The adventures of Carey & Heather to rid their life of the complicated security of traditional life. Our boat "Cerridwen", a Fantasia 35, will carry us from the Napa Valley of California to many distant shores.
We made it to Benicia around 2pm'ish. What an awesome ride. we had the wind at our back, with an apposing tide. We were pretty happy with the whole trip. We had to wait till 9am to get some fuel for the ride down river to Benicia. Wow it was beautiful. There wasn't too many boats on the water for a Saturday morning. The weather was perfect. Just enough of a breeze to keep a slight wind at your back, and cool enough for me to be able to only wear 1 layer of sun protection. The kiddz had a ball too. They just wandered around, slept, and just checked everything out.
This is where we plan to spend some quality time with each other, and get familiar with Cerridwen, before the leap.
We launched on Thursday the 12th, not Friday the 13th, So that was the rising, FULL Honey Moon. And that day she said she would bring them by in the afternoon. Well she got busy and forgot the time, and said she would bring it in the evening. She got to the boat around 8:3o. She told us that every grape in these bottles were hand picked, de~stemmed, crushed, and everything, by her two hands. It was her first attempt at making wine. She purchased the rights to a small vineyard, with Pinot Noir grapes. She hadn't made it before, so it was a new experience for her. She literally poured herself into these grapes. She did it all by herself. Everything.
We have another bottle, we intend on partaking of this one.
We have been chatting about when to do our 'maiden voyage' with SV/Cerridwen. Well yesterday the Cap'n called and said that he was thinking of taking her out when he got home from work. He needed to change the oil, so the oil will be nice and warm. When he got home, the wind was still blowing pretty good, so he kabashed the deal. Then right after that the wind died down, and the Cap'n said 'lets do this' and we stripped the windows off, and the wind picked up again, and kabash. So I started to think about dinner down below, and the Cap'n stuck his head down and said 'ok this time for real'. We stripped the windows again, and threw the lines overboard and took the hell off. Haha not really, we did untie her, and got underway towards the mouth of the marina. The Cap'n was awesome. We went out, down river a little bit, and back, into the marina to out spot at the end of the dock. We had a blast.
The water was pretty calm, the tide was high. You can't get to the marina at low tide, there is a berm right at the entrance. When you go out, at high tide, you have to stay in the middle, and head left out the entrance. Then coming back, you have to come in from the right. There is an older Cap'n across the dock from us, that ran aground on his way out the other day. He got a good laugh out of it too.
Our Maiden Voyage wasn't very far, but I will tell you what, there is nothing like taking off, just the two of us, on a voyage. Continuing our adventures, together.
The launch was alot different than I thought it would be. Instead of being in the sling, we were actually lifted from a flat trailer. It was pretty trick how they tilted the heads of the 'arms', fit like a glove, and all of them acted as one to lift it straight up. I tried not to take a bunch of pictures because the guys were trying to avoid the camera. They did an awesome job hanging out while the Cap'n went aboard and made sure all the the through holes weren't leaking, and the stuffing box was dribbling a little, but that means he didn't over tighten the Rudder. The Cap'n had the tools all ready, anticipitating the need to tighten the stuffing box a little. They backed her straight in.
There is really no feeling like the anticipation of a smooth launch. All the times you dreamt of this exact moment. All the times you thought of all the things that needed to be done pre~launch, and all the things you need to be doing during the launch, and then all the post launch things that need to be done after the launch. That feeling when everything went just as anticipated. No surprises.
The next morning Duke and Doug, with Cruising Sea Services, came out with their tanks. Cleaned the fuel, and pressure washed the inside of the tanks with the fuel. It was quite interesting how they processed the fuel through filters. And it was under $350.00. That is including the filters, and his travel time. It only took a couple of hours. We only have 4" of fuel in the tank right now. Doug said that the tanks can only condensate on the walls of an empty tank. It is better to run with a full fuel tank, less condensation.
Now time to get the Diesel cleaned, Dusty is coming out on the 12th, or 13th. The first thing after getting in the water, and now make sure the diesel is properly filtered, and the 'guck' off the bottom, getting mixed in. I guess he will probably go through 4+filters. We have decided to plug the through hole for the old transducer, until we know if we want to put something there. The method he uses, uses elevation for flow, so he need to do it when we are lower to the ground, instead of being on stilts.
