Back to Jones, our home away from home

As hoped, we were able to take Aeolus away from the dock on Sunday. I did a furious boat clean up and by lunchtime we loaded some friends onto the boat and headed off to Jones on a warmish and sunnyish day.

This exact formula produces marvelous results every time: sail to Jones, dinghy to beach, play on beach, hike around Jones, return to beach, return to boat, sail home. Perfection every time.

It was not that warm by the thermometer, but with a small dose of sun on that south facing beach, it was very comfortable. The recent rains have reawakened all the smells and the grasses have all burst green again.

The motor ran and sounded fine and so my alignment must have passed the test. No funny vibrations or noises. I'm happy.

By the way, the reason Elliott has no pants is because the boys played in the water and we made them take off their wet pants before getting onto the boat. Never mind that the water is quite cold, the kids had a blast. 

She's running again!

Ha! Went back to Aeolus today and after connecting this, that, and everything else, I started her up for the first time in about a month. Filled her with oil, filled her with antifreeze, changed all her filters (fuel and oil), attached the new heat exchanger and whamo! she purred like a kitten.

I have never had trouble starting my Universal diesel after the lines have been cleared. I pull the stop switch and crank her a few seconds to prime the oil system. I loosen the bleed valve on the injection pump. I turn the key on and let the electric fuel pump do it's job until it builds up pressure and stops. With all this, she always starts as always, on the first crank.

Now I have a massive boat cleaning job to do, but I might be able to pull her out of her slip just to take a short jaunt tomorrow! Yippee.

Engine alignment and other reconnecting tasks

I haven't had a lot to report over the past few days as I was away for travel and the work of aligning the engine is tedious. I think I was spared the worst case scenarios associated with engine alignment because now that I am done, I would estimate it took about 6-9 hours of time and a lot less donated skin than I anticpated. Not too bad really.

My transmission flange and prop shaft flange were already within reasonable tolerances when I dropped the diesel back down onto the new mounts. I had eyeballed the new mounts to match the old ones, as you would, and got lucky. However, when you need to get two surfaces within .003", being close is not much reassurance.

Replacing engine mounts

For some time now I have recognized that it was time for me to replace my engine mounts. They are orginal to the motor installation in 1988 and by any criteria it is high time to replace them. In addition, I have known I have an oil leak somewhere, and it was either my rear main oil seal or something related to the oil pan, neither of which can be accessed without raising the diesel off its mounts.

Once we had returned from our amazing August trips into British Columbia, I figured it was a good time to launch into this major project because I had satisfied my need for sailing time and wouldn't need to be out on the water for a few weeks.

Bringing Aeolus home from Comox: 15 hour day

What a journey. Aeolus was sitting up in Comox, BC waiting for me to come get her. If you have read the previous entry you will see that we left her there after crossing the Straits of Georgia in the Labor Day storm. On Friday after work I chartered a flight up to Comox to begin the journey of bringing her back home.

We've been having bright sunny warm weather, and Friday's flight was incredible. In a Cessna 172, we flew at 2-3,000 feet over the San Juan and Gulf Islands right up Georgia Strait to Comox. Man, I love flying! I've got too many interests to fulfill them all. The flight only took 90 minutes, and it had taken us 7 days to reach Comox on the Dad's trip I described earlier. We flew at 125 knots of SOG and so about 20 times faster than our 6 knot sailboat SOG.

Comox-Desolation Sound-Comox: What a week!

A prelude:

I'm sitting in a cozy leather chair near the fireplace in my lovely home with dry clothes and clean dry skin and nice moisturizer on my hands and the big speakers playing nice music and my stomach filled with large amounts of food and my hands still looking around for hand holds...

Anyone who has returned from a sailing cruise, especially one with some exposure to rough seas, can relate to what I say above. My wife and I woke this morning with all the disorientation of being home after a week aboard Aeolus. We have residual impulses to grab for handholds in our kitchen and Amy even said she was worried about running out of water while she was letting the sink run this morning doing dishes.

Oh, the greatness and oddity of being at home on land.

Friday Harbor to Comox, BC with the Justis boys

I'm just back from a trip so wonderful it certainly surpasses any attempt to render it in words. My close friend Cleve and his two boys Galen (5) and Daniel (3) joined me and my two boys for a week of voyaging north into Canada. It was a men's trip. Or, given the age of the men, a boys trip. Our wives thought we were crazy to go on an extended boat trip with four boys under the age of 8, but Cleve and I are the sorts that value adventure together so highly and for our boys that we'll pay just about any price.

The trip took us from our home port here in Friday Harbor to Comox, BC on Vancouver Island, via the Gulf Islands and Lasqueti Island in the Straits of Georgia. Besides being an incredibly good time of swimming and playing with our boys, it included some of the finest and most enjoyable sailing I have ever experienced.