Ready To Leave. Maybe

Boot Key Harbor, Marathon, Florida

 

I really don't want to leave here. It is so nice. But summer and hurricane season approches. Sigh.

 

I was planning on leaving Monday, and heading for Fort Myers and the Okechobee Waterway, just because we like that. But weather forecasts said it would be better to leave today.

 

• Solar panels stowed Check.
  
• Go up the mast and inspect the rigging. Check.
• Test run the engine after the recent work we had done on the alternator. FAIL!
• Tell the cruisers net that we are leaving. FAIL!
• Put the Honda generator away and bolt down the cockpit floor for sea. Check.
• Retrieve my bicycle and check out from the marins. Pending.
• Put the dinghy on deck. Pending.
• Re-clean the bottom and prop. Pending.

But wait, what about the two fails? I found a wiring mistake. The alternator lead was hooked to the wrong side of the current measuring shunt. That means it worked OK, but was not measured correctly. If fixed that.

 

The cruiser's net failed because of some problem with the power wiring to the VHF. It is intermittent. I rewired it a month ago, and it has been working fine until this morning. I'm going to have to rewire it again before leaving. If that doesn't work, we'll have to cancel today's departure.

 

Gotta run. More work to do. We can leave anttime before dark. By the way, there should be a beautiful full moon tonight. That will be very nice.

 

If we do leave today, next blog won't be before Tuesday.