We woke up the next morning to a hot, stuffy boat. The fans we had blowing on us during the night, our “boat AC” if you will, weren’t running and we were sweating like two prostitutes in church. The fridge wasn’t cold either so a nice, refreshing glass of OJ was out of the question, too. What kind of five-star operation was this? Pretty Woman got better treatment than this, and she was an actual prostitute! Phillip went up to check on the cord and, sure enough, Plaintiff’s Rest had most definitely been unplugged:
Ours is the sad, little unplugged one on the bottom.
We had been operating under the assumption that our boat would remain plugged in while the folks at the marina were working on it, which is why we had left the fridge running. Don’t want the caviar and Cristal to go bad. Well, you know what happens when you assume … There we were – two asses baking on the boat.
It could have been our boat neighbor, good ole’ Tenille, who unplugged us so he could run a belt sander or beer fridge or something, or one of the mechanics or some other boat that pulled up. We eyed everyone around us suspiciously, but the truth was we had no way to know who dunnit and it didn’t matter anyway. It was already done. The batteries had run clean out. We plugged her back in so she could recharge and started packing up to get back home.
If you recall, we had taken the Genny sail down so we could re-sew the sail cover. Now, the sailing newbies out there (trust me, I used to be one) may be scratching your head. What on earth does that mean? Let me drop some sailing knowledge on you. So, the Genny (short for genoa sail) is the headsail on the boat.
It’s called the headsail, or foresail, because it’s for-ward, up near the “head” (the bow) of the boat, as opposed to the back (the stern). The Genny is furled (really fancy sailing term for ‘rolled up around’) the forestay, which is the wire that runs from the mast down to the front of the boat. In the previous photo, she’s pulled out, and here, she’s furled up:
Now, you may be thinking: Well, how do you pull her out and roll her back up? Great question. With your teeth! I’m kidding (but that may explain some scraggly pirate grills out there …
No, you do it the same way you handle all sails on the boat – with lines (another real fancy word for rope!). So, you have lines (ropes) that pull the Genny out, either to the starboard side or to port
You see them here, one going to either side of the boat.
You then secure them on either the port or starboard side with big wenches in the cockpit. You remember these (they debuted in several of The Crossing photos):
And you roll (furl) her back up with one line that runs back to the cockpit and it spins the drum you see here at the base of the Genny to roll her up:
Ahhh … learning. Wasn’t that fun? Reminds me of the good old days of PBS and “The More You Know!”
Oh, and Reading Rainbow circa 1983.
And if his pink ski jacket and knitted fingerless racquetball gloves (hot!) didn’t take you back, this certainly will: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQcItttVuRY.
So, the UV cover on the Genny is the green trim you see here:
That covers the entire sail when it’s rolled up to protect it from UV damage when it’s not being used.
The cover on our Genny had begun to tear and flap during The Crossing which meant we needed to sew her back down to be sure our Genny was getting adequate protection from the sun. Nobody likes a burnt Genny.
So, we packed the sail up and took it over to our trusty broker’s house for some hard-core Martha Stewart action with the sewing machine. Did somebody say Sew Party?!?! Yes, please!
Roll that fabulous footage:
Yep, that’s exactly what you think it is. A big ass sail we dragged into Kevin’s foyer.
Kevin was a rockstar with the sewing machine.
After we (well, I should say Kevin – he did all the real work) got her all stitched up, we dragged her out to the front lawn to properly flake her.
In other words, fold her up right – like so:
It took some thinkin’
More on my part than the boys. But that didn’t stop me from telling them how to do it (never does!):
But we got it done and shoved her back in the Prius till we could get her strung back up on the boat.
Then, as one always must do after sewing festivities, we engaged in a rousing arts and crafts session with Kevin and Laura’s little cutie – Kai (beautiful name by the way – it’s Hawaiin for ‘Ocean’ – he’s clearly got sailor’s blood).
Did someone say Sticker Party?!? Yes, please! Let’s face it – pretty much anything that ends with “party” is going to be a ‘yes’ in my book!
Anyone who can rock a Sponge Bob sticker on the forehead gets a kiss from yours truly!
Great fun was had by all and it was very productive. We got the sail cover fixed and we thanked Kevin, Laura and Kai by leaving them with an original, signed hand-made Annie sticker masterpiece.
So good it kind of blows your effin’ mind, right? I know. I get that a lot … They can hock that puppy once I die and make some real dough!
But, we had one major problem. As we were telling Kevin about the boat and the battery situation, he laid some nasty news on us. Apparently, it is not good at all to run the batteries on the boat completely down. Turns out simply plugging her back in doesn’t always work. Once they’re run completely out, they sometimes can never be charged back up, or if they do charge up, they can’t hold the charge. Kevin was worried our batteries might never recover.
I tell ya … with boats … if it’s not one thing it’s a damn-nother.
We still had one more leg of The Crossing to make (about a 48 hour sail total) to get her from Carrabelle back home to Pensacola, and if the batteries were toast, we were going to have to throw a new batch in along with a transmission. So, we needed to know exactly what kind of state our batteries were in – sooner, rather than later. We jumped back in the car the next day and drove our happy behinds back to Carrabelle to check on the boat … yet again.
Nice action shot of Phillip making the drive – all serious and Japanese anime-like. Go, go Speed Racer!!!
