Another month with more progress… again moving forward is alway to goal… We have a targeted “soft date” to launch on our adventure and this now leaves us with just a few months to get the “life sustaining” items completed and done so we can leave.
We started out this month with a huge list and started it off with a weekend of beach time with some friends who have been gone for several months and just returned. What a welcome home party that was! Work this month was extremely limited as Andy’s girls had to come home for college and return 2 weeks later back into their dorms. That essentially took out 2 full weekend this month so we squeezed in what we could when we could.
A new fresh water toilet was purchased for our cabin (it’s yet to be installed but on the list “to leave”.
Andy finished the bushing that was needed for the Auto pilot and today (8/24) is working on the wiring of the auto pilot. Once this is done, we can calibrate while in our slip. We will do the full calibration when the engine is running again and we can get off the dock for our 1st true shake down voyage.
The engine is and continues to be an ongoing issue. As of today (8/24) the engine is still not running. We have had to replace the 4 injectors and now the pump appears to broken so the engine is not getting any fuel to start running. Anyway once the wiring is done on the autopilot, we can empty the aft head “garage” and move all items back to their storage location under the bed.
I have gone thru and updated the perishable provisions list… again… and just need to get some filler items to top off. My goal this weekend is to get this boat ready to leave by next friday for the shake down cruise and fully test this girl out to see if we will need more time to make more repairs or if we are able to leave as planned.
Andy did get the GPS unit installed which goes to the navigation system and auto pilot. So once again, baby steps, it’s all a move forward in the right direction.
“More Better” our dinghy was given some love and attention this week as well. We took her back to the RV and gave her a good scrub to remove all of the barnacles and some growth, changed out the lower gear oil on the motor and then washed and ceramic coated the hypalon and hull. Brought her back and got her back in her spot on the davits.
Can’t believe I almost forgot that we got the Epirb installed and fixed to the rail!
Ticked some thing off the “to leave list” and still have quite a bit to do and time is running out. It’s almost time to start thinking about quitting our jobs and moving onboard full time soon as well. Dogs will need their shots and permit for the Bahamas but I can’t do that too early so we need to figure out when we can make the plans to do that as well.
