July 1 & 2

 I promised myself I was going to get some time on the water this weekend come hell or high water...
(I think I phrased it in the old Pete-ism "I don't care if it gives the Pope a harelip, I'm going out on the boat!")

So the day started off well...

Yeah.
Exactly what I needed.

My recent experience with stuff like this, upon taking it to a Tire Store, after an interminable wait, the tire technician will tell you:

• The damage is too massive to be plugged- You'll need new tire.
• The damage is too close to the edge - New tire required.
• The puncture went too deep- New inner tube and tire needed. (huh?)
• That's a philips head screw- New tired required.

Oh and by the way - you'll need two tires... Can't have a mismatch like that on the Tacoma.

Fortunately I found a guy camped out in front of a closed tire place on Florida Ave that apparently makes spending money plugging tires on the weekend- seems enough people like me needing a quick fix that he can sit there on Saturday and Sunday and make $10 a pop to plug tires.
Done and dusted - On to St. Pete!

I had packed an overnight bag, grabbed my basics and some stuff to munch on and I was out the door.
About an hour later Serendipity & Jane Ann were headed west- Destination - Egmont Key.

Heading out of the harbor

Jane Ann looking good...

Well... fortunately we are riding an outgoing tide.

Motorsailing with the jib out... Winds under the Skyway are crazy so I keep to a minimum of sail and stay ready to furl it if things get out of hand.
Back in February an unintentional jibe about took my head off coming through the span, so I've been a little gun-shy ever since...

 

Our spot for the evening.

Andy got a good hook on Jane Ann and threw me a trailing line to hook up to...

He immediately went in to check out his hull...
I did the same- that was the intent of the whole trip for me...
I wanted to see how the new bottom paint and the new prop were doing.

Sorry - no underwater pics this time..

I took a scrub brush to the bottom, getting the thin coating of algae scrubbed off... Took all of 20 minutes, where it used to take me ninety minutes to two hours to get most of the barnacles, oysters and other growth off.
Everything looked good.

Sundown over Egmont.

I rigged a canopy to sleep under - too damned hot to sleep below deck.

I dropped the line to Jane Ann and went out to drop my own anchor... Safer that way.
I have a 15 pound plow anchor on the bow pulpit... its a decent all-purpose anchor.
We were in 10 feet of water - I had 50' of line out - decent scope for the expected wind...

And of course nothing goes as planned -
Wind picked up a good bit and my anchor alarm went off...
The wind shift had change my position - swinging from southeast to southwest more than the allowance I had planned.
I reset the alarm and waited...
20 minutes later it went off again...
I was drifting west... The anchor was dragging.
Oh shit.

Start engine, run up to the bow, pull up the anchor...
Run back to the cockpit, reposition the boat...
Throw her in neutral and run back to the bow...
Drop the hook...let her drift back...
Hold the anchor line to see if I get a good set... Nope. I can feel it skipping on the bottom.

Lather - rinse - repeat
I try again - and still can't get a good hook set.
Damn. Time for plan B.

At this point I can see Andy is up doing the same shenanigans with Jane Ann.
When the wind does a dramatic shift and picks up speed sometimes it can cause even a really well hooked anchor to come loose... And the bottom where we were anchored was sand and silt/mud... My plow anchor is not the best for that.
 

Plan B, of course, is to get out the Beast. The 25lb Danforth anchor in the lazarette...

The good - it would definitely do the trick.
The bad - I'm still adrift.
I need to get further out so the wind doesn't push me into the shallows, dig out the Beast, dig out the backup anchor line, get one married to the other, maneuver the boat to a good spot, get them up to the bow, and get the Beast deployed and cleated. 

I got all that done - keeping in mind that this all started about 11:30pm and it was now closing in on 1am. It had take Andy about 20 minutes to do his pas-de-doux. He was about 40 yards further out than I was...
I spent another 15 minutes organizing the rat's nest of lines up on the bow.
I got my regular anchor line into one pile and my backup line into another relatively organized coil, i wanted to be ready just in case it didn't hold...

But hold it did, but that didn't let me sleep any better.
By 5am I was tired of faking it and I got up, nibbled some crackers, drank some Gatorade and started making plans for the return.
My fuel gauge was acting funny... It was bouncing between empty and 1/4...
It was doing me a little concern... I rearranged gear and gave the fuel tank a tap test... Inconclusive.
The wind had shifted 180 degrees from when we'd arrived...now coming out of the SSE.
Somewhat good for sailing back into Tampa Bay... But I had work-stuff to attend to, so it wasn't going to be a leisurely trip back.

As the sun came up over the Skyway I had most of the details I needed to attend to taken care of...
As I was up on the bow stuffing my regular anchor line back down into the spurling pipe (I've been calling it a hawspipe, but have been re-educated) and getting ready to transition the Skyway.

As I said earlier, I've had issues transitioning the Skyway span so I want to make sure nothing can come loose or go overboard when the seas pick up to  a heavy chop and the wind starts whipping.
Serendipity is a sturdy girl, but she needs a hand on the tiller at all times while underway.
Andy has outfitted Jane Ann with an autopilot so he can actually do something other than spending all his time steering the boat... Trivial things like putting sails up or down, going below to fix a problem or to look for a needed item, or get a bite to eat.
On Serendipity, it better be withing arms reach or it doesn't exist.
I can lash the tiller and keep her going in the general direction, but she's a little unbalanced (like her owner)  so she veers after one or two minutes...
Anyway-
I was buttoned up and battened down by 7am... Andy was up and moving.
We arranged to transfer 5 gallons of diesel from Jane Ann to Serendipity...
This was fun...
We put all our fenders out and rafted up- no mean feat in the wind and choppy waters...
He handed off a 5 gallon jug of diesel and a shaker siphon (ooh! I gotta get one of these) and I fed Mr. Beke... Ah. Much better.
The last thing I wanted was to run out of diesel fuel...
Mr. Beke has been reliable since I did the fuel system overhaul, but repriming a diesel is not something you want to do offshore.
I was back underway at 8am -

Again - motorsailing - Jib up and making 6.5 knots with Mr. Beke running at quarter throttle.

Eastbound, wind out of the south...

Andy went full-sail, no motor - making 4 knots...

I cleared the Skyway in an hour- probably the easiest transition I've had.
Dashed off a quick of prayer to Poseidon and two hours later I was in my slip at SPMM.
Another hour of cleanup, wash down, offloading all my gear and I was heading back to Tampa to put out fires.

(Like the 97degree temperature alarms in the EC Computer Room -
But that's not Good Stuff. We'll talk about that another time.)