Oakland Yacht Club Buffett Party

I forgot to blog about what we did LAST weekend.  I mentioned we were trying to find someplace to go-I checked the Oakland Yacht Club website and discovered they were having a Jimmy Buffett party with live audio from his concert in Mountain View.  We were able to get a slip assignment for Saturday night so we cruised on over there. 

Some very nice people with a Krogen helped us into the slip.  We saw them at the party that night and found out the original owner of the Krogen was someone we knew from Coyote Point.  Small world.  The party started at 5:30 with everyone gathered around the TV to watch the Giants play the Phillies.  The party price of $15 included a cheeseburger and fries and two drinks.  We enjoyed some DELICIOUS margaritas as we watched the Giants win! The game ended just in time for the concert.  The audio quality was great and for $15 versus $150 it was not a bad way to listen to the concert!  Most of the folks were dressed for the occasion and luckily Matt and I had brought Jimmy Buffett concert tee shirts from the 2008 "Year of Still Here" tour so we fit in.  We did not make it to the end but instead went back to the boat and went to sleep! 

In the morning we debated going back up to the club for breakfast and we ended up making banana nut muffins on the boat then heading back to CP.  It was raining a bit but we found driving from the lower helm was no problem.  Once we got back we went up to the club to watch the 49ers beat the Raiders (YEA!) though the Giants lost :(.  We decided to stay on the boat again.  It was slim pickin's for clothes to wear to work on Monday but after such a great weekend we didn't really care.

Weekend Plans

This weekend we are taking the boat to a state park, Angel Island.  More specifically we are going to Ayala Cove.  The first Spainard to sail through the Golden Gate into San Francisco Bay was Juan de Ayala and he anchored in Ayala Cove!  Angel Island has been a military base, an immigration station (the Western version of Ellis Island) and I'm sure some other stuff I could remember if I wasn't typing this at 10:40 at night.  (I am not a night person.  Or a morning person.  I'm a sleep a lot person.)

We invited several friends from our yacht club to join us and at this point I think we have one who may come, if it isn't raining.  I really don't care if it is raining or not, I'm going.  Now that we know our heater works great "I ain't scared".  Plus we haven't used our new to us dinghy.  I think I blogged that a good friend of ours has pancreatic cancer and he came to the Marin cruise (our first weekend on the new boat) for a day and gave us his dinghy.  It is really nice and even has a trailer.  I would never have forgotten my dear friend Mike in any case but I shall think of him every time I use that dinghy.  We look forward to playing with it this weekend.

We think we have our food planned and purchased for the weekend.  The downside of Ayala Cove is there is nothing there except a snack shack type place with very limited daytime hours.  We will be out on a mooring ball and will have to use the dinghy to get to the island.  So we have to come prepared to be self sufficient. For the past few years we have led a cruise out from our yacht club to Ayala Cove and we've had to plan and provision for several meals and activities for a group.  I am looking forward to only having to worry about the two of us!  We plan to lunch at the snack shack Saturday, then have flank steak for dinner.  Sunday morning we will have bacon and eggs then head back to our marina.  We will spend Sunday on the boat as I fly out early Monday from SFO, which is near the marina.  I have to pack my bags for a week business trip before we leave for our weekend boating adventure!

So far we are really enjoying this whole powerboat thing!

Boat Stuff

We had a great time Saturday as race committee.  After we saw off the fleet we decided to try and label the wires running up the wire chase from the lower helm station up to the flybridge.  We took the wood casing off the chase and Matt stationed himself there with a flashlight and I climbed into the compartment at the front of the flybridge.  To get in there, I had to crawl through a not very big opening and of course I ended up having to crawl in and out of it a few times over the course of the ~two hours we worked on this so I ended up bruised, scrapped up and a little sore.  Wow, just like sailing! 

We managed to get maybe ~75% of the wires labeled but that is just the ones that lead to the flybridge, there are other wires in the chase that lead off in other directions so that will be a project for another day. 

Towards the end of the project (as dictated by the fact that the fleet of racers was rounding the last mark and heading towards us so we needed to resume our race committee duties) Matt said "I think we are getting boarded."  I am in a kind of confined space I cannot quickly get out of so I did the "who, what, where".  He said a fairly official looking zodiac was headed our way but he could not tell if they were USCG or what.  So I managed to extricate myself in time to actually see them and hear the conversation.  Turns out they were Fish and Game and they thought we were out fishing.  Since we weren't, they weren't interested so I had climbed out for nothing.  Oh well, back in the hole.

Somewhere over the course of the weekend we realized the water in our bilge was coming from our starboard shaft packing.  Matt borrowed some wrenches and some manpower and tried to adjust it last night to no avail.  He and the other guy could not even BUDGE the thing.  So the mechanic is supposed to come today or tomorrow and fix it.  Estimated cost is $150. I am not sure if he is going to adjust what we have our replace the packing but hopefully we will get the drip under control.  We did at least figure out that our float switch works and we identified which of the three "Bilge pump" switches on our three electrical panels does what!!  Two of the three have to be on to override the automatic pump.  We still have not figured out why five things have two switches that both have to be on--and these two panels are both at the lower helm.  Ah the mystery and allure of boats!

We had such a good time on our Redwood City trip the other day that we are trying to think of somewhere to go this weekend.  We were thinking Redwood City again, South Beach (in San Francisco) or Encinal (in Alameda).  We decided it was too soon to go back to Redwood City, South Beach has potential to be nuts due to its proximity to the Giants ballpark and unfortunately there is a cruise in at Encinal.  We are thinking of going to Oakland Yacht Club, which is next door to Encinal and having some sort of Jimmy Buffet party with live audio from his concert.  Sounds pretty cool!  We'll see what shakes out!

October 9 Plans

This Saturday is our sixth wedding anniversary so we thought we'd do something really romantic--be race committee for a club race and then host a pot luck dinner at the club!  I suppose this is fitting since we DID meet at the Yacht Club (in June of 2003) and we had our wedding reception there! 

I am really itching to work on our wiring.  I took apart the wire conduit that leads from the lower helm to the upper helm and the overhead panel above the lower helm to feed the "limo light" cable through there and found all sorts of interesting things, including a fairly heavy duty looking wire that was cut and a wire that looked like a lamp cord or cheap home extension cord.  Actually there were LOTs of cut wires.  I would really like to clean the wiring up and in the process remove all the electronics that don't work.  For instance, the GPS the lower helm does not work.  Actually, to quote the P.O., "it works, the display just doesn't work."  I am not QUITE sure what about it "works" if there is no display???  The antennae works? and with no display, that helps HOW??  Hopefully checking out all the wiring may lead to some things working again...  Hey, it COULD happen!

Weekend Wrap-Up

Our yacht club asked us to do a dinner Friday and give a presentation about the Pacific Cup.  The boat owners put together a slide show / video and Matt and I served tacos for dinner.  That only took three trips to Costco and one to a Mexican restaurant for beans and rice.  I did the shopping and Matt did the cooking and prep.  Several people pitched in to help with the room set up and clean up and all in all we had a great time AND we got this nice note from one of our members:

Hi Jennifer and Mat:

Besides being a lot of fun, the dinner you prepared was the best of the year. I love taco's. All the best, --

WOW!  So after THAT we had to take off and relax for the rest of the weekend.

Saturday morning we took the boat down to Westpoint Marina in Redwood City.  The marina is so new that it and the channel through the slough that lead to it are not charted.  It was somewhat nerve racking to get in there but we made it!  Matt was not totally lined up with the slip and came in a little too close on starboard but the docks are designed with rounded edges so we just got a little scratch.  The Owner of the marina was down there before we even had the dock lines tied and gave us a warm welcome, complemented us in the boat and then went to get us a 50 amp to 30 amp converter so we could plug in.  He also pointed out the wi fi and the slip side pump outs that were available to us.  We really like the place and look forward to the day when the proposed further development is in place.  Right now it is a mile walk to get to the yacht club and restaurant up the rode.  After we got the boat settled in we set off on that walk to go check out the "port fest" at the port of Redwood City.  It was super fun and we ended up finishing the afternoon at the Sequoia Yacht Club.  They cruise to Angel Island for the weekend on the day after Thanksgiving every year and we let them know we were coming up Thanksgiving day and would be there the whole weekend.  They also invited us to come to South Beach Yacht Club in San Francisco with them to go ice skating in December.  AND one of them offered to drive us back to Westpoint, though we ended up having a friend come up to have dinner with us at Bella's and she drove us home after.

Here is Matt on the boat at the slip in Westpoint.

We were in bed by 9 and had grand plans of leaving early Sunday morning.  We actually did not leave until almost 11, which we can pretend was due to the tides as that gave us a nice ride home on the ebb tide.  I drove a lot of the way and then turned it over to Matt to get us into the slip as I got out the lines and fenders.  It was his best docking yet, just absolutely spot on.  He made a comment that of course he did great with nobody around and I pointed out that someone on the next dock had actually been watching.  I have seen this same guy watching us several times and Matt said he has heard that this guy just got his boat and is afraid to drive it.  Our motto is it is only fiberglass but this guy's boat looks a few decades newer so I guess he has more reason to be paranoid about getting in and out of the slip???

We have a few different boat projects going, including installing GFCI outlets (1 down, 1 or 2 to go depending how they are wired) making covers for the outside of the windshield windows, finishing the throw pillows... we have a two page to do list...

This Saturday is our anniversary and we are going to be race committee then host a potluck.  Hopefully Sunday will be "our" day and we can relax and work on some of our projects!

Our First Oil Change

Our new (to us) trawler has overall been VERY well maintained, however she was in need of an oil change ASAP as it had not been done since January of 2009.  (It should be done once a year).  So we went to Kragen for oil filters.  Which they did not have and they sent us to a different Kragen.  Then we had to figure out how much oil we needed.  And go to Kragen for oil (and a BIG box of disposable shop wipes).  Then we had to borrow an extractor to get the oil out of the motors.  And then we were intimidated by the fancy electric oil extractor we borrowed so we borrowed a simpler manual one.  Then we were ready to get to it.  Oh except then we borrowed a five gallon bucket so we could transfer the oil from the extractor to the bucket so we only had to make ONE trip to the used oil shed, not four (each time we filled the extractor).

Ok, SO, the event itself...  We have two engines, so when you drop down into the engine room from the hatches in the center of the saloon floor you are standing between the two gleaming blue beauties.  The engines are identical to each other, so what you are looking at on the left side of the right engine is up against a fuel tank on the left engine.  And vice versa.  Basically, only one side of each engine is accessible.  The manufacturer WAS nice enough to put both dipsticks towards the middle.  The engine extractor goes into the dipstick hole and sucks all the oil out through it....

BUT FIRST!  The oil must be warmed.  This is to make it flow more easily AND to hopefully stir up any particles and "what not" and suspend them so they will also be extracted.  Of course the obvious way to warm your oil is to run your motors and what better thing to do while your motors are running than GO SOMEWHERE in the boat????  Since we only have a 9 gallon holding tank, the most obvious place for us to go was over to the pump out station to pump out the holding tank!  Once we were done there, and heck, since the motors WERE running and all, we took the boat out on the bay for a brief spin and to give me some driving practice.  By the time we got back we had done SUCH a good job warming up the oil, engines and engine room we had to take a break and go have lunch while it all cooled down a bit...

Ok BACK TO IT.  So, we have everything assembled, but of course word had gotten around we were changing our oil on the new boat so we got some onlookers.  One of them was nice enough to hop down in the engine room with Matt so I only had to sit in a chair in the saloon and hand them things as requested, or make trips out to other boats to borrow things (oil filter wrench, sharpie to date the new filters).  Also the person helping's wife came by and gave me some pointers on the stove, as she has the same one... 

"We" got all the oil out of engine number one and our friend set about filling it with nice fresh oil.  I was handing him the oil (by the gallon) and he was pouring it in.  After about a gallon and a half it occurred to him that my husband COULD go ahead and remove the oil from the second engine while we were filling the first.  :)  The first engine took 2 and a half gallons of oil and then was reading full on the dipstick. 

After "we" got all the oil out of the second engine, the gal was showing me the stove and all the sudden our smoke detectors went off.  They are all wirelessly linked together so when one goes off they all go off.  The beauty of this is if a fire (or CO) leak starts in the engine room it will set off ALL the alarms right away and hopefully alert everyone more quickly.  These things are so loud we attracted quite a crowd.  The alarms first said "smoke detected, evacuate" then "CO detected, evacuate" --what the heck were those guys doing in the engine room??? Come to find out Matt had bonked his head on the "test" button in the process of trying to shimmy around to the oil filter on the motor with the outboard filter.  Well, they definitely all work! 

Wouldn't you know it, the oil filter that was EASY to get to didn't leak a drop of oil when he unscrewed it but the one that required crazy Cirque de Soliel-esque contortions of course had oil gushing out the bottom of it.  *Tsk* so typical of all things boat related.  :)

Our friend filled the second engine with oil by himself, putting in the same amount as he had in the first one, and then he said the dipstick was showing overfull.  He held up the half empty gallon and said, see, I put in the same amount.  (If you are thinking this through, he put two and a half gallons in the first one, and had a half gallon left over.  How does he STILL have a half gallon left over????  You see what happened here right???)  He seemed mystified that one engine held more oil than the other.  It was time for cocktail hour on his boat by then and he had guests gathering already so we sent him on his way without pointing out he'd put a half gallon more oil in the second engine than the first.  Hey, he spent an hour helping us, we were NOT going to complain.  We removed the extra oil with the handy extractor! 

After we had everything cleaned up and put away we realized we should have changed the oil in the generator while we were at it.  Oh well, there is always next weekend!

New Trawler

Be closed on our new trawler last Thursday.  It is a 1984 PT 35 made by Tawain Overseas Industries.  It was a sundeck, flybridge, two cabins, two heads, a nice large saloon, inside steering and galley down.  Oh, and two 220 hp turbo diesel Perkins motors (ST 6.3544Ms). 

We went straight from closing to visit the boat at the boatyard where she was awaiting one last repair before being refloated Friday.  We spent a few hours climbing up and down a ladder loading her with things we'd need for our Labor Day weekend cruise.  We came back after work Friday and spent the night on her (in a slip) and headed out early Saturday morning for our first trip!  We picked her up in Sausalito and took her to the Marin Yacht Club in San Rafael.  It took us about and hour a half to get there and we had no issues.  It was a beautiful morning and lots of our friends were already at Marin on their boats as this is one of our club's most popular cruise outs each year.

We had quite the revolving door of visitors and it seemed like as soon as one group of people left another arrived.  We arranged to take Matt's brother out for a ride on Sunday and soon other people were asking to tag along as well.  Since Matt's brother was bringing his wife, kids and in-laws we tried to limit the other riders.  We ended up taking out a total of 12 and had more that wanted to go but we felt like 12 was more than plenty!  We wanted to leave by 10 am to make sure we were back before it was windy but didn't get out of the slip until noon.  It was an uneventful trip until we were back in the slip.  We had mentioned to one of the passengers that our ice maker was acting up so while he was on the floor asking me for a screw driver my brother and sister in law started hollering from the galley that the refrigerator door had come off and could I bring THEM a screw driver. 

Last time I'd seen the tools they were in our stateroom but they were not there.  My sister in law was afraid the fridge door would rip out on the bottom if they did not replace the top screw so she was quite adamant I find her a screw driver ASAP.  I finally tracked down my husband obliviously chatting away on the flybridge and sent him into the din of chaos to deal with all the people clamoring for tools.  :)  we easily got the fridge door back on and got everyone on their way other than the friend diagnosing the ice maker.  We settled into the saloon to trouble shoot with him.  We ultimately ended up taking it off the boat and we will do some more trouble shooting at home.

Sunday we got underway around 10 and headed home at about 8 knots (more or less depending what the current was doing in the part of the bay we were in).  It took us about 3 1/2 or 4 hours and again the trip was uneventful.  We then spent a few hours cleaning and fixing some little things, like getting the flybridge speakers to work. 

It looks like one of our friends is going to give us his old dinghy with motor and trailer.  I hope that pans out. 

I hope to post pictures later!