was that ILENE is 17 years old and renewal was in order.

I have added up the dollars spent during this winter but will not give you the total because some friends would think me foolish to spend that much.

But it is in winter that time and money is spent. In summer ILENE pays us back with the joy of sailing.  Barring hitches, very little needs to be spent on the boat between now and the fall. I do have"Request" is a far nicer word to use than "Mutiny!" a few more days of work, cleaning the interior and compounding and waxing the topsides, but this can be done amid sailing days.

The first session of the Old Salts is scheduled for this Wednesday afternoon.

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We have also had a change of plans about our destination this summer. This came at the request of the First Mate. "Request" is a far nicer word to use than "Mutiny!"  She is having a problem with her vision and did not want to be so far from friends and doctors.   So while we will be living aboard for the three months, we will not be spending more than four weeks at any one time cruising away from City Island -- and hence not able to go as far as Nova Scotia. I don't like having to change plans and it has taken me a few days to get over my stubbornness, but I'm over it.

One beneficial side effect of not going to Nova Scotia is that we will be able to join the Harlem's annual Summer Cruise.  In fact I volunteered and have been reappointed as "Fleet Captain" and will organize it.