Life on s/v High Country

New Roles

2009-01-16T09:10:00.007-05:00

Rick is recently unemployed and therefore has more time on his hands than I do. As a result, he has resumed his position as Chief Dishwasher and is also now Apprentice Breadmaker.

We're back!

2008-11-02T17:59:00.020-05:00

I could make all kinds of excuses as to why there has been such a long delay in a new post (graduate school, busy Vineyard summer, ambivalence about a blog devoted to boat life when living on land, etc.) but I'm going to get on with things and post some fun new pics of the latest crew member to High Country, Spud, a 4-month old golden retriever. Granted, we've moved back ashore to our winter rental, he gets crewmember status since we still regard ourselves as "boaties." So, without further ado, heeeeeeeere's Spud!

Obviously taking to boat life well and finding his niche in the water world (as well as new things to chew!). We got Spud at the beginning of October, just after we'd moved ashore, so he wouldn't have to make too many adjustments at once.

Spud's first dinghy ride. At first, he was very nervous about the floating dinghy dock and dinghy as well, putting up a big fuss and racket, but over the course of a week, he got quite accustomed to both and now leaps into the dinghy like and ol' pro.

"Don't forget to save room for Spud!"

Our winter rental is minutes from the beach. Spud loves to eat seaweed, which does nothing for his digestion. Fortunately, he's mostly given up eating seashells, but he does enjoy carrying around the occasional washed ashore horseshoe crab.

Tunneling through seaweed.

One warm afternoon, I decided Spud ought to start swimming, so I began by throwing sticks into the water in gradually deeper waters so that before he knew it, he was swimming. After ten minutes of that, I brought him back to the house, attempted to give him a quick rinse-off (rather unsuccessfully), then toweled him off and buried him in his blanket, since he was shivering pretty hard.

So many choices! How's a dog to choose?

Spud hangs with Uncle Winslow after a short romp.

Taskmaster Spud keeps an eye on Rick's sit-ups, making sure he doesn't cheat.

A fun joke by visiting Rod and Kristin (Rick's brother and sister-in-law) left Spud with a new favorite toy, a rather realistic looking mouse.

Spud looking vicious with his mouse. Like his lambie that he came with, he mauls these stuffed animals from time to time, but never tears them apart.

Awwwwwwwe. Quality time with the dog on his turf. We sleep on a double-bed, therefore, not a lot of extra room for a dog, though he is occasionally invited up for a snuggle.

Spud's first Halloween. He did rather well and was happy to chew his rawhide rather than the pumpkin.

New Year's Resolutions

2007-12-30T09:26:00.001-05:00

Hey Everyone!
As you consider making New Year's Resolutions,
take 20 minutes to watch The Story of Stuff
What do you suppose an alpaca's new year's resolution is?
If you have an idea, leave it as a comment, we'll see how many we can come up with and I'll forward them to the alpaca farm here on the Vineyard and see if they happen in 2008.

Haulout 2007

2007-12-28T18:30:00.001-05:00

What started as a long Thanksgiving weekend project turned into a 3 week project, due to weather, fume-induced sickness, added tasks such as reefing out old seams and putting in new cotton and seam compound, and attempts at perfection, which are near impossible on an old wooden boat.

Rick twirls the cotton to be pounded into the seams.

Some of High Country's seams had very little cotton left and seam compound that flaked away with a touch. That would explain the excessive leaking when on port tack last summer. Here, Rick uses a caulking mallet to pound in new cotton, to be followed with a soaking of red lead paint, then some seam compound.

Notice the very clear, blue-green water, almost Caribbean-like.

A nice day on the sunny side of the boat finds us having a quick lunch of jalapeno, chicken, potato soup before putting the first coat of bottom paint over the thin coat of red lead paint.

We like to use different colors for each coat of bottom paint for two reasons. The first reason is that then you are less likely to have "holidays" as you're painting and the second reason is then you can see when each coat has worn away and it's time to repaint.

We finished just in time. It snowed a beautiful snow the next day.

View of Vineyard Haven Harbor.

No pictures of High Country "splashing" because I was subbing in school when she slid back down the railway. She'll sit at a town mooring for the rest of winter, along with the rest of the wooden fleet, of which there are many here.
Next project: wooding the masts.

How I spent my Thanksgiving Vacation

2007-11-29T08:42:00.001-05:00

High Country awaits her first haulout on a marine railway. With the last nor'easter, sand got washed over part of the railway, making it impossible to haul her until the tide came in a bit more.

Her bottom was the dirtiest it's ever been (sorry, no pictures, I'd gone home by then). We made the mistake of using cheap paint last year (I knew as soon as I picked up a can of the stuff that it would never do, very light) and we've been paying for it ever since with bi-weekly scrubbings while in these cold northern waters. Of course, since about September, we sort of let it go, figuring we weren't going anywhere for awhile. We'd been planning to wood the bottom in the spring, but Nat suggested the fall, since the yard and railway get busy in the spring. With the approaching holiday weekend, we realized it would be a great time to do the work, hopefully while everyone was away so we didn't have to fumigate everyone.

High Country finally gets hauled, not without mishap. With only two guys doing the hauling, there wasn't enough communication and HC's bowsprit got very intimate with Ayuthia's mizzen boom gallow.

Keeping the bum and toes warm. We just heard that it's been unseasonably cold for the Vineyard at this time of year. Figures.

In between burning the paint off the bottom, Rick repaired the damage to Ayuthia, whose owner was expected to arrive back on Thanksgiving weekend (00ps). Rick had talked about using a torch to burn the paint off the bottom, but I hadn't pictured putting actual flame to a wooden boat?! Everyone assured me that this is how it worked and looked, but I was still nervous as hell, what with flaming bits of toxic paint still burning once they hit the ground and my boat occasionally on fire (splinters). We melted through 1 plastic tarp and scorched holes in 4 bed sheets and burned into a 2x4. After getting sick from the fumes, I took a day off and was only allowed a heat gun thereafter. Rick got sick too, but managed to pull himself together for another 1/2 day of burning to finish the job (guys are tough). We'd originally intended to get ourselves a fresh air supply for this job, but it all happened so quickly, we never did. Anyone out there inspired to burn off your bottom paint, get yourself a fresh air supply rig!

Rick worked Thanksgiving morning, but I managed to drag him away for an afternoon of feasting at the MacGinnis's house, thank you Hugh and Deb!

Some post-turkey reclining.

2007-11-19T15:57:00.000-05:00

By choice, Rick and I have no automobile. We bike, walk, or take the bus (or beg and borrow) and like it, most of the time. But the other day, I was starting to wonder if I have a masochistic streak in me. It was time to make a wine run and what any sensible person who is in possession of an annual bus pass (that's me minus the sensible part) would have done would of course be to take the bus to the liquor store (Vineyard Haven is a dry town) to stock up for the month. But no, I looked outside, saw the sun shining (it was still only in the 40's though), and decided to make the wine run via bicycle. After all, I have a milk crate attached to my rear rack which will perfectly accommodate two boxes of wine plus a few miscellaneous bottles. In retrospect, the liquor store in Oak Bluffs would have been a better choice (closer), but I had two other errands to do on the way to Edgartown, so E-town it was. Edgartown is about 7 miles away and our winter rental adds about another 1 mile , so, let's see, that makes for a round trip total of 16 miles, which ordinarily I wouldn't think would be such a big deal. However, I only recently began bicycling after a 10 year hiatus (too dangerous on St. John, VI) and this trip came as a big surprise to my legs. Not to mention (OK, I will), the trip home was into a bracing NW wind and my rear was laden down with about 20 lbs of wine (I'm guessing wine is comparable to water in weight). To make matters worse, as I was placing these items in my crate, I noticed that one of four screws holding on that rear rack was missing, making the whole assembly very suspect and wobbly. Had I known this before making my purchases, I would have forgone the assorted bottles because the last thing a teacher-wanna-be needs is to have her crate crash down and wine bottles splatter all over the sidewalk as children are returning home from school. I made it to Vineyard Haven with no mishaps and just in time to catch the bus for the last mile home. It was only one more mile to go, but I didn't have it in me. Fortunately, the buses on the Vineyard are all equipped to carry bicycles (and they allow dogs and big bags of laundry - very progressive).
All of this being said, I will now reveal that I feel sort of rebellious by not having a car. I've been thinking that this is silly to feel this way, but it turns out that there are others out there who feel the same way (it may still be silly). In fact, someone even wrote an entire dissertation on this subject. It's called “PUT THE FUN BETWEEN YOUR LEGS!”: THE POLITICS AND COUNTERCULTURE OF THE BICYCLE.
(For those of you new to the web, or blogging, you can click on that title and it'll take you to the website where the dissertation is found).

My first Nor'easter

2007-11-09T08:41:00.001-05:00

Thanks to a photographer for the Martha's Vineyard Times, I do have one picture of this event. Click here and scroll to the bottom of the page. The last photo on the page, the couple in yellow and red walking into the storm, is me and Rick. Around 3:30 pm, our curiosity and concern overtook us. We donned full foul weather gear and waited by the side of the road for the bus to come. Before it did, a kind couple took pity on us and gave us a ride to town. Walking down the hill at Owen Park, we could pick out High Country from the forest of masts because she's the only one with a radar reflector on the triatic stay. "Phew, at least she's still on her mooring," I thought. Boats were jumping around quite a bit and waves were already crashing over the breakwater. It wasn't even high tide yet. Down at the dock, while I took cover behind the lifeguard tower, Rick made his way to the end of the dock without being blown over. High Country was too far out to see much and we certainly didn't want to launch the dinghy, which we'd drug ashore the day before. We just hoped that our full day's preparation was enough. We had spent the previous day taking down sails, halyards, and booms, attaching two 1" lines to the mooring plus a length of chain, all of which had hose on for chafing and were made off on the sampson posts and then backed up around the main mast. Folks would dinghy past, eye up our preparations, and make comments that led us to think maybe we were overdoing it. But that's our style, a play well-rehearsed from many hurricane preps in the Caribbean. This time was similar, albeit much colder and no swimming down to the bottom to set anchors and run anchor rodes amongst the spider web we used to weave in Borck Creek, St. John.

Feeling reasonably assured that High Country would successfully ride out the storm, we bought our groceries and took the bus home. I prepared a chef salad with the remaining daylight, since by then the power had gone out. I love occasions like this when your normal activities (computer stuff, reading, anything involving electricity) are halted. You get to eat by candlelight and lie in bed in the darkness, drink rum, listen to Prairie Home Companion on the battery-powered radio, and slowly drift off to a blissful sleep......

Changes

2007-10-23T08:22:00.000-04:00

Changes to the blog. How do you like the new template? Easier to read? I tried to read my blog with the black background and found it very difficult. Sorry to torment you for so long, but I liked how the pictures looked against the black background. And have you checked out the new links? Gonna raise money and vote for Kucinich?

Changes to life. High Country has been lonely this last week. We moved ashore last weekend into our winter rental and are adjusting to the landlubber’s life.

The first of 8 trips ashore. Who would think we could have all this stuff on such a small boat?!

Our living space increased dramatically from under 200 sq ft to just about 400 sq ft plus bathroom, closet, pantry, laundry area, and front hallway. We are spoiled with such luxuries as refrigeration, hot running water, and a washer and dryer (no more hauling sail bags full of laundry onto the bus). There is ample space to lay out the yoga mat and if we had more patience, we could watch cable TV (having a hard time with commercials). My appliances in the kitchen tripled. In addition to the usual coffee grinder and mini-food processor, I now have a microwave, convection oven, toaster oven, and coffee/espresso maker. We are 1 minute from the beach, 3 minutes from a pine and oak forest with wonderful trails to run on, 25 minutes to town (walking) or 10 minutes biking, and for those rainy days we are on the bus route. I can watch the morning sky change color over Nantucket Sound as I prepare breakfast and we can hear the fog horns on those foggy mornings. Nice to know that we're not so far away from the sea.

Off to school. Before I found the locker room (and shower!) I tried to keep my bicycling to school at a slow pace so as not to sweat too much.

When I’m not spending my days trying to create order in the classroom as a sub, I am out on the boat doing a major cleaning. It IS good to get off the boat once in awhile, if only to give her a good going through and cleaning. Yuck! Mildew of 10 years in some places and enough accumulated dust, grime, and hair balls to clog up every limber hole and bilge pump a 100 times over. And that’s even without a dog!

Settling south for the winter: Martha's Vineyard

2007-10-10T09:57:00.000-04:00

Well, the Vineyard is south of Maine, so technically we did head south for the winter.

I was supposed to be the one to get a job for the winter and Rick was going to take care of the boat and home life. But by early September, nothing had worked out yet, so when an email arrived offering Rick a job at Gannon and Benjamin Railway ( www.gannonandbenjamin.com) in Martha's Vineyard, we made our preparations to leave ME and sail south. It has been a fantasy of his for awhile to work here and when we came through in early July, we checked the place out and introduced ourselves.

I was anxious to get to the Vineyard in order to make sure we got things organized while we still had time to flee even farther south if it didn't work out. Hence, sailing in conditions we don't normally as described in the previous post. We also wanted to arrive for the launching of s/v Charlotte, Nat Benjamin's new boat. The launching was one of the neatest events I've ever had the privilege to attend. I also learned that there are a lot of good cooks on the island.

Forty hour work weeks are rather an adjustment and not just for Rick! Also, having lives scheduled according to weeks and weekends is unusual for us, but I like to think that we're adapting rather well.

Rick is currently building a 15' launch, but took some time away from that project to help rip off the deck of this launch.

Old dinghies serve many purposes. This one has a duel purpose: a tub for soaking frames by day and a beer tub by night and weekend.

Wire tying the steam-bent frames on.

Guess I'd better get used to foggy days.

From a month ago...

2007-10-10T09:51:00.000-04:00

(I include this only because such days are so rare for us)

It was one of those days where not only did the deck get washed, the cabin top rinsed, but you got to pee in the cockpit because a) the cockpit was getting rinsed regularly b) you couldn’t get to the head because of all the stuff that had fallen from stowed positions and c) it was too dangerous to hang your butt over the side. And, as such days are apt to be, it was a day of many sail changes. We left the Isle of Shoals at dawn with a reefed main and mizzen, staysail, and jib – the flying jib and topsail stowed. As we left the protected waters, it became clear that we needed more sail to drive through the waves. Out came the reef in the mainsail as we drifted ever closer to the Anderson Ledge. Sheeted back in, we safely passed the ledge and continued to drive hard into the waves. The waves weren’t terribly big, but close enough together and steep enough to knock us back and keep us from going in the direction we wanted to go. Half an hour later, the reef had to be put back in and half an hour after that, another reef went into the main. Under the double reefed main, the boat and us were still taking a beating and we both silently considered turning around and retreating, but neither voiced that thought and High Country continued to bash her way on, with me shuddering every time her bow slammed into a wave.

Because it was so rough, I did not permit myself to go down below for fear of getting seasick and then being no help at all. So, amongst the morning’s sail changes, Rick managed to put out a bowl of oatmeal, cold by the time we got around to eating it, but a delicious distraction from worries of sailing an old wooden boat so hard. The oatmeal turned cold because before we could eat it, Rick was elected for the scary job of going out on the bowsprit to tie up the flying jib that kept losing its sail ties as waves and wind battered it. I had seen this happening but was hesitant to say anything (even though I know the situation would only get worse) because it always fills me with dread to see Rick go out there when it’s this rough. But, as always, it’s not as scary as my mind imagines. We heave to or turn downwind and the boat’s motion steadies and she doesn’t heel over much. The only downside to heaving to was that that put us on the other tack, which, for whatever reason, made the boat leak A LOT more. Hmm, something to look into. Probably that hole behind a chain plate that we didn’t feel like dealing with last spring and put some shmooey in, but could be something else.

Just as Rick was leaving the cabin for another bout of sail handling, I heard a loud crash from down below. I didn’t find out what it was ‘til the next day when I opened up my pressure cooker full of beans and the inside looked like someone had left it on high burner. I initially accused Rick of having splattered beans all over and up the steam vent (he got to make lunch too), but when asked, he said it had taken a dive, which I later confirmed when I saw a chip of wood and varnish missing from a cabinet opposite the galley.

Other exciting mishaps of the day were the fuel jugs that refused to stay lashed up-right and leaked out gas, the overhead hatch which, even after being latched down, still leaked water over our bunks and Rick’s clothing net, and the portlight over the computer, which has had lot’s of attention this past year (completely rebedded) yet still insisted on leaking down on computer, wires, etc. And what was I doing while Rick was doing all the scary, hard stuff? Holding on for dear life. My job was to not get sick and to steer. We tried the autopilot for a bit, but it couldn’t head up fast enough after a wave. The next day revealed the evidence of how hard my body was holding on – a right bicep painfully sore and a left buttock so tight I had a hard time moving between sitting and standing.

We stayed hard on the wind, thinking we might want to bail out and head into Gloucester, but by the time we reached Cape Ann, the wind had shifted a bit more to the West and we decided to make the run for P-town. For several hours, we had an exhilarating ride. With the wind on the beam and the waves no longer in front of us, we struggled to keep the speed under 7 knots, any more than that and the boat works too much.

Much to our surprise and dismay, we finished the day by motoring the last two hours into Provincetown. All afternoon, the wind kept decreasing and before we knew it, we’d shaken out all our reefs and put up all 6 sails. I suppose we could have floundered out there for a few hours and made it in around midnight, but after a morning like that, I was very much looking forward to being anchored before dark, rinsing all the salt off of me, having a glass of wine and going to sleep in my soggy bunk.

We're Back!

2007-08-30T16:58:00.000-04:00

Since leaving NYC, we’ve been busy sailing, catching up with friends and family, and gulp, looking for jobs. Sorry not to have fun postings from Long Island, Block Island, Martha’s Vineyard, Woods Hole, Cape Cod, Gloucester, and Isle of Shoals, but such is the life of a lazy vagabond with intermittent Internet connection. Thanks to everyone who took us in, fed us, showered us, loaned us cars or drove us to grocery stores, or otherwise wiled away a few hours with us.

Greenport, Long Island, NY. Met up with friend Domi and her little dog Finn too. Finn first came aboard High Country in the Bahamas, where he was on his first sea voyage from the Virgin Islands to his home port in Greenport.

Very aggressive birds in Greenport.

Beachcombing (well, picking up deflated balloon's) on Martha's Vineyard.

Fishing boat in Menemsha Harbor, Martha's Vineyard.

Maine, land of spruce-clad islands and...

beautiful reflections.

Checking out our options to clean the bottom. The guy who owns this boat has been wintering over in Portland the last few winters, a possibility we'd actually been considering - yikes!

s/v Boundless, back from the first successful week of taking a group of kids sailing in Maine. Boundless normally does these trips in the Chesapeake in the summer and the Bahamas in the winter. This was her first summer in Maine and we were happily surprised to see them when we pulled into the anchorage by Peaks Island.
www.differentdrumsailing.com

Rick looking very much like a day charter captain aboard as he entertains the 2 Nancys. Meredith has heard it all already and can relax and smile for the camera. We all spent the day aboard s/v Margherita, which belongs to Nancy and her husband Jerry. How nice to go sailing on someone else's boat and not have to worry about a thing! No wonder people like to go on charters, it's very relaxing.

A junk moored off of Peaks Island.

Rick's brother Rod and nephew Nick drove all the way from Richmond, VT to Portland to hang out with us for the day. Not much wind, but got them to haul the sails up anyway and brought them over to Peaks Island for the day.

Occasionally, we got around to doing some boat work this summer. Here Rick is installing a horn, which we purchased after our trip aboard ssv Westward and we nearly ran over a small sailboat (High Country size) that hadn't been sounding a horn in the fog. While Rick hung out aloft, I recovered (warmed up) from having spent 15 minutes in the water scrubbing the bottom.

More family! This time from my side. This is Uncle Jim and Cousin Sam trying to catch us a mess of mackerel for dinner.

After cleaning 3 mackerel, Uncle Jim decided that he'd rather have lobster for his birthday dinner, rather than spend all day filleting these small fish. No one argued.

Aunt Julie hanging out on High Country.

The Eggemoggin reach Regatta, High Country observing, not racing - we always seem to break something when racing.

We invited former charter guests (and parents) to join us for the Eggemoggin Reach Regatta. The day started off foggy and it looked like we'd have to bag it, so we spent the morning eating Lemon Poppyseed Muffins and coffee and in a few hours, it cleared enough to take off. Afterwards, they took me for that Maine experience, picking wild blueberries.

Shadows of water bugs in a stream coming down Acadia Mountain, Mt. Desert Island. The shadows make it look like they've got huge pads on the end of their legs, but I could never see anything on the actual bug. Any entomologists out there?

View from the top of Acadia Mountain. Pretty, but not many blueberries up here.

s/v Simplicity hoping for more wind, but making nice reflections in the water. He escorted us into Rockland Harbor and gave us the use of his mooring, conveniently situated in front of the public landing.

Mussel madness! I was so excited to find this abundant source of free protein, that I got a bit ahead of myself and served us a batch of mussels before checking on the water quality from where I'd gotten them (Peaks Island). That locale had just been closed for a few weeks due to red tide and was in general closed due to pollution.

We later found suitable places to collect mussels, but had to give up eating them after Rick broke a tooth on a mussel pearl.

ssv Westward: Our first weekend in the Penobscot Bay, we left High Country to sail aboard the Westward, which is one of Ocean Classroom's sailboats that offers educational trips. We had been interested in working for them or similar organizations and after an interview, go invited to "deadhead" (no students) from Rockland to Boston.
The first day was completely in the fog, but during our night watch, the full moon rose above any lingering surface fog.

We got to participate in the workings of the ship, which meant standing watches (steering, lookouts, etc).

The lookouts as we enter Boston Harbor.

And as an added benefit, during our morning watch, 4 humpback whales showed up for a visit, along with dozens of Minke whales.

I learned that there is more than one way to furl a sail, and they all have names. The captain decides which furl to use, depending on circumstances (like if you're trying to show off or just want get the damn thing secured quickly).

I was particularly excited about this trip because Boston is one of the few big East Coast cities that we missed on our trip north.

Comments from Mothers Regarding Previous Post on Country Hams

2007-06-25T06:04:00.000-04:00

My previous post on country hams generated a swift email response from both our Mothers. Here's what they had to say.

Rick's Mom: "Loved your blog although the story about the country hams made, and still makes me nervous, I must confess."

Jenny's Mom: email subject "about this meat thing"
email content: "....gag me with a spoon! Yuck!

Mom"

Some Pics from Atlantic City and NYC

2007-06-24T20:01:00.000-04:00

We hadn't intended to put into Atlantic City, but the lure of striking it big was strong and we pulled in early in the afternoon. Well, ok, it wasn't really the lure of big money that brought us in the Absecon Inlet, but the strong desire to go for a walk (and with any luck, find a shower). It had been almost a week since we'd been off the boat.

The bird lady of Atlantic City

Going against the warning from the City Marina staff concerning the one-mile walk to the Boardwalk (they were concerned about evil doers), we walked anyways. Along the way, we asked a bicycle-riding policeman, Officer Berg, whether it was safe for us to be walking through what looked like project housing at 10am and he assured us that at that time of day, we would be fine. Four in the morning would be a different story and certainly when I awoke the next morning at 4am, I heard many sirens.

The setting full moon over Atlantic City, 5am

Keeping watch
From Atlantic City, we had a big day (80 miles), motorsailing to Sandy Hook, NJ. Happy to have these long summer days. The next day, we moved up to Great Kills Harbor on Staten Island, where we spent the next 2 weeks, repairing the engine that overheated during our sail up Sandy Hook Bay and also taking time to visit Manhattan.

It's at times like this that I really miss the Caribbean.

We made 3 trips into Manhattan. The first trip, Rick's Mom met us, took us to lunch and agreed to do the tourist thing and board a Circle Line boat to circumnavigate Manhattan. My reason for wanting to do this trip was that once we left Staten Island, we had to travel up the East River and through the notorious Hell Gate. I'd been reading many scary reports about that area (some of which were sent by my own Mother!) and really wanted to see it before having to take my boat through it. More on this later.

The Bubble Man in Chinatown: bubble blowers for kids to lazy to blow their own.

Funny Lady in Washington Square Park: she had just snuck through the no-dog area.

On our two other trips to Manhattan, we met my cousin Ted, who came down from New Paltz to hang out with us. Since he's a minister, he felt it necessary to take us into at least one church (Trinity Church). I was more interested in the sculpture outside, which was inspired by an uprooted sycamore tree after 9/11. We got him back though by dragging him into New York Nautical and the 79th St. Marina.

Rick and I love the Staten Island Ferry. From our anchorage in Great Kills Harbor, we would walk a mile to the train station, take a 20 minute train to the ferry terminal (if you get off a stop early though, it doesn't cost you anything, a crazy man told us this and it works), then hop on a ferry and be in Manhattan. The total trip is about 1 1/2 hours if all of your connections go smoothly.
We'd wondered about the capacity of these ferries and how the crew know how many people are on board. The response from a crew-member after being questioned on this matter was that they don't know. Hmmmm, and they don't take into effect the growing size of Americans either.

Cousin Ted had earlier been asking what we do when it rains. Well, never one to just tell when I can show, I arranged for some rain as we took the ferry to Staten Island and got back to High Country. He got to see that we do as most people do, though we generally refer to it as "hunkering down". We hide down below and computerize, read, or cook.

(Ted on the left, Rick on the right)

Our second attempt up the New York Harbor (the first one aborted due to an overheating engine) proved successful. Here, I am pictured under the Verrazano Narrows Bridge, holding the VHF radio close by, trying to understand where the traffic is. I don't know if it's me or the radio, but I can never understand anyone on the radio, hence, my heightened level of anxiety. Nevertheless, we managed to get in the way of only one supertanker and realised in time that he was headed straight for us.

High Country with lower Manhattan in the background. It turns out that shortly after we went up the East River, a swimming race began with 88 swimmers, who swam 28.5 miles around Manhattan. Amazing. I was nervous enough being aboard a boat!

Due to the strong currents we expected to find while transiting the East River and Hell Gate, we prudently put on our life jackets. I had never put one on while aboard High Country, and you know, they're kind of comfy, a back cushion wherever you go. At one point, just before entering Hell Gate, the GPS read 10.1 knots, certainly a record for this old boat. All in all though, the Gate was happily uneventful, even though we went through at full flood.

Very happy to be through Hell Gate, unscathed (note Manhattan in background). And it only cost us 1/2 a jar of peanut butter and a package of Asian fried broad beans (during times of stress, we both turn to our comfort foods, Rick dives for the peanut butter and I lunge for anything salty and fried).

The end of the Country Ham

2007-06-21T19:48:00.000-04:00

The end of the country ham looks rather like a cordless drill I think.

Not having refrigeration and having a husband who likes a lot of meat in his beans, I was thrilled to learn about country hams while back in Virginia. It turns out that country hams are cured in such a way that they do not need to be refrigerated. I had vaguely known about country hams since last year, but had not yet been brave enough to purchase a whole one, not really being sure about the whole idea of 20 lbs of meat hanging unrefrigerated on the boat. Fortunately for Rick’s beans however, we met a fellow while at the boatyard who not only had a country ham hanging over his galley, but had been eating them for quite some time with no ill effects. With his assurances, I went in search of a country ham and found one, in all places, at a Sam’s Club. Still uneasy about buying a 20lb hunk of meat, I told the butcher what I had in mind. I explained that I lived on a boat, had no refrigeration, and intended for this ham to last me several weeks. He wasn’t so sure about my plan and planted in my head an image of flies and maggots. With that in mind, I bought it and took it home.

It was 2 days after purchase that I worked up the courage to open up its cloth sack and see what I’d gotten myself into. What I found was initially disheartening, 20 pounds of moldy meat. Now, I had heard that cured meats occasionally form some mold and that you just wipe it off with some vinegar and all is well again. But I was not prepared for this quantity of mold. Holding back my tears of disappointment, I muttered something about figuring out a way to wash it down. We were still at the dock and my first thought was to take it on the dock and hose it down, but I didn’t want to scare away future dinner guests, so I proceeded to give the sink a good scrubbing and set it in there. Not knowing how to properly disinfect a country ham, I heated some water and mixed in some peroxide and started to scrub it down. Hams have numerous creases (like an elephant), requiring the use of an old toothbrush to work out the heavy mold. Twenty minutes later, I had a mostly mold-free ham, ready for cooking. After slicing off several big chunks for a batch of beans and also split pea soup, I wiped the whole thing down with vinegar, dried it off, wrapped it in fresh parchment paper, tied it up with string, put it back in its sack, and found a place to hang it where it wouldn’t hit us on the head when out sailing.

That ham lasted about 6 weeks and made many pots of beans and soup. Each time I would open it up, there would be a little bit of mold, but nothing like the first time. I’ve since learned that country hams are known to be rather ugly. Calvin Trillin, in his book Alice, Let’s Eat, makes reference to an enterprising student in New York City who, to support himself in college, took to “uglying up ordinary hams to make them look like properly cured country hams…” apparently to sell to desperate Southerners stuck in NYC. Sadly, I am now in the northeast, where such things as country hams are not sold, though I did happen upon an Italian deli in Staten Island where they had salamis hanging from the ceiling. I once again explained my situation (boat, no refrigeration, keep meat several weeks, etc) and the deli monger thought I’d be fine with the hanging meat. So, rather than a ham hanging over the galley, there is now the remnants of a fine salami.

Dead fish and sea flies: The Chesapeake Bay north of Annapolis and the Delaware Bay

2007-06-01T14:56:00.000-04:00

Left Annapolis Sunday morning on a hot, muggy, hazy day. Light winds moved us slowly downwind at 2 knots, a good speed to drag the fishing line with. Alas, as usual, I didn't catch anything and probably a good thing because the rest of the day and following days revealed many dead fish. Not sure why. Maybe it was just the holiday weekend and the throwbacks from everyone out fishing, but it gave me the willies. Nevertheless, happy to be sailing, even slowly.

More of the same on Monday, with the exception of running aground in the Bohemia River. Not hard aground and we were able to mush our way out, only to head back to the mouth of the river to anchor for the night. A definate increase in herons in the north of the Bay.

Up and at 'em before the crack of dawn on Tuesday brought us through the C & D Canal in good time. Rick had it all studied out to maximize the current and there was even a sailing breeze when High Country nosed into the Delaware Bay. Notable sights along the way were numerous large ships, the Salem nuclear plant, and dead fish floes (this time, the fish were so numerous, they must've been the by-catch of a larger fishing vessel).

Thursday brought us out into the ocean to head north along the Jersey coast from Cape May. It's a mystery to me why, when out at sea, miles from land, the boat is inundated with flies. No matter how fast we kill them, it doesn't seem to decrease their numbers. Between the 2 of us, we probably killed a couple hundred flies, which are then littered all over the deck. Can anyone explain this phenomenon? It doesn't make any sense to have more flies on board when at sea than when in port. I would think it would be a poor strategy for flies to fly out to sea.

Farmers’ markets and bus demographics

2007-05-28T16:00:00.000-04:00

One of the things I love about being back in the States (in addition to libraries) are farmers’ markets. If you don’t have the time to actually talk to people and ask where the farmers’ market is (or the people you talk to don’t know), a quick search on the Internet will reveal times and places, which, when plugged into Google Maps, tells you how to get there. This past Saturday brought us to the Anne Arundel County Farmers’ Market on the corner of Riva Road & Harry S. Truman Parkway, Annapolis, MD. From 6^th St. in Eastport, it is about a 5mile walk down West St., then Riva Rd. If walking there in May/June, keep an eye out for the mulberry tree on the West side of Riva Rd. for a nice snack.

As always, it pays to arrive at farmers’ markets early. We, however, were a bit late (8:30), but lucked out anyways. After purchasing my greens and expressing my surprise that there had been tomatoes available earlier, the old man went to his truck and pulled out a brown paper bag. In it held a quart of greenhouse beefsteaks that he had been saving for a favorite customer. That favorite customer had not arrived in time and the last quart was now up for grabs. I snatched them up before anyone else could overhear our conversation and start a bidding war. Later, after eating tomato sandwiches for lunch, Rick said those tomatoes reminded him of tomatoes from his childhood.

Here’s the listing for Maryland farmers’ markets: http://www.mda.state.md.us/md_products/farmers_market_dir.php

Rick’s panniers were full, albeit full of light greens. Nevertheless, we opted to take the bus back to Eastport. As we boarded the bus and began to take our seats, the young man sitting in front asked if we had a cell phone and if he could borrow it. I said yes and as I was digging it out, he explained that he had just gotten out of prison and needed to call his Mom. As I handed the phone over, I reasoned to myself that if he was going to steal our cell phone, he wouldn’t be telling a story about having just gotten out of prison. Besides, where on the bus was he going to hide? He never did reach his Mom, nor his girlfriend Katie (who’s name was tattooed on his arm), but he did return our cell phone. It was interesting to note that at a time of record gas prices and in a city with a great bus system, the only people on the bus were women of color, elderly white ladies, transient boaties, and an ex-con.

PS
Rick was just about to report me to PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) when I quickly explained that I was not abusing his honey bear, that I was simply trying to de-crystallize the honey.

Boatyard happenings

2007-05-19T15:38:00.001-04:00

High Country was lonely last winter and took revenge by blowing off most paint and varnish, leaving a big ol' mess to work on in the spring. Five weeks of constant attention brought us back into her good graces and she's rewarding us by hardly leaking.

High Country before

High Country during

High Country after

One of the reasons we chose Jenning Boatyard in Fairport, VA was the dogs, who are perfectly happy to retrieve all day long, as long as it's in the water.

Holy Saturday brought a holy snowstorm! My first snowfall aboard brought five inches of heavy, wet snow when we awoke. It was great.

Caught him laying down on the job with the camera this time. "Hey Rick, how does it feel to have 16 tons hanging over your head?"
I enjoy most jobs on the boat. This is not one of them. Painting the metal mizzen stand.