Dauntless Summer Adventure 2015 Begins

Yesterday.

We got up at the crack of dawn so to be able to start engine at 06:15. The last line was thrown off at 06:45 and our Summer Adventure officially began.
Today, Sunday, 24 May, 2015, I awoke to the visage of Claudia III out the salon window, quite a change from Waterford. But how did we get here?

Casting off yesterday morning, with our bow pointed into the flooding tide, Dauntless left Waterford with hardly a ripple. A little left rudder, forward gear at idle, she glided smoothly into the oncoming 2 knot current.

I can’t begin to tell you the feelings of getting underway, cleaving the bonds that tied us to a particular place. The steady purr of the engine, the big wheel turning a big rudder, Dauntless becomes frisky. Krogens are made to roam the seas and can bring their lucky owners to virtually any place they dare to go.

We had arranged to go to the New Ross Boatyard for haul out. 12 months and 4,000 miles after our last haul out, I figured it was time again. The Waterford boatyard’s lift was too narrow for our Krogen, but they recommended the New Ross Boatyard. Our departure from Waterford was predicated on two factors: the need to depart into the current and the necessity to arrive at New Ross close to high water. That meant an hour downstream against the current and then an hour upstream with the current. Turned out there was also a swing bridge to traverse, but we had three feet to spare.

Arriving at the boat yard, with a two knot current still running, made for an exciting entrance, finally on the third attempt, Dauntless was safely cradled in the lift.

The bottom was in much better shape than I had anticipated. The previous haul out, half the anti-fouling paint was gone. This time, there were just small areas where the old ablative paint was showing through. So we, actually Karla and Larry, spent the rest of the afternoon touching up our bottom. Now it looks a bit like a moth eaten leopard, but only the fish will know.

The two zincs were half gone. I replaced the one on the rudder. The one of the shaft is a combination steel cutter attached to a clamp on zinc anode. It costs only $60. It’s the second one I’ve put on and it works wonderfully. Half eaten, it tells me it’s doing its job and no pieces of line wrapped around the shaft as had happened in the past.

We’re ready to go back in the water, but today is Sunday, so we will have a day of rest and just small jobs. I must service and grease the Ideal Windlass and probably replace one of the solar panel controllers.
The Delorme InReach is now on, and my intention is to keep it on until Dauntless returns its 2015-6 winter home October 1st. Therefore, you can find us at, https://share.delorme.com/dauntless

If there is not a current update, either the boat has sunk or I neglected to charge the InReach.

Thanks for coming along with us.

Boat Propeller Shaft Line Cutters at Zincwarehouse.com

Sorry, the pics are too hard for me to upload here, they are on my blog.

Wxx3 said:

...Thanks for coming along with us...

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Thanks for allowing us to share the ride.

As one still living vicariously through others voyages until that day the admiral and I cast away our own lines, I'll look forward to your updates.

OD

It's taken 5 tries Judy to get the pictures above uploaded.

Richard: The bottom looks great for the miles you put on her over the last year. Do you remember what prep you did for the rudder? I've never had good luck with paint staying on.

Wonderful.The saga continues.

That is a wonderful find ... impressive zincs. I'd looked at line cutters but at $300 for 1.25" shaft, well, that didn't happen. I rather like this though. And I suspect the stainless could be reused with donut zincs after the first set goes kaflooey. The line cutter parts appear to be through bolted.

Just pondering mind you.

Run, Forest, Run!!!

Hope you're having a good time out there, Richard!!

https://share.delorme.com/dauntless

Larry M said:

Richard: The bottom looks great for the miles you put on her over the last year. Do you remember what prep you did for the rudder? I've never had good luck with paint staying on.

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Prep?

Same thing we did for hull.
It was all sanded.
Then two coats of the $99 per gallon ablative that was on sale.

I was surprised. I expected much worse considering 4,000 miles on it, then sat for 8 months without moving.

Thanks again for shaming me into getting the prop done. Even now or looks so pretty.

Wxx3 said:

Prep?

I was surprised. I expected much worse considering 4,000 miles on it, then sat for 8 months without moving.

Click to expand...

It seems the only way you'll ever know why it did so well is to keep crossing the Atlantic back and forth for a while, and monitor the condition on each lap.

BTW, sincere congrats on your 7 page spread in the recent Waypoints magazine.

healhustler said:

BTW, sincere congrats on your 7 page spread in the recent Waypoints magazine.

Click to expand...

Cool! Is this available online?

FlyWright said:

Cool! Is this available online?

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Found it.....Kadey-Krogen Yachts: WaypointsKadey-Krogen Yachts: Waypoints click on the Winter 2015 edition.......great read, thanks.

Way cool! (as my kids would say!)

Nice article, Richard!! What a great read!!

My favorite is the last line.....


(spoiler alert!!)



At the time of writing, we still have 50 pounds of rice and
24 cans of mandarin oranges

Sweet! Thanks for sharing! Looking fwd to more

Great article Richard, still amazed at your courage!

That was amazing, my hat off to you both!

Thank you, a good read.

Thanks for all the support and kind words.

I thought that Waypoints story came out two months ago. I know I had a hard copy in March.

I've just posted the account of the last few days, Ireland to France on my blog.

https://dauntlessatsea.wordpress.co...15-day-01-new-ross-ireland-to-scilly-islands/

I have slow internet, so while I can repost them here, it takes too long to upload the pictures.

If you have strong feelings about me also posting here or not, please tell me.

I'll also be posting more pictures at Richard Bost

Currently, I'm waiting for this storm to pass through, as we are leaving tomorrow for Jersey!

Richard, I just subscribed to follow your blog updates, but maybe an occasional post with the link here reminding TFers of an updated blog or photo page might help.

It's a lot of effort to keep the blog updated and duplicating it here would only increase your time on the keyboard. Sure love the blog...you're living the dream!!

Fair winds and safe harbours Richard.
We've got about 80% of our work done so far and we'll be leaving Belturbet(with a hangover) on the 14th of June.
Careful around the Channel isles, watch out for the high tidal range and strong streams.
We'll be dropping in to New Ross to catch up with old friends before going round to Kilmore Quay and then over to Wales.
Keep us posted.
Geoff & Evelyne on 'Snow Mouse'.

Wxx3 said:

If you have strong feelings about me also posting here or not, please tell me.

Click to expand...

I'd love to have it all, in both places. And in my email box (subscribed already)

Your adventures and insight are of interest, and too you write well.

I've added your blog to my favorites and eagerly anticipate every new post. I can keep up with it there, but, as Flywright said, an occasional reminder that you've added to the blog posted here on the forum might be a good deal.

Dauntless Summer Cruise 2015 Days 04 to 07, Trebeurden, Lezardrieux & Jersey

Here is the post I did today, I seem to have good internet connection for the time being, so it is not an onerous task to repost. But pictures are another story, since they are not on this computer.

There is also a short video, but it is sideways and I do not know how to correct that in Wordpress.

A reminder for a few links you may find interesting:
My blog is at dauntlessatsea.wordpress.com

Some extra pictures are at Richard Bost But I don't update a lot if I'm not in NY

YOu can also find Dauntless on Marine Traffic, 367571090

Also find Dauntless at Share.delorme.com/dauntless

Best way to contact me is through my gmail, wxman22

from my post today:

After 10 months, I finally got the water maker up and running. I had needed to replace the aux pump and wanted to rewire it a bit, to use a relay closer to the power source. This also enables me to have a switch on the helm to turn it on and off.

I had done the electrical weeks ago, but the pump fitting were giving me fits. Between national pipe thread (NPT), garden hose thread, plastic fitting, brass fittings, American fitting and European fittings, I was at my wit’s end.

I didn’t like the first solutions I had come up with which had made it look like something Rube Goldberg would have designed. Finally in Trebeurden I found a coupler fitting and that led to an elegant solution.

The new auxiliary pump, centrifugal, is very quiet and made to run continuously. That’s thanks to Parks at Hopkins-Carter Marine in Miami.

Having to find a new dock in Miami last winter, while stressful at the time, ended up being the best thing ever. My helper, the other Richard, got to see some of the Miami boating environs and I ended up meeting some really helpful and nice people: Parks and my Nordy friends, Ed & Rosa. A wonderful result on all accounts.

So Saturday morning, we got up and were underway to Jersey. We didn’t make it.

For the first 4 hours, our average speed was 4 knots. At that rate, we would get to Jersey the day after tomorrow. Not really but it felt like that. So I decided to find an interim stop. I did, Lezardrieux, promptly nicknamed, Lizardville. As soon as we turned upriver to the town, about 5 miles, our speed shot up to 9 knots. We arrived just in time to miss the lunch hours, meaning a wait until 19:00, 7:00 p.m., to eat. I don’t like eating late anymore, convinced that part of my weight loss has been due to not having evening meals for the most part.

The forecast was for a storm to be moving through on Sunday, but you know me and forecasts. I wanted to get to Jersey because the window of opportunity was getting ever smaller.

Therefore, we are underway now to Jersey, in moderate winds, 12 to16 knots gusting to 25, but the seas are relatively flat, at 2-4 foot. Yes, I have come to accept that 2-4’ is relatively flat. Our roll has increased to 8°.

We now have a counter current, so although I am making the supreme sacrifice by running at 1800 rpms, where fuel burn is 2.0 gal/hr, our speed is still only 5.8 knots. If my Navionics currents are correct, we should have a helpful current going our direction in the next two hours.

Our intended destination, St. Helier on the Island of Jersey, is a port that has a sill to come over. The sill, like a cofferdam, keeps the water in the basin, otherwise the harbor would be dry at low tide but now, this means the harbor entrance is only open 3 hours on each side of high tide. So, it’s also closed for 6 hours. I’m running faster to try to get there before it closes.
I’ll let you know how it turns out. But you can probably figure it out as it happens just by watching our route at the Share.delorme.com/dauntless website.

Ummm, turns out I had rebooted the InReach and then did not realize it was not transmitting, so no joy that way. However, I did get an email from MarineTraffic telling me Dauntless had arrived in Jersey!

The wind stayed out of the southwest until the final hour into Port St. Helier. This meant the fetch was small and the waves stayed in the 2 and 3 foot range, with only an occasional 5 footer, in spite of the 15 gusts to 25 knot winds. Just before landfall, the winds turned westerly and north westerly at 25 knots. That combined with the much longer fetch, was immediately saw waves a few feet higher. All of sudden we were getting 6 foot waves on the port stern quarter. That angle of incidence does make the roll more than usual, and we had one roll of 15°. But not much more than a curiosity, as the port was in sight.

As we pulled into the harbor, I saw the three RED lights signifying the marina basin was closed. Not only was it closed, but the water inside the marina was already three feet higher than the water Dauntless was in. We tied up at the “waiting” dock.

So my tide calculation was only off by about 6 hours! Se La Vie.

All’s Well that Ends Well

If you cannot find me via the Delorme, you can also try Marine Traffic, but a caveat.

If you google MarineTraffic Dauntless, please be aware that we are not:
A Greek bulk carrier, nor the Tugs in the UK and Singapore and not even the British war ship.

So if you are like I and are easily confused, just google “Marine traffic 367571090”.

We went into town and had a great, early dinner. I’m beat.

I'm traveling right along.Tough deal on that harbor being closed.

When I see green strands forming along the waterline, I say to myself "need to take the boat out more often!"

Regarding your video....

When recording a video with a cell phone or tablet you need to hold your device horizontally and NOT vertically otherwise your videos will be displayed as it did in your wordpress blog (90 degrees off). Hope this helps...

Diesel Duck 492 said:

When recording a video with a cell phone or tablet you need to hold your device horizontally and NOT vertically otherwise your videos will be displayed as it did in your wordpress blog (90 degrees off). Hope this helps...

Click to expand...

I've never taken a video vertically, always landscape. That's why I don't understand why it does that when uploaded to WordPress.

Just posted the most recent shenanigans.

I need some calm winds.

I'm getting ready to leave at 6:00 to take advantage the race currents. Though it's not clear to me what time the water will be high enough to get out.

I'll make sure the InReach is on, so it can record our record breaking speeds.

I just posted "What Not to Do" on my blog.

https://dauntlessatsea.wordpress.com/

Part 2 is forthcoming

Dang Richard....and you say it goes downhill from there!! Waiting apprehensively for part 2.