Crimson Kathryn and her crew

We have now been tied up on the Reynold’s Park pier for 3 days and we are into the dock groove!! You have to adjust to being on the water but not at anchor. When you’re at anchor, the boat always faces into the wind which makes for a more gentle stay. When you’re tied up on a dock, the wind can move you around (or tilt you) in different ways. We’ve been very fortunate so far to have had good weather. Today (Friday) has been the first day of strong winds, making us heel over slightly.

Today we had a great “sundowner” visit with Jane and Steve. It was so nice to relax and chat with them. Jane and Steve are learning about their new boat and discovering all it’s secrets. It was great to share successes and struggles with a couple who are also going through the same thing. Mark and Steve have lots of fun exchanging ideas and solutions for boat problems and challenges

Our days have been filled with constant jobs. Our main goal was to get the boat “liveable” and then we would take a day off. Well we’re still working and our “day off” hasn’t arrived (although it’s now planned for this Sunday!!!😁). Mark has spent his days trying to seal all the deck leaks we have that are allowing water to seep inside the galley and storage areas. I have spent my days cleaning mold/dust and dirt from the interior of the boat. We also used our Airbnb unit’s dishwasher to clean all of our dishes which gave me the opportunity to recognize the galley.

Back in April 2020, we left all the boat fabrics (towels, sheets, etc) tied up in green garbage bags. Unfortunately we returned to find all these fabrics needing to be washed due to the lengthy storage. It’s a lot of laundry time so I’m doing it a little at a time

Everyday poses new challenges for us and we are working our way through them. I can honestly say that I have not worked this hard or this constantly for over 19 months (since the last time we were on the boat), so I’m pretty tired by the end of the day. It’s super rewarding when you look around at all the work you accomplished in the day and you go to bed feeling very satisfied (until morning when you see how much more needs to be done – oh well, at least it’s warm and there’s no snow 😁😁)

Crimson Kathryn is back in the water after 19 months on the hard!! She is a very happy boat today! The travel lift arrived at 11:15 am and we were in the water and tied up at the Reynolds Park Pier by 1:30pm. It was a great day and we’re very excited to be afloat.

This post will be short on words (I’m pretty tired tonight), but long on photos! This is our last night in the Airbnb. Tomorrow (Wednesday) we’ll move onto the boat full time. Our wifi may not be as good on the pier at Reynolds so our posts may spread out a bit!

The cleaning and fixing continues as we inch closer to our launch date. Mark and I have spent the last 2 days working on a variety of jobs to get the boat ready to be splashed! It’s incredibly rewarding to see all our hard work paying off and I can say that we are ready for launch!

On Sunday, Mark finished all the through hauls and he cleaned the inside of the fridge and freezer – now that was an interesting job!! We moved the sails out of the cabin and onto the deck and I continued cleaning the main cabin and other areas inside the boat. The last job of the day for me was to set up our enclosure! After being stored for so long, it was stiff and hard to work with. By the time I got to the last side, there was about a 1/4 inch gap between the zippers! We just left it overnight, letting the sides stretch and relax. It was all good by Monday afternoon.

Monday rolled around way too quickly! I started the day doing laundry (washing all the cushion covers and bed coverings). I also finished cleaning the galley. Mark spent the day working on an emergency rudder (just in case we need one at some point). After that Mark did battery checks, engine checks and maintenance and also made sure the bow thruster batteries are good.

Tomorrow (Tuesday) is our scheduled launch day! It looks like we will be splashed in the afternoon so that leaves the morning to do our final jobs. We’ll clean up on deck and around the boat. We’ll attach dock lines and get fenders ready. It’s really exciting to finally be at the point of putting C.K. back in the water!!

Well we’ve been working hard on our boat jobs for the past 2 days and we’re starting to see some progress. Mark spent Friday and Saturday working on all the through haul valves (there are 8 in total). These valves allow us to close all the “holes” that lead to the water. These through hauls let us drain our sinks, decks, toilets etc. It’s super important to make sure each of these valves are lubricated well so if one needs to be closed, it can be! By the end of our working day today (Saturday), all 8 were fully functional!!!

I have spent the past 2 days working on washing all the surfaces in our boat and I mean ALL the surfaces plus inside cupboards and shelves. Mold and dust has spread everywhere and it took several cleaning methods to remove. Some areas that were really bad received the mold control treatment (a special cleaner designed to kill mold on the surface and penetrating deeper) and other areas were wiped down with vinegar and water. After the initial vinegar treatment, all the surfaces were washed with pine-sol. I am super happy to say that the main cabin and the aft cabin are now clean and look amazing.

We are working hard to get the boat ready for launch which is schedules for Tuesday, Nov. 16. There are a few more jobs that need to be completed before the boat goes into the water and that includes checking all the through haul exits and changing the zincs.

The start to our newest boating season has been quite challenging. We certainly never dreamed the boat would be in such a state. It was very discouraging at first (and second) glance but now that we’ve made headway on the cleaning and some of the jobs, it is looking much better. We do have a few surprise things to replace that aren’t working like the microwave and it looks like all our batteries need to be replaced . These batteries provide power for all boat systems (including starting the engine) when we are not plugged into shore power.

We still have 3 days before we have to move out of our Airbnb and onto the boat. We will continue to work on our jobs so Crimson Kathryn will be in ship-shape when we move aboard!

Oh man!!! Our boat is dirty, inside and outside. We thought the deck was bad (and it was) but then we went inside. It was a bit shocking to see how much mold there was inside the boat. Pretty much every surface has some mold (white not black).

We started off cleaning the exterior (got to start somewhere) – washing the deck and other dirty objects on the deck. It basically took us most of the day to do the top side. There was a lot of debris on the deck – it looked like old leaves mostly. After lots of scrubbing and hosing down, the deck and cockpit look pretty good.

We decided to take it easy today and quit working around 3pm. We spent a bit of time chatting with Jane and Steve Holler. We met them during our last season at Reynolds and they’ve become good friends. They got down here over 2 weeks ago and their boat looks great!! Gives me hope that Crimson Kathryn will eventually make her way back to looking great! It will definitely take some work to get her ship shape again.

The day finally arrived and on Nov. 8th, the US Land borders opened for those of us longing to get back to our boats. We were eager to head south and ended up leaving Kingston 2 hours earlier then planned on Nov. 9. We left at 1pm and arrived at the Thousand Island border crossing in about 30 minutes. We were very worried about the wait time at the border and we were watching it very closely on Nov. 8. Some crossings reported wait times of 3 hours or more so we were ready for anything. Fortunately, we breezed through the border – no one ahead of us in line and after all the questions were answered, we were on our way!! Oh so easy!

The drive down was good – not too much traffic (except around the usual places) and even the Washington bypass went smoothly. Our biggest challenge was driving overnight. We both became super tired around 2 am and then again at about 5 am. But we powered through and made a few more stops to stretch our legs and wake ourselves up.

All was going great until we got to Georgia!!! There was about 2.5 hours left on our drive when the tire pressure warning came on. Sure enough we had a rear tire losing air..fast!! Fortunately we were close to an exit with 3 gas stations. We pulled in and Mark changed the tire. Of course to get at the replacement tire, we had to completely empty the back of the car!!! The tire didn’t take long to change but we needed to fix the old tire (or replace it) because the temporary tire is just that..temporary. Okay, now we’re on the hunt for a place to fix the old tire! Fun!

We ended up at Darien Tire and Lube in Eulonia, Georgia. The tire couldn’t be repaired but they sold us a new one – mounted it, installed and balanced it for a really good price and they did all that in about 1 hour.

We made it to Reynold’s Park by noon and went straight to the boat. Crimson Kathryn looked great but man was she dirty!!! Lots of green mold on deck (from stagnant water) and rotten leaves. It will take a bit of scrubbing to clean her up but we have the time!

We checked into the Airbnb around 3 pm after a very short grocery shopping trip to Publix. We’ve now had dinner and a bit of bubbly to celebrate! We’ll be heading to bed early tonight and starting the cleanup job tomorrow! Yippy!!!

It’s hard to believe that a year and a half has gone by since we last stepped foot aboard Crimson Kathyrn! The boat has been patiently waiting for us to drive back down to Florida, clean her up and splash her back in the water. We sure never dreamed it would take this long to get back out on the water. Who knew?

April 10th 2020 was the final day of preparing C.K. for what we hoped would be our usual 6 months hurricane season rest. We had left the Bahamas early because of covid and headed back to Reynolds Park Marina where we would store the boat. We spent our last few days in Florida removing all food items and making sure the boat was well put away, just in case we were gone for longer than 6 months. As it turns out, it was certainly worth the extra effort.

As the days dragged on and we got closer to the 2022 sailing season, Mark and I began looking at options for getting down to Florida. I had booked an airbnb for the month of November (I did this back in June) to make sure we had a place to stay if we were able to return to Florida. By the end of the summer, it was still unclear if the border would reopen to land travel and whether mixed vaccinated people (that’s me) would be allowed to cross. By the beginning of September, I canceled our Airbnb – things weren’t looking great at that point. Friends of ours had decided to fly down and ship their car. We looked into this but by the time we started this process, lots of car transports were full.

Finally in the middle of October the good news came – border reopening Nov. 8 and mixed vaccinated folks are good to go!!! There was a bit of celebrating in our house that day! I quickly booked another Airbnb for the week of Nov. 10 – 17 and our plan was taking shape!.

So here we are – in one week we’ll be driving down to Florida. Our goal is to leave Kingston around 3pm on Nov. 9 and drive straight down to Green Cove Springs (just south of Jacksonville). It’s about a 19 hour drive – long but doable. We’ll spend that first week getting the boat water ready and launched so we can move aboard by the end of our Airbnb week. This season we’ve decided to stay in Florida for Christmas (just in case Covid rules change again) and the girls are flying down to join us for a week over Christmas. We will definitely miss our family celebrations but are planning some video chats over the holidays! At the start of the new year we’ll be off to the Bahamas!!! Sailing season 2022 will be underway! Yippy!