Launch Day!

We made it! Independence is now floating in the water after 2 years of being on the hard! After getting the fuel polished and cleaning the tanks this morning, the lift crew came for us. But not before we downed a little brown courage to ease the nerves. And of course this morning I found myself getting a bit sentimental for this dusty yard and the place we have been. It’s just little things like the smiles and goodbyes we got from some of the Demir boys as we were leaving. It even felt like the lift guys were happy to see us finally getting in the water. It’s funny how you can build small relationships by a daily nod or a simple hello. That in comparison to a boat hauled out next to us a couple of months ago. They may have been on the hard for less than a week, the woman spent her entire time sitting in the cockpit reading Glamour magazine as hired workers scraped and painted the hull. And then get this, as the lift team arrived they were scrambling to get ready. She then picked up a bucket on deck, and without looking threw the contents off the boat barely missing the lift guy, who I then saw grimace and wave his hands in front of his face. She almost threw her bucket of piss on him! Where is the awareness? Or the desire for that feeling of satisfaction by doing something yourself? Anyways, despite these past 3 months being a rough go, and at times greatly envying the ones who didn’t lift a finger, we know that we can own this experience and there is depth to the time spent here. But now back to the story! Again, after a little brown courage, they pulled Indy to the ‘pool’ where they lifted her out of the cradle (we both wondered if the cradle would rise with her since she had been sitting in it for so long!) and lowered her into the water. I like to think that I could hear her go “ahhhhhhhh”. Then Mike was quickly below making sure water wasn’t sprouting from a thru-hull or some other unexpected spot. Our only discovery was water trickling from the cockpit drain thru-hulls but nothing that would make us go back on land, just a little monitoring After all seemed ok they pulled the straps out from underneath her and there we were…floating.

Mike then decided to start the engine and make sure it would turn over, and it did. He even tested out the gears and forward and reverse ‘were’ working. After sitting there for what seemed like forever, the guys in the tenders came to lead us to our new home…Bravo pontoon. Oh god. That is the outer break water that is a million miles from anything. But who cares! And of course, there has to be a glitch in this story somewhere. So as we start to motor toward Bravo Mike realizes that we now have no throttle, we could only move forward at idle speed which wasn’t enough to overcome the winds. But good news, the tenders came to our rescue. One driver could see our anxiety increasing and simply said “Don’t worry, be happy!”. We then remembered that these guys are professionals and move boats around with no one on board. Our stress quickly dissipated as he happily climbed on board with a smile and laughter to handle the mooring line, while the two tenders shoved and pushed us into place. A smooth landing into our new home.

And what a view! Again, we are on the inside of the outer breakwater so just the open bay behind us. And the boats directly to our port and starboard are empty. Oh, it feels really good to be out of the masses. Not to mention away from all of the noise and dust. It’s almost hard to believe that we were just in the parking lot a few short hours ago. After getting a little acclimated and taking a shower to wash all of the dirt away, we put our new cushions in the cockpit and enjoyed a glass of Retsina we had chilling just for this occasion. And we both had separate times where we noticed the feeling of weight suddenly being lifted from our shoulders. Our reality has suddenly taken a 180 degree turn. There is still a lot of work ahead of us but the goal feels more tangible since reaching this milestone. Not to mention being able to jump off the boat for a swim in the middle of a work day! While lounging in the cockpit for a bit, we found ourselves getting really hungry and sleepy. So after an early dinner we made our way to bed with light still in the sky, with fresh breeze on our faces and the boat rocking us to sleep.

One More Sleep!

Neither of us slept very well last night. Mike got up for a few hours in the middle of the night, where I just took forever to fall into a fitful sleep. I definitely have some butterflies present among the general excitement about getting in the water TOMORROW! Mike spent another day cleaning up and putting things in their place. I ran into town and bought some material to make fender covers, and then spent the rest of the day screaming at our geriatric sewing machine. She is a beautiful thing but man, temperamental. And it doesn’t help the fact that I am not a seamstress or anything close for that matter. But with Mike’s help (and patience) he was able to fix the problems, that arose every 10 minutes, and I was finally able to get 4 big covers done. Then it was enjoying our last night (fingers crossed) on the hard with some dinner and a movie. Hopefully this time tomorrow we will be gently rocking back and forth with the sound of water lapping at our hull.

Meet Big Red!

It’s official! We are on the list to be launched on Wednesday, the 14th! Holy shit. Are we ready for this? Hell yeah! Today we got another coat of pain (I mean paint) on the boot stripe and the name. This means that we’ve officially finished all the planned painting projects! Of course, there will undoubtedly be some touch-ups to come, but the big stuff is done. Despite any misgivings about our painting technique, I have to say that we are both very pleased with how she turned out. Indy is looking GOOD! After finishing painting we ran into town to pick up zincs for her belly and a few other items, and on the way back to the marina we actually were able to spot Indy from the road. I think her new paint job might stand out a bit. But what the hell? Why not have fun with it?

Here she is.....!

Kinda funny, huh? It wasn't even on purpose. I just couldn't reach the I and N!

Three More Sleeps

We are starting to wrap stuff up around here! We got a coat of paint on the boot stripe and ‘Independence’ painted on the transom. We hauled Mike’s butt up the main mast so he could bring down a broken mast head light that we need to replace. Uhmmm, what else? I tackled cleaning the fenders and the BBQ, while Mike continued to button up some of the loose ends. The BBQ was about one of the dirtiest jobs I have done yet during this haul out but how exciting that we are getting to that point! The feelings of tedium seem to have worn off, and I am now getting PSYCHED!!!

Yard Sale

Another morning of getting up early to get a third and final coat on the topsides! And after taking all of the plastic off the toe rails it looks fantastic! Maybe some brush strokes here and there but I really don’t care at this point! As Mike reminds me (ad nauseam) “It doesn’t have to be perfect, it’s not a perfect boat”. We are also in the process of trying to clean up our junk yard. Three months of serious projects as well as a ton of donated “goods” has left the area under and around us chock full of boating stuff. Some useful, some not so much. So Mike painted ‘free stuff’ on a big piece of plywood and announced it on ‘The Net’ this morning. We had a handful of people come and rummage through but a lot of it will ultimately go to the rubbage bin. It feels good to purge ourselves of all of this stuff, and it feels even better to realize that we have all of the big jobs done! But unfortunately today, the small jobs are feeling tedious. At least to me. Mike seems to like just putzing around on one little thing or another. I keep telling myself that we are so close and to “get motivated!” but think I am still just really tired. Tonight was also kinda rough due to realizing that all of my girlfriends were spending the day together celebrating our good friend Heidi’s bachelorette party. It’s times like these that make it hard to be away from home. Mike and I also realized that we got engaged one year ago today! Man, what a year it has been. Makes me wonder where life is going to take us this next year…

Them's some dirty feet!

Early to Rise

The wind howled all night long which I blame on my poor night’s sleep. But surprisingly, it wasn’t too hard to get out of bed at 5:30 am to start painting. We were out there before the sun rose and the second coat is making quite the difference. It looks awesome! We even got some smiles from the Demir boys as they showed up for work! But after that I was done and never really recovered. I am tired. So I spent the rest of the day updating our blog and was secretly thankful it took so long because I failed miserably when I attempted to do anything that took more energy. By 6pm I was starving and ready for bed. After a quick meal of beans and a failed attempt at watching a bunk DVD, I headed to bed while there was still light in the sky. And it felt really good.

Spring Cleaning

It felt like we were waiting to paint most of the day. Mike got the final prep for the topsides done and then we putzed around on other little jobs while waiting until it cooled down enough to start painting. This included Mike diving into the lazarette to organize things and to rid ourselves of many, many useless items. I think I married a packrat. Mike has a tendency to keep anything that “might come in handy some day”. Given, some of it may, but the chance that we will need THAT particular item is close to nil. I guess it stems from the need/desire to be completely self-sufficient.
Unfortunately, painting seems to bring out a bit of stress in me (and therefore, us). Maybe because of all of the prepping we do I want it to look good, not like we just slapped it on. So after reading about painting polyurethane on the internet, I felt like I had some good tips. We briefly discussed our strategy, and then got to work. And of course, that’s when the wind decided to pick up. I mean really pick up. And all our planning quickly went out the window. At one point our tray full of paint was actually blown off the scaffolding. We then decided to switch to the leeward side of the boat, and after Mike moved all of the scaffolding we started again. We followed the recommended technique of one person rolling on the paint and the other following with a brush to even things out, but the results looked like shit, which only added to our developing stress fest. We then decided that only one of us would ‘roll’ which turned out to be me with Mike as my paint lackey. Luckily, we just got the first coat on when the skies grew dark. And then immediately went inside and drank a bottle of wine for dinner. Now it’s just getting up before sunrise to get a second coat on. As much as we hate setting the alarm for 0530, it’s gotta be done. Especially before the Demir boys show up and can see our work!