Power Outage and iPad

A quiet night, but those wretched west winds returned just after dawn and blasted through the marina once again, providing us with significant rolling action in the salon. We held onto our coffee cups rather tightly for the duration of the day. The wind backed in late afternoon and instead of the warmer west winds, icy cold Antarctic bullets shot us with gusts to 45 knots. It knocked down some trees near the marina evidently because we were without power for nearly six hours...like being at anchor. Using our new iPad, we're able to SKYPE on board. This is a great improvement from earlier days where we had to walk a mile to find a telephone booth and then figure out how to dial overseas and which coins needed to be deposited for the call. Not only could I sit in the comfort of the salon in my PJs and talk to friends and family, since it was computer-to-computer, it was free. How good is that? The advantage of the i-Pad is that it doesn't require headphones like the laptop and it has video. Hmmm...come to think of it, in my PJs, hair all mussed... the video part was probably not an improvement.

A Wild Night and a Clean Bilge

A wild, fitful night as maniacal west winds pommeled us with 40 knot gusts. Cups rocked and rolled in her berth, straining and stretching her dock lines. Halyards clanged and banged noisily throughout the marina as the wind swooped down off the hills and fired one blast after another. Needless to say, not much sleep. We were glad to be in the marina. David gave Cups a wash and cleaned the bilge today. This involves opening every floor board and hauling out smelly, moldy stuff that perhaps hasn't been hauled out since the last bilge cleaning. There's never been a hose that David didn't like or keep. He keeps them all...just in case. In some cases, longer than a decade which I think to be a bit excessive. He sorted them out today and actually threw some away. I watched another yachtie eying them and scooped them up once David had walked back down the pier. One man's trash...

The boat does indeed smell better. We have no malt vinegar left aboard. Ah, the many uses of malt vinegar beyond fish and chips...that's a discussion for another time.

Dinner guests tonight. Ian & Wendy watched Cups during our absence and aired her out once in awhile. They joined us for a good catch-up chat and chicken curry followed by apple crumble.