The Haul Out

Here are a couple vids of Mother Culture being hauled out...

And a few *Before* pics of her bottom...

What a beautiful keel she has!

Come Monday

Today was a pretty big day... Ben put the finishing touches on his newly designed exhaust system and the Atomic 4 is purring like a kitten again. Now, we need to pick up the jib from the sail repair shop and we'll be good to go. I foresee a sailing adventure in our near future!!

This is Ben, tucked inside the lazarette, working on the exhaust.

Here we have the bowels of the boat. The white tubing on the left is the blower, which pumps gas fumes out of the bilge before starting the engine. The mechanism in the middle attaches to the tiller at the top and the rudder at the bottom, for steering. The black tubing on the right is part of the new exhaust, which attaches to the muffler (which is in the back lazarette and not visible in this picture).

For a little perspective, this is a view of the tiller in the cockpit.

Saturday Morning on the Mooring Field

Here are a couple videos of a sea lion and some seafowl frolicking off the stern of our boat. Boy, that never gets old! Happy Saturday, everyone! :)

TGIF (but Saturday would be better)

I'd like to whine about the 5 days I spent on the boat alone, but I'll spare you. Instead, I'll just say I rowed just under a mile each day. I lost about 4 pounds. And I cried for the first time in *oh-I-don't-know* a year. It's been a rough week.

On a positive note, I was able to snap some shots of these pelicans as they cruised by the boat. Interestingly, they appear more colorful through the lens than the naked eye. They are very timid and quite camera-shy. In the first photo, you can see his wings raised as he gets ready to fly off. The second photo, their backs are toward me. They see me and are attempting to duck and run. (HeHe). The pelican in the last photo is giving me evil eye. (I know it when I see it).

25 Random Things

In the tradition of facebook notes and myspace surveys, I've decided to create a list of 25 random things I'd like to share... not necessarily about me or us, but instead about "boat life":

1. We DO NOT HAVE a shower on our boat. (We instead pay a monthly fee for access to the showers/gym/pools/hot tubs/sauna at the Sheraton hotel less than an a mile from our mooring field).

2. We DO NOT HAVE hot water.

3. The icy cold water that we DO have on board is carried BY US in 6 gallon jugs (36 lbs. when full) from the dock to the dinghy to the boat. These are extremely heavy for me and I am not physically able to lift them from the dinghy onto Mother Culture. Ben always takes care of that part.

4. We get ALL of our electricity from the sun. This means that we never leave things plugged in when they aren't in use and we are very conscious of every bit of electricity we do use.

5. We do not have a heater on the boat. We stay warm with body heat and blankets.

6. The square footage of the cabin (enclosed area) of the boat is less than 200 square feet. (Probably a lot less than).

7. We can't flush toilet paper down our toilet. And, we learned this the hard way. (I'll let you use your imaginations here).

8. We don't "flush" our toilet. It requires pumping.

9. We live downstream. Everything you rinse down your gutters ends up in our "yard". (This includes chemicals, oils, trash, etc.)

10. When it rains here in San Diego, the water gets contaminated (see #9) and if you want to stay healthy, you best stay out of the water.

11. Two of our live-aboard friends fell in the water during/after the last rainstorm and both contracted a flesh-eating bacterial infection and had to go to the emergency room for treatment. Now, I make sure to always wash my hands after touching the water during rainstorms.

12. Ben cleans the bottom of our boat. He uses his scuba gear to go underwater and scrape all the algae, animals, etc. off the bottom of the boat. It takes him a lot of time and elbow-grease. He also cleans the bottom of both dinghies.

13. Many homeless people live on the benches and sidewalks along the bay where our boat is moored. Most people I know are disgusted by homeless people. I'm intrigued by them.

14. Lola is so well potty-trained that she will not go to the bathroom on the boat (even when we ask her to). 99.9% of the time, we MUST bring her to shore to potty. In other words, we have to make trips early in the morning and just before bed. (We're still working on this one...)

15. Ben has an inflatable dinghy with a motor but most of the time, we use my plastic dinghy and row to shore. (I recently purchased a trolling motor and once I get a battery for it, I will use that when the current is too strong to fight against).

16. We live completely off the grid, which means we don't rely on any public utility services. (Go GREEN!)

17. We have the best view of the San Diego skyline. And we pay the cheapest rent within city limits (with the exception of the people living in motorhomes).

18. On major holidays, we can watch (from our boat) 5 synchronized fireworks shows at various points around the bay.

19. The Coast Guard Station is very close to our boat and on many a day, they run their helicopters for hours on end. They are loud, they create blustery winds and rotor wash, and they sure seem to be wasting a lot of fuel during their drills.

20. On holidays, it's fun to turn on the VHF radio and listen to all the goings-on in the various waterways around San Diego.

21. We don't have an oven. Instead we have one butane burner to cook on.

22. We have a propane grill. Unfortunately, we lost the control knob in the water the other night and a new one costs $30+.

23. We live on the water which means if you drop something, you probably aren't going to get it back unless you go diving for it.

24. One day I realized our bucket was missing and I concluded it must have fallen into the water and drifted away. Later that day, on a walk downtown, we found our bucket across the bay, anchored in the rocks. We got our bucket back. :)

25. My dinghy has been "saved" once by a neighbor. Ben "saved" his own dinghy with my dinghy. And we have "saved" three other dinghies on the run... Always pay it forward.

Updates

I've been slacking again with the updates, so here goes...



The three of us spent most of the month of January at the hotel while the owner was in India. Ben needed to be on site for any problems that arose and I filled in at the Front Desk for a few weekends.



The picture to the left is the crusty muffler/exhaust that Ben pulled out of Mother Culture. He is currently reconstructing a new one and once that is installed (along with a few other repairs and a coat of engine paint), we will resume sailing.

Other than that, I don't have much to report. I did have the opportunity to experience my first "bad" storm at the mooring field, back in December. I call it "bad" but maybe some of the seasoned veterans of the mooring field wouldn't agree. Ben had to work that day and the storm was pretty much over by the time he got back to the boat. I felt a little queasiness by the 6th or 7th hour, but I survived. (Actually, I slept through most of it... I thought I'd read some books but my body thought otherwise.) I'm anxiously awaiting the next storm. (Hopefully Ben will be around for the next one! ;) Here is a short (and shoddy) video clip of the storm:

What's Up

Since we got back from the Grand Canyon, we haven’t done any sailing. There are some things we need to accomplish before we head out again, so we’ve been working toward those goals.



The trim on our roller furling (headsail- or the one that goes in the front [bow] of the boat) is very torn so we took it down and brought it to a sail shop to be repaired. We have some alternate sails which we brought to a park and unrolled to check the condition of. In the interim, we’ll probably try using one of those sails the next time we go out.























Since we aren’t experienced sailors, we’d be foolish to sail without the security of a working engine (that has the proper amount of oil). We’ve been brainstorming how to check the oil level in the Atomic 4 engine (it seems the engine is lacking a dipstick). We will most likely research how much oil the engine should hold, drain the oil, fill it with the proper amount of new oil, and create a dipstick of our own. And when I say “we”, I mean Ben. My knowledge of engines is very limited. In January, I plan to enroll in an introductory class on automotive engines to better my knowledge. (Yes, I realize this is a marine engine, but I have to start somewhere).














Other than that, we’re just waiting for winter to hit. We’ve had the pleasure of experiencing our first two rain storms on the water (and I use the term “storm” loosely here in San Diego). The sound of rain hitting the deck is soothing, just as it was in Tater. However, the sensation of a sneakered foot stepping into 3 inches of water in the dinghy (not to mention sitting in soaking clothes while rowing from the dock to the boat) is much less soothing. We’ve each got a raincoat. I’m sure after a couple more rain storms, I’ll be hitting up West Marine for a pair of foul-weather pants, some rubber boots, and a waterproof bag for my belongings.

Sailing Pics

Here are some pics from our last sailing journey. We sailed toward the south end of the bay and under the Coronado Bridge. We had a chance to play around with the sails and learn more about how they work with the wind. There is a lot of water traffic (often in the form of giant military ships) coming from that area of the bay so we also got some practice in getting out of the way... FAST!

The Convention Center















Some Crazy Navy Ship

Me @ the tiller

Lola Chillin'

Getting Ready to Sail Under the the Bridge

Under the Bridge

A View in the Other Direction

Ben & Lola Taking a Break

The Aircraft Carrier that came up behind us... FAST!

Me in my Foul Weather Gear

The Mainsail

Ben in his Foul Weather Gear

Lord Hornblower

Dipping the Rail

There are a few reasons it has taken me so long to post this blog:
1) The photo upload process on this blogger is slow and therefore a deterrent.
2) Most of the photos we take while sailing look exactly like all of the other photos we've taken while sailing. (Hopefully this will change someday.)
3) Our sailing experience a few weeks ago scared the $%!# out of me and left me deep in thought (and therefore speechless) for a period of time.

Here's what happened:

I believe it was a Wednesday, about three weeks ago. After two successful SOLO sailing expeditions around San Diego Bay, we decided we were ready for the ocean. The wind was working in our favor. On a normal day, we'd have to tack (zigzag) back and forth across the bay for 2+ hours before crossing into the Pacific. On this particular day, the wind was pulling us straight down the middle of the bay toward the ocean. We were cruising fast... and we knew we'd be there before long. Suddenly, as we cleared the corner of Coronado Island, the wind shifted and knocked Mother Culture on her side (eloquently referred to as "dipping the rail"). Everything in the cabin began crashing to the floor. I zipped Lola into her Pup Tent for fear she would tumble overboard. That day, the words "batten down the hatches" took on real meaning for us. In addition to battening down the hatches, it appears we must batten down the books, batten down the dishes and batten down everything else, including Lola (and, honestly, I may even batten down myself).

Not only did everything go flying around the cabin, but the boat herself was flying...so fast that, after careful consideration (or perhaps panic) we turned the boat around, rolled in the jib, and took a relaxing cruise back to the mooring ball under mainsail alone. Let's just say we sailed faster that day than we've sailed to date. So fast that I had to give some serious thought to this sailing thing.

What did we learn?

1) Always, ALWAYS batten everything down. No matter what the weather looks like and no matter where we are going.
2) When the wind is knocking you down on your side, let out the mainsail. (This we learned from some of our good neighbors).

The following pictures were taken on our journey back to the ball. (Unfortunately, in the heat of the moment, I forgot to snap some shots of the boat on her side and everything crashing down below.)

Sailing: Take One (and Two)

We've gone sailing a couple times now... so I'm posting some pics from our first two journeys. We tacked back and forth around the bay until the wind died down and then we headed back to the mooring ball. Thankfully, each time we were accompanied by a different experienced sailor, allowing us the opportunity to learn two different perspectives (and without too much worry!) Next time we will probably give it a go by ourselves.







Pictures from Voyage #1

Me at the helm


Me at the helm with Charlie


Ben adjusting the boom


Ben at the helm


The Stars & Stripes (America's Cup Winner 1987 & 1988)





Pictures of Voyage #2

Ben and Scott on the deck


Ben working the tiller


Ben working the tiller while Scott pulls the sheet

One Giant Leap

Wednesday was a big day for us. We finished our 7-week Boating Safety course with an average score of 99.5%! Although the course is not required in California, we figured we should have some idea how to tie knots, read navigation aids and plot charts, etc. But this news is small news compared to what we accomplished earlier in the day.

After weeks of frustration with the Atomic 4 engine (broken starter, clogged carburetor, etc.), Ben adjusted the timing and got her purring like a kitten. And we finally left the mooring ball for the first time by ourselves! WHAT A RUSH!

Thankfully, the mooring ball to our starboard side is currently unoccupied... that made the task a little easier for us. Once we managed to untie her and back her out, we headed towards the dock with the pumpout station. We came up a little too quick on the first run so we decided to turn her around and motor around the outer edge of the moorings to get a feel for the boat and the engine. Once we figured out how fast and far we'd drift in neutral, Ben coasted us up to the dock and I jumped off the boat to tie her off. We took turns taking pictures (see below), pumped her out, washed the deck and headed back to the mooring ball. The pressure was on coming back into the mooring as we have an audience of homeless people watching from the land. (They were probably there when we left the mooring ball but we were too preoccupied to notice.) We got her in, tied her off and had a cocktail to celebrate our achievement! (But who really needs cocktails when you're running on pure adrenaline. There is nothing like it!)

Now that we feel confident the motor will start every time... and we have an idea of what is involved in getting into and out of our mooring, we will be taking her out much more (hopefully with some of the experienced sailors we've met who live out here on the water). We will post pictures of our experiences as they happen...


Ben @ the helm














An unobstructed view of San Diego from the bow of Mother Culture














Ben cheering for a job well done


















Pirate Ben... Aargh!














Me on the bow giving a Thumbs Up














Me again...














Mother Culture and Me at the dock















Lola showing absolutely no interest