Date:05/03/08 / Depart: 0835 Anchor Marina / Arrive: 1030 Soutpoint Boat Yard / Temp: 75 deg F / Wind: SSE 20 gust 30 / Water: stained / Wave ht: 2-3' / Skies: Clear

Stayed aboard last night. Around 0130 this morning sky was filled with lightning and rain....driving rain and strong NE wind. Woke back up at 0615 and began to make preparations to get underway. Went to retrieve the camera, and when I got back, the commander was already aboard, so we took in the port mooring lines, fired up the Westerbeke and as we were about to cast off, the new owner of the Great Dane, across the harbor sought us out to comment that he had had his eyes on Olivia, admiring her for a long time. This happens frequently, so I took some time to talk a little about her. We shoved off, and chugged out of the fingers. When we poked our nose into the bay, we were hit by a gust and heeled over under bare poles.

At the causeway, I steamed through what I thought was the overpass, but everything appeared wrong. I suddenly realized we were one piling too far west! And as many times as I've been through there. Taking no chances, I spun her around and went the right way, crashing into the south part of the Laguna. The waves were rolling about 2-3 feet, with the wind on our nose, and it became evident that we were not going to make the 0900 swingbridge opening, but decided to try anyway. We hailed them on channel 12, and they told us we had to go around.

"Going around" involves chugging an additional 5 miles or so up the Brownsville Ship Channel, through the Y ( The shrimpers call it "Deadpicker" hill), up the Port Isabel side channel to Southpoint....another hour or so.

Off we chugged.

I was a little worried about fuel as I had neglected to pour the 6 gallon jug in the lazarette into the tank, and we only had about 1/4 remaining....should be sufficient for several hours though....

About half way to the powerlines, we realized that we could just turn around and go back to the swingbridge...make the 1000 opening, and that's what we did. I went below to fire up the Origo and put on some coffee as David held her on course.

Near the swingbridge we were joined by the Queen Isabella, on our stern quarter, and they contacted the swingbridge operator. Soon the thing yawed open, and we slid through heading to Southpoint

Docking at the travel lift took a bit of effort. The wind was piped up directly off of our stern, and two other boats were parked side by side in the hole. The first pass, the commander got a bow line to a dock worker, but try as I might, I was unable to kick the stern around as the wind played havoc in our rigging. So we let loose, but not until for one uncertain moment we almost got sideways, thank goodness for Olivias iron heart, a quick handfull of throttle, and we were back out in the side channel, where I once again swung her around and pointed the bowsprit downwind of the dock, so I could creep up into it.

This time success.

David got a spring line to the yard worker and then got a bow line hung, and soon we were fast to the dock. I secured the systems and went to find George.

 In the office, George looked at the photo of 'Divs bottom, and we went back out and positioned the travel lift. As the boat inched out of the water for the first time since I've owned her, I was holding my breath the whole time.

High in the slings, a precursory inspection revealed only one small blister (on the rudder), and a tiny pinhole in the rudder as well. The rest of the bottom looks pretty good, thru hulls dirty, the prop just a bit crusty (but amazingly not bad), and a small amount of material at the starboard keel root needs to be epoxied, but all in all in amazingly good condition.

I am sitting at my desk relaying this, still rocking slightly from the trip across. My friend Don is donating a gallon of Petit Trinidad and I believe they are going to begin painting tomorrow. The yard has promised me that they will have me back in the water within a week, and Dan said actually, it would probably be no later than Wednesday. The sooner the better.

Boats were not made to be on the land.

I am breathing a bit easier now, knowing what my boat looks like underneath, knowing that there's not a lot of things to fix. Olivia has a lot of sea miles left in her.