ouch

I turned down a free boat...that's not like me. It wasn't a free toy, day sailer, or dinghy - but a distance proven 37' Steel cruising sailboat. Granted it's very old and needs a lot of work - but hey... it's free !

It would have taken lots of money to re-fit, even more to re-rig, and another  large amount to redo the stripped out interior;But with a few years of weekend and evening hours, help from my friends, and scavenging from scrap boats - this would have made this an exciting and (I feel) doable project.

The problem was moving it. No local marina would accept such a large project boat - so moving it would be a necessity. After weeks of research, I came up with one name - and he was out of town. No one else in the area seems to want to deal with a steel boat that old and large - and if they do, they want an exurbanite amount....the one reasonable quote I did find was immediately overshadowed by unforeseen financial difficulties..

So,  I turned down a free boat - a boat that could have started making our dream a reality!. I guess if it was meant to be, it would have happened.

Down for the count...

  Tropical storm Alex and the following tropical disturbance have brought nothing but rain. Rain, rain, rain and then some rain...I'm more then ready for blue skys and brisk breezes. I've been back to Blew Bayou several times - mainly checking the lines as we are now not only adjusting to a new location, but also to extremely high tides brought about by the recent weather.

 I did find the knock in the engine to be remedied by retarding the timing somewhat extremely ....perhaps I have some bad fuel. Also shined a light back on the shaft while she was running, and noticed that the engine is obviously out of alignment . Although correcting the oil sending unit seemed to take care of most of my leak, with the engine that far out of alignment I would not be surprised if the rear main seal was also leaking.

I need to pull the motor this winter - but until then, I am just trying to get the time down there to align it.