So happy to be home!!

Our beach. I love it!

H.O.M.E

Long trip. Glad to be here. Lots more trees down from winter storms. Tons of work to do here. Happy to be home!!

Having Fun

...at the KOA campground in Mount Pleasant S.C. with grandson Bram. Despite the rain that started minutes after this picture was taken, we are getting some good one on one play time in with a crazy and fun three year old. Right now he is napping, but in a few minutes will wake up to all the toys he chose for himself at WalMart today. Life is good!

Christ Church Frederica

Episcopal church, st simons island

A garden chair...

Live Oak, Azalea, and Spanish Moss...

On St Simon's Island

Evening with Friends

Arrived

We are back at the Coastal Georgia r.v. Resort. This time we have a very nice site - this is our view! Can't complain at all! We are going in later to have dinner with our friends on St. Simons Island, and if the weather holds out tomorrow we will get to have a beach walk and a tour of the town. Looking forward to it!

Relaxing

in Welaka, Florida at our friend's house. We are on our way back to Rhode Island - slowly. Tomorrow we head to St. Simon's island for a couple of days, then to Charleston for four days. Packing everything up at the boatyard was exhausting, so we are happy to be lazy about getting back home!

Really?

One fire ant, on twenty acres of land, has to find MY FOOT and once again torture me. Thank you.

Here we are...

...being hauled out of the water as the search continues for the source of the clanging. Nothing they have done to this point has solved anything. Notice the *tropical* setting.

**see previous post for reference to tropical...

Will Trade!

That's right. For sale, or will trade for a 14 ft. ladder. There hasn't been any interest from anyone to buy this poor old dinghy, and although it literally came free with the engine we bought Darryl still feels it is worth something. That something being a ladder. We actually already have a ladder, which we need to climb aboard the boat when it is in the work yard or storage area. The problem is it is only a 10 foot ladder, which falls a few feet short of what would make for a comfortable "landing" . The last step up is a giant leap -not for mankind, and definitely somewhat awkward for those of us with short legs. The boat goes back into storage on Friday so hopefully we will make a trade before then.
In the meantime we are still at the boatyard. The little clanging noise in the engine that Darryl is intent on solving has turned into a two week project. And lots of money. They have replaced a bunch of things, ordered more parts, taken out the transmission, ordered more parts, sighed and shaken their heads, put parts in, taken parts out and then ordered more parts. The UPS man has taken to waving to us when he drives by. Today another part has arrived. The boat has once again become a giant floating toolbox, so Scooter and I moved back into the camper which is in a storage area along with a bunch of parked cars, trucks and heavy equipment. In situations like this cruisers are frequently known to use the expression "We are Living the Dream!" - mostly used to refer to what the outside world THINKS we are doing. All in all however, we do agree that for the most part sunny, warm weather trumps the aggravation of boat repairs. The definition of "Cruising" for most of us is simply repairing your boat in a tropical setting. Soon enough we will be home remembering this winter with humor, telling friends our stories while they tell us how they envy what do. And for today? I am just keeping my fingers crossed for that 14 ft ladder!

One Happy Man!

Honda motor for Sale!

We are now the proud owners of a new, 9 year old, dinghy engine. After about a week of searching Darryl finally found this one for sale about an hour and a half north of here. I could hear the screeching of the tires as he left the parking lot yesterday to go and look at it. There seemed to be no doubt in my mind that he would return with it, beaming proudly like the father of a newborn son. As excited as a 3 year old on Christmas morning. It is an old Yamaha 2 stroke engine - that's 2 strokes less complicated than the Honda 4 stroke we spent so much time and effort trying to coax back to life. What is the difference you ask? It boils down to this. One works and the other doesn't. At least for now. He also came home with another dinghy, deflated and rolled in a ball. Really? I have no idea what we are going to do with it. (If it deflates and can be rolled in a ball you won't catch me floating around in it!) And whether they work or not, we now have two engines and two dinghies. I actually feel at this point we are one step closer to being approached by the producers of "Hoarders". Oh well. Off I go to help with the official transferring of the engines. Wish me luck!

Boatyard. Still.

After a brief trip up to Port Hope/Cobourg/Toronto here we are still at the boatyard. It seems while I was away Darryl decided to dig into the engine on the big boat and remove the fuel injectors and the exhaust manifold. Nope, I am not really sure why either, except the engine had been making some "clanging" noises and he hopes by doing some maintenance the "clanging" will go away. In the meantime he had Eric, the yard manager, order some "parts" (really? Parts of what?) which were supposed to come in Friday but BIG SURPRISE did not show up. So here we are waiting. The hope is that when everything is reassembled we will head back to Stuart for a week before we have to come back here and put the boat away again for the spring/summer/fall. In the meantime if you have been hanging on the edge of your seat waiting for news of the dinghy engine (too many engines to look after in my opinion) we got the news from the mechanic that, alas, it seems to be a piston problem or some such thing. Anyway my eyes just glazed over when Darryl started telling me about it. The bottom line is that is going to be just too darn expensive (not to mention impractical) to fix this 15 year old Honda. Darryl's days of voodoo magic to get the thing going are (just about) over. The mechanic said we might have a couple of more weeks limping along with it. Sigh. When we started this cruising thing back in the 90's, I am pretty sure the brochure showed palm tress, sunshine, hammocks and piña coladas! Well, we do have the sunshine. And, while plugged in at the dock, we also have our Keurig coffee maker (YESSSSS!) and a heater for these few days of chilly weather. Add a HONEYBELL orange and life is GOOD!