October 2009 Archives

We stayed a day longer than expected at the house clearing things out. We have been gathering the last remaining load to take to the boat. The load is too big though. I'm hoping this morning we can re-evaluate the pile and eliminate a bunch of things we won't really need for the trip. After cleaning out this house for the past several weeks, I think too much stuff is a bad thing! Besides, we don't want to overload Tahina - it will literally slow her down. Catamarans are very weight sensitive.

We have run dozens of errands this week trying to complete all the tasks we need to do on the home front. Lots of trips to the post office, bank, stores, DMV, dive shop, etc. And, we spent many hours day and night filing papers and clearing out the house. Several trips to our storage, goodwill, and the dump. We're going to need at least one more trip home next week to take care of last minute items, and complete the house work.

Yesterday we went to the dive shop and got our air tanks filled and picked up a couple of other items (a shorty wet suit and an underwater light). The guys at Down Under Surf and Scuba in Cary have been great working with us over the years. We've used them exclusively for the past 10+ years.

We hope to load up the truck and other car and head down to the boat later this morning. But, the computer is currently backing up a hard drive which may, or may not, finish in 3 hours (I started it last night). We have enough stuff to load it may take us that long to load anyway.

This weekend we'll be working hard to get all the new junk stored. My main goal is to test all the new systems. We need to verify the SSB is working properly, test data communications with the satellite, install new firmware in the chart plotter, and finish testing the computer network.

We are striving to be ready for departure by the end of next week. We are in the final stages of clearing out of our house, and the boat is 99% ready. However, there are still a good number of items left on the checklist, and we have a lot of testing to do with a new computer network on the boat, our SSB radio data communications, and some safety practice drills to run before we will declare Tahina ready to leave. We are also waiting on some items which might not arrive by the end of the week. Once everything else is ready - we have to wait for the proper weather window for our first passage to Bermuda. It's a 3.5 to 4 day passage, and so you want to time the passage for both good winds and to avoid foul weather if possible.

This week I went to the DMV to have my driver's license renewed. The normal process in North Carolina has been for years that you fill out a form, pay some money, and sit down to have your photo taken. Then a few minutes later they hand you a new card printed on a special machine. Everything was going fine for my renewal until just after the picture (no, I didn't break the camera!). Instead of handing me a new card, they handed me a "temporary ID good for 20 days" with instructions that said they would be mailing the new one in 5-10 days. Apparently they just instituted this change a month ago. Great. If it doesn't show up before we leave, we'll just have someone mail it out to us at one of our further destinations. We rarely drive when we go to other countries anyway.

For those of you hearing about the british couple who apparently were indeed recently captured by pirates. We have been watching the news closely. Piracy is obviously still a very real threat - even in the 21st century. Our primary strategy, as with many sailors, will be to avoid areas with reported piracy, or even burglary, as much as possible. With regards to Somalia - it will be three years before we enter those waters - hopefully measures can be taken by governments and the military to drastically reduce piracy in the area by the time we reach that part of the world.

The Tahina Expedition has appeared now in two newspapers: our home local paper, and the local paper where we keep Tahina down in Wilmington, North Carolina. They took photographs of us while we were in the dive shop for the first one, and on the back of Tahina for the latter.

You can read the first story by Jordan Cooke of the Cary News titled: "Come Sail Away". Make sure you check out the photo (which appeared on the front page of the paper) showing Frank in a wet suit.

You can read the second story by Si Cantwell of the Wilmington StarNews titled"Here Now - Cary couple set for 5-year sailing trip around the world". I really like this story and the fact he made sure to point out the URL to our web site! It has a photo of the two of us sitting on the back of Tahina with our feet dangling over the water.

A critical part of sailing safely around the world is to carefully plan your route according to the weather. Weather routing is dependent on two main factors: good weather data, and good weather decision making by the mariner. Today mariners have vastly superior data available thanks to advances in satellites collecting data on our weather, improvements in computer modeling for weather forecasts, and the availability of data through the Internet and onboard weather software.

Recently I was introduced to the team at ClearPoint® Weather (www.clearpointweather.com) and after a brief discussion with them about the Tahina Expedition, we were soon offered a partnership and access to the ClearPoint Weather software and weather data services. This is an invaluable tool for Tahina that will enable us to more quickly understand the weather around the globe, and make more accurate decisions about our routes. It is a data-rich, professional product that provides pro's and novices alike with weather analysis that is easy to read, understand, and plan by.

ClearPoint is a sister company to Weather Decision Technologies Inc, (www.wdtinc.com), a WDI company, which created some great real-time global weather data for Google Earth. It was in conversations with WDT about the plans for Tahina Expedition that I learned about ClearPoint Weather.

We are very grateful to be using the same weather software and data used by top around-the-world sailing competitors. Expect to see in our blog some examples of the weather data from ClearPoint that we use to make our decisions as we prepare for passages. We welcome Clearpoint Weather as our weather partners!

Last week a lot of our focus was getting the boat cleaned up and organized. Not only to prepare for the departure, but also for the little social (a small bon voyage) we held at the marina on Saturday. We had invited a few friends and folks from the marina to come down and see the boat. The event turned out really well (despite having a lot of rain at the start - but, we had a small enough group initially to fit everyone inside).

We had a nice lunch with just the right number of folks who could fit inside while it rained. Then the sun came out and some of the other guests from Raleigh came. From 2-4 PM we had invited other boaters in the area and the marina staff to come see Tahina. About 25 people got tours and it we really enjoyed sharing our new home with people. Almost everyone seemed impressed with our layout and features.

The rest of the weekend I spent working on our new computer setup. We have a new base computer for the nav station which will serve the navigation software on the main screen. We decided to upgrade to Windows 7, and had to use the XP emulation mode to install the nav software (which hasn't been upgraded to Windows 7 yet). Fortunately, the software installed and runs fine (although there's something weird with the network parameters). It took about 4-5 hours to get everything running smoothly Saturday night.

Sunday I spent a good portion of the day testing the SSB and setting up for E-mail. Unfortunately, things are still not working properly. This is a critical function for the trip, so I have to get this working when we get back to the boat.

We're leaving today to head back to our home and try to complete our move out of the house. We still have a couple of truckloads of things that need removing to the boat, storage, dump, or give away. We hope to do this within about 2-3 days. Wish us luck on that!

There's also still a long, but actually shrinking, list of other tasks that have to be completed before departure. I'm currently thinking we may be done with the bulk of the tasks by early next week. We will still have some more boat testing to do before we can begin weather planning for our actual departure. All critical boat systems must be tested and working before we will be ready. So, I'm guessing the end of next week will be the earliest. That's only about 4-5 days off our original schedule.

Yesterday we received some packages from some of our final purchases before departure. One of the bigger boxes included new lines (that's what sailors call the ropes for handling the sails). We bought the lines so we would have spares on board in case some lines have problems.

The biggest line (nearly 240 feet in length), was bought to replace our main halyard (the line that lifts our main sail, but is also used for other things like lifting our dinghy). Since the main halyard is so critical, and our old line had some visible wear and tear, we decided to replace it before we leave. We bought an extra strong line, so this line cost quite a bit of money.

Late in the day, Karen and I started preparing to send me up the mast to replace the main halyard. I got the bosun's chair (the canvas seat I sit in as the line pulls me up) ready with some tools. Attached the new line to the seat to take it up with me. And even used a different halyard for the lifting so I could send down the old halyard down.

The first problem was that the shaft for the attachment point for the top end of the main halyard was also used as the shaft for the pulley holding the halyard I used to get up there. Oops! I couldn't remove that! So, I had to go back down. Karen was operating the electric winch to lift me, but had to manually control the line to let me down.

I then realized I could use the main halyard to go up there and disconnect the end since it wasn't supporting me up there anyway. But, I'd have to go again to remove the old line, attach the new line to the end and pull through the new line. So, that's what we did.

Once we had it down, I couldn't use either of the two main halyard, so I decided to use the spinnaker halyard to take me up. But, it is on the other side of the mast. We managed to pull me up this time and I began the process of attaching the two halyards together. I used some twine and tape to connect them. Only, I forgot to take the knot out of the new line I used to carry it up! Meanwhile, I managed to drop the needle to the twine I used to sew the lines together (which, believe it or not, I actually found later in the sail cover - Karen said it was "like finding a needle in a sail sack!" :-) ). So, I had to go back down again...

To make a long story a little shorter, I'll just say what should have taken not longer than 1 hour and only two trips up the mast - actually ended up taking nearly 4 hours and 8 trips up the mast! It was a comedy of errors, with some serious overtones. It's not a good idea to be going up a mast 70 feet off the water that many times. I should have done a better job of thinking things through, analyzing with binoculars before I went up, and having every step planned. We actually ended up going up the mast the last three times after sunset. The good news is that I learned a lot of lessons that will greatly improve my planning (and safety) in future mast trips. And, although I dropped a couple of things, nothing bad happened. Karen did a great job of not making any life-threatening mistakes!

Oh, and we have the new main halyard installed!

Having communications with the world is an important part of sharing the experiences of the Tahina Expedition. We have a number of communications systems on Tahina:

1. VHF radios - for short-range voice communications ship to ship
2. HF/SSB radio - for long-range voice and very low-bandwidth data communications
3. AIS receiver - Ship-to-ship data communications for showing vessel location and other data
4. EPIRB beacon - an emergency system for communicating to satellites our location in the event of an emergency
5. satellite communications system - capable of voice, fax, and data communications)
6. long-range WIFI receiver when WIFI is available near shorelines.


When evaluating our data communications systems for off-shore applications, I contacted a friend named Brian Barnett who runs a satellite communications company called SatWest. His company has been providing a wide-range of satellite communications solutions for companies world-wide for over ten years.

The Tahina Expedition, through its partnership with VideoRay, has a small underwater remote-operated vehicle (ROV) with a video camera system and a grappling arm. The VideoRay ROV will enable us to check on the health of coral reefs, dive on wrecks, and view a huge variety of marine life (including sharks) from the safety of our boat. Not only that, but the ROV can be operated, with special software, over the Internet. We have planned to allow some lucky students in various classrooms to have the opportunity to drive our ROV during parts of the expedition.

In order to link to the Internet, and provide streaming video for the ROV, we needed a satellite communications system. Marine-capable satellite systems with broad global coverage can be very expensive. The antenna systems have to be very sophisticated in order to insure the antenna stays pointed at the satellites even while the boat is moving on
the water. The usual solution is a complex gyroscopically-stabilized platform.

  

Thanks to a partnership with Vizada, Tahina has a Thrane & Thrane Fleet 250 system on board which offers high throughput for our broadband connection, along with simultaneous voice & data communications. It's a lot more cost-effective and easy to manage and it was compatible with the computer systems installed as well. This system was provided as part of a partnership with SatWest and Vizada, and it will provide the essential IP streaming needed for us to broadcast the findings of the ROV.

These partnerships were critical to enabling the Tahina Expedition to have better communications for safety, weather data, voice communications, and to enable the ROV applications. We thank both SatWest and Vizada for their advice and services and look forward to working with them on the ROV, and other applications, during the next
five years of the Tahina Expedition.

Just to illustrate how crazy our lives have been over the past few months, I thought I would describe how the day went today - a rather typical day for Captain Frank lately (this is a real description of today - it's not made up):

• Captain Frank wakes up at about 5:30 AM and immediately heads to the computer to start working in our office upstairs.
• Decided to list the two sets of bedroom furniture (bought for our kids when they were 10) on Craigslist. The furniture has been sitting in half our garage for weeks. I listed the furniture under the title: "Princess Bedroom Suite" and had some photos of the all white furniture. The furniture was nice quality and cost a small fortune new. But, I offered one suite at about 40% of the original price to see what would happen.
• Started researching HD video camera options. I had intended to get a consumer HD camcorder. But, then I read about the new Canon 7D SLR having amazing versatility (including HD video with a wide range of recording options) and wondered whether that might be a good option. I wrote my professional photographer friend Juan Pons (see his site WildNaturePhoto.com) to get his opinion.
• Started working on E-mails and blogs when Juan wrote me back and suggested we talk via phone. Spent half an hour discussing the pros/cons of the two choices (an all SLR approach, or use our existing SLRs and a mid-range HD camcorder). We decided for the short-term the HD camcorder would be a better choice for our applications.
• Got a call from our partner Virgil at EarthNC. Virgil is helping us develop the map mashup for viewing the tracks for the Tahina Expedition, working on the Google Earth KML layers, and developing tools to take our reports while at sea to update the maps in an automated fashion. We discussed details and Virgil went off to work. He does some amazingly fast coding in my experience.
• Took a number of boxes from our attic downstairs, and emptied one of our last remaining closets at the house. This closet had our many small boxes of photos and slides. Consolidated the boxes and put them in a pile to take them to storage later in the day. Nearly one small pickup load worth of boxes!
• Spoke to one of my daughters and she reminded me I had promised to get her a new laptop at Best Buy since today Windows 7 was released and they had new laptop inventory. We agreed to meet around 4 PM.
• Picked up all our sports equipment in the garage (golf clubs, roller blades, softball gear, etc.) and took them to Play It Again Sports to sell. They offered a pretty low price, for which I only managed to get them to go $6 higher after a bit of negotiating. But, at least we have less stuff in our garage.
• Since I was near the Best Buy, I went to look at the prices of the new laptops. I remembered I needed to buy some other computer equipment and a Windows 7 license for one of the boat computers.
• Met with my friend Andy for lunch and we discussed some of the computer software integration he is assisting with for the Tahina Expedition, and he offered to install the Windows 7 on one of the computers.
• Finally got home around 1 PM and started loading the pickup truck with the boxes from earlier in the day.
• Around 1:30 went up to check E-mails. Discovered I already had about 10 E-mail enquiries about the bedroom suite furniture! Called three different people and within an hour or so had agreements from all three resulting in all 13 pieces of furniture being sold and ready to pick up today! All of the furniture ended up selling for close to my asking price.
• Finished packing the truck (with help from Karen) and then the first Craigslist buyers showed up to pick up one complete set of the two bedroom suites. It actually took over an hour to gather everything together, disassemble parts so they would fit in their vehicles, and get it all moved on and tied onto their truck. Meanwhile I was juggling final details with the other buyers.
• After the first buyer left, I started checking E-mail (even more enquiries were being made, so I deleted the listing). This was the most successful Craigslist sale I've held so far!
• We had a few phone calls during the day from friends who saw the article in the local Cary News newspaper about our trip - which was published on the front page yesterday.
• Karen and I then took the truck load to our climate-controlled storage facility and unloaded. On the way, we stopped at our doctor's office to get some 6-month prescriptions for Karen.
• We then rendezvoused with our daughter at Best Buy and after 30 minutes or so purchased the laptop she had selected (and bought some software and a service contract).
• We headed home, and the next Craigslist buyer was waiting in her car in our driveway. The woman was buying all but two pieces of the other bedroom suite. It again took about an hour to assemble and load all the furniture (possibly a little longer as it was just me doing the heavy lifting and some of the furniture was still in the house). It took her two loads to get all the furniture transported in her minivan (even after removing her seats).
• Karen grabbed some dinner at a fast food place and brought it home. I had about 8 minutes to eat it all (it really was fast food!).
• The last buyer showed up while we were loading the second load for the woman. The last couple were getting the last vanity with chair and full length mirrors. It took another 30 minutes or so to get everything put together and loaded in their cars.
• At this point it was 6:30. About 4 hours later than my original plan to leave for the boat today by 2:30. Karen and I quickly packed, loaded the car with more stuff for the boat, checked E-mail, and were out of the house by 7:30 PM.
• We arrive at Tahina around 10:30 PM. We unloaded the stuff in the car into two carts and took them out to the boat. Packed away everything, and then continued tidying the boat.
• We have an interview with a local paper in Wilmington in the morning around 10 AM. Hope to get up early and wash down the boat and the windows before they arrive to take pictures.
• Decide to blog about our day as an example of what our lives are like lately.

Whew!

All in all, I call this a really good day. We made a huge amount of progress removing stuff from the house - that furniture took up a LOT of space in the garage. And, we even got some decent money for our troubles. But, it's time for bed now. Tomorrow is another busy day!

The most frequently asked question we get lately is: "When do you leave?" Or, "Have you set a date?"

The short answer to the question is: "We don't know, but as soon as we and the boat are ready and the weather is right!" And: "Hopefully by early-November"

Here's the better answer to that question:

Our plan for months now has been to have ourselves and the boat ready by the end of October or early- November. However, there are three main factors determining our actual departure date:

1. Checklists complete - we have been working on a massive list of TO DO items that until recently seems to continuously grow. However, the list is finally shrinking. We have a final list of "must be done before departure" items. These are things that must be done before we can leave. Things like:
   • All financial matters in order.
   • Everything requiring us to be here in person completed. For example: my driver's license needs renewing.
   • All personal items we're leaving behind need to be put in storage or with family or friends.
   • New tracking map ready on the web site. So you'll be able to follow us on our travels.
   • And so on...
2. Tahina Readiness - All systems ready and tested on Tahina. We can't leave if the boat is not ready for the long trip to Bermuda, and then down to the Caribbean. We have a lot of new systems on board that have to be thoroughly tested. And, in general the ship has to be thoroughly prepared to go with all main systems in a state of readiness. We have a passage preparation check list for this. Things like all provisions on board, spares on board, all safety systems checked, communications tested, passports on board, etc.
3. Weather - You never rush a departure on a long passage. You leave when the conditions are right. We first had to wait until the end of hurricane season (according to our boat's insurance, that is October 31). If there are any hurricanes out there, we'll probably delay a bit. :-) Our first passage will be to Bermuda which should take about 3 to 4 days on Tahina. Once we have everything else ready, it may take several days before we get a good 3-4 day forecast along our route to Bermuda.

   While we really would like to get the trip started, we don't have a specific date set for arriving in the Caribbean. The incentive is strong to leave (we are eager to be in those warm Caribbean waters!), but we have to be prudent sailors and make sure we have a proper state of readiness and the weather is good.

Spare time is not something we have a lot of right now, but it is time for spares. Over the weekend I spent some time making purchases of items needed for Tahina on our checklist. A vessel at sea has to carry a lot of things you might not think about because when something breaks down, you may not be near a repair shop - possibly hundreds, or even thousands, of miles from one. So, a prudent sailor carries spares and tools needed to effect repairs.

While we have been buying supplies and tools for months now, there are some items which hadn't been purchased yet. Here is a list of some of the items just purchased:

• spares kit for our generator - includes filters, v-belt, pump impeller kit, plugs, etc. We already had some of these, but wanted a more complete set.
• watermaker filters - Tahina has a machine that makes fresh water from salt water. But, you have to keep fresh filters ready to change them out when they go bad. They're hard to get for our unit except from the manufacturer, so we bought a year's supply.
• bolt cutters (very large size) - these are only needed in the event of an extreme emergency - if we were to be dis-masted we would need to quickly cut the cables holding the mast to the boat.
• shackles - sometimes the shackles which hold various items to the boat can work their way loose, or (even rarer) break. It's always a good idea to have plenty of spare shackles on board. You can also use them to create solutions to other problems that may develop.
• drogue - Drogues can be used to slow the boat under heavy weather (strong wind) conditions. They can be particularly effective on a catamaran. We can also drag warps (lines) behind the boat to slow the boat, but a drogue can be more effective.
• pumps - spare bilge pumps in case one goes bad is essential. Bilge pumps remove water when it finds it way into the bottoms of the hulls. Very critical if you have a leak, but usually are used when condensation forms on the hulls, comes from air conditioning units, or from sinks and showers in the heads. We also have manual bilge pumps in case the electrical system goes bad or we are unable to install a new bilge pump.
• tools - I've been gradually beefing up the tool box with tools I've never owned (because prior to owning boats, I've never been mechanically inclined). Also, some of the tools I did have were not ready for the marine environment (i.e. they would corrode quickly in the salt water conditions). Seems like every day I'm back buying some other essential tool I didn't think about.

Last week we went to the dive shop to buy some new scuba gear. We needed new wet suits since our last pair were 8 years old and somehow shrunk a bit in that time. While we were there, I got a call from a local paper that wanted to do a story on Tahina Expedition. They asked if they could send a photographer to take some pictures while we were at the dive shop. I haven't seen the photos yet (the article hasn't been published), but I was wandering around the store in a wet suit looking at various items with Karen while he took photos. Oh joy! The paper sent a journalist over to interview us on Friday. Unfortunately, Karen was not feeling well, so the journalist only heard my perspective on the trip. But, he certainly got an earful of all the plans we have for the expedition!

Meanwhile, the Cape Fear Power Squadron, which invited Frank to speak to their organization last month, has written a couple articles about the talk in their Foghorn newsletter. You can view the newsletter here (PDF). They plan to do a vessel safety check on Tahina before we depart to make sure we have all the proper safety equipment in order.

We also have an interview with another media company in the Raleigh area later this week, and more announcements of partnerships will be coming out soon as well.

Meanwhile Karen and I went back to the boat this weekend. We needed to organize the many items we've been gradually taking down to the boat during the past several months and storing in various nooks and crannies inside Tahina. So, we basically pulled out everything, organized, and then tried to figure out more permanent locations.

Next weekend, we are having a bon voyage party and boat tours for a few of our friends from Raleigh and new friends at the marina. Not everyone has seen the boat in person, and certainly not since we added all our belongings and decorations to the boat. The party has given us a deadline to get the boat cleaned up. So, after organizing everything, we have been working on cleaning up the boat inside and out. We made a lot of progress on both areas over the weekend, and hope to get most of it done by Tuesday. The hardest task is waxing all the top sides. Most of the areas are covered in non-slick which doesn't need waxing. So, you would think there's not much to do - wrong! :-)

Today we have a "boat doctor" coming by (that's what he calls himself) to work on the repair to the trampoline slides (both sides have to be repaired). It will be good to have that task out of the way, and the builder has agreed to pay for the work.

Although we still have a huge number of tasks left before we depart, and we are incredibly busy getting them done, it is suddenly hitting me we are going to be leaving soon. Our house is up for sale, and we've been moving our most special possessions to various places with friends, family, a few to the boat, and the rest into storage. Karen has already been feeling the departure blues for several weeks - probably because she has been working the most on clearing out the house and she invested so much in making our house a wonderful home over the past 10 years.

Our kids are off in college and living their own lives. We see them occasionally, but there's this reluctance to get too close because of the impending separation. The plan is they will be visiting us during the Christmas holidays so it won't be too long before we see them. So, I guess we use this as an excuse to keep from getting too emotional right now.

Although we're getting very excited about beginning our dream of sailing around the world, soon we will be saying "au revoir" to friends and family. Saying goodbye to our home and our normal possessions (even selling our cars!).

I've always been a dreamer, and I learned a long time ago that there are prices to pay to achieving your dreams. While it is difficult to face these departure blues, I try to remind myself of the joys we will experience once we begin this amazing journey.

Thanks to the Internet, we, at worst, will be just an E-mail or Skype call away from friends and family. Better yet, we hope a lot of friends and family will come down to spend a week or two in paradise with us. That's the biggest reason why we ended up with Tahina: plenty of room to have guests on board and to share our dream even more intimately than through this web site. If you are a friend of family member, don't hesitate to call or write an E-mail and ask if you can come to visit. We'd love to see you!

Another thing that will help cure our departure blues is that, we know from past experience, the boating life is filled with making new friends and meeting new people around the world. Upon entering a new anchorage, you will often find yourself meeting other sailors there and soon forming new friendships - many of which last a lifetime. Sailors have a common bond of loving being on the ocean, being dreamers, and loving the boating life. It's amazing how easy it is to be friends with other sailors, and is one of our favorite parts of this mode of living.

And, we've found that people in remote countries, and especially the remote islands, are very open and welcoming to people visiting by sea. We look forward to not just visiting for a day or two, but getting to make friends when we stay for weeks or even months at a time in some countries. That's why we're taking 5 years for this adventure - we want to stop and smell the flowers. Not just drop in and see the popular tourist sights.

Lots of things to be excited about. But, I can tell the departure blues are going to be difficult to deal with during our finally few weeks before we leave.

In America, we know them as a "marine store", but the more official term (and used more often by international sailors) is a chandlery. Boaters get to know, love, or sometimes hate, these places that provide essential needed items to keep our boats running smoothly or to fix inevitable broken equipment. It is sometimes a challenge to find a good chandlery as you are sailing in remote islands, but every good sailor will eagerly look over the available wares when he finds himself near a store.

Our preparations for this trip have required quite a few trips (unfortunately for our wallets) to both local and online chandleries. My favorite two are West Marine (because they have stores in most popular boating regions in the US as well as an online catalog), and also Defender (who also have an online catalog, good pricing, and great customer service).

West Marine staffers were very helpful when we purchased our new chain and anchor, and in helping us find many unusual items either in their store, online, or in some cases sending us to other stores over the course of the last several months.

I've used Defender many times over the past 10 years or so, and they have always been a pleasure to work with. They often have sales related to boat shows, so you can often get better prices on expensive items if you time yourself right. When we bought one large item this summer, I noticed a week later they had it on sale for $100 less. They not only offered us a store credit, but even offered to pay us a refund on the difference in price. That kind of service buys a lot of customer loyalty!

Preparations are moving along. But, not without some new hurdles popping up out of nowhere. We had a scary one on the weekend.

This weekend we discovered a problem that initially caused us grave concern. It appeared at first we had a major structural problem with the boat, but it turned out it was "just" a mistake made during manufacturing that made it look that way. The problem involves a long metal track slide that goes along one of the bows to hold up one of the two trampolines between the bows (mostly used by sun bathers, but also used for setting up sails during passages). The slides hold plastic "slugs" which are little square shaped "holes" that hold the lines which are connected to the trampoline mats. The slugs are designed to break if a large wave hits the mats (just one or two might break if the force is strong enough).

We had a little wave action on the trip when we came back from Beaufort weekend before last. But, not much. Until Saturday when we were doing some waxing of the bows and noticed the slide on one of the hulls had been pulled out about an inch! This should never happen because the slugs should give long before the hull should give way. I immediately jumped in the v-berth in the bow (this is on the port side), and saw that the washers on the bolts for the slide - which serve as a "backing plate" on the inside of the hull - were pulled through into the "wall" on the inside!

I had all sorts of visions of our having to do major fiberglass work, but I took some pictures and sent notes to the builder. He responded on Monday with a calming, but apologetic, voice. The issue isn't structural. It turns out they put about an inch of insulation on the inside walls of the living spaces (to prevent condensation). Where these bolt washers went in place, someone was supposed to put a hard "spacer" against the inside of the hull, and THEN place the washer on top of that. But, instead they just stuck the washer on this thin shell of inner wall covering the "soft" insulation. Well, they held for the last 8000 miles, but gradually weakened. Then during our last trip, we finally broke through.

Needless to say, the builder has said we can get it fixed and he'll pay for it. He even gave detailed instructions on the best way to make the repair. Now we have to find someone available on short notice to get the work done.

The good news is that this happened before we left. Once fixed, we'll have great confidence the problem won't happen again. We also have had no other issues of significance with the manufacturing of the boat, so our confidence isn't greatly shaken.

I just wish it didn't happen this close to the end of our preparations.

The Tahina Expedition has actually been working with EarthNC for years. EarthNC is a service for boaters that provides all kinds of nautical data (charts, weather, information on nautical events, and more), for use with computers and, more importantly, with Google Earth. Even before we bought Tahina, we used EarthNC's electronic charts with Google Earth on a sailing trip to the BVIs we made in 2007. And EarthNC was used on our first passage of Tahina back in August 2008. EarthNC's founder, Virgil Zetterlind, has been working to help Tahina Expedition develop some unique Google Earth content which you'll be seeing in the coming weeks. And, we plan to use data and tools EarthNC provides as we travel around the world.

So, welcome EarthNC as a Tahina Expedition partner! You will find them on our new partners page where we will be listing a few select partners who will be involved with the Tahina Expedition during the next five years of our circumnavigation.

Because I've been writing the Google Earth Blog (GEB) for the past 4+ years, I'm determined to make the Tahina Expedition a showcase example of using Google Earth to share our experiences. I've written about thousands of uses of Google Earth and shared them with about 6 million readers world-wide per year. Now I hope to show folks I can practice what I've learned. Today I'll share one of the more interesting projects I have planned.

One of the things I proposed for our Google partnership, was to provide them with some aerial photos. Aerial photos of very unique locations at very high resolution. One way I plan to do that is to fly kites and take straight-down shots just like you see in Google Earth. Only much higher resolution than what you typically see.

There's actually a popular hobby called Kite Aerial Photography (KAP) for taking some truly unique photos by flying a camera with a kite. One Google Earth developer I wrote about on GEB, because of his work with the USGS (he wrote the Earthquake monitoring tool), is actually one of the best-known KAP people out there. Visit Scott Haefner's site here to learn more about KAP and see some amazing photos. Scott was helpful in introducing me to KAP and directing me to someone to build my system.

My system was built by Brooks Leffler (see his web site). It includes a custom camera carrying rig (which can rotate altitude and azimuth), remote control panel, and a shutter control to take pictures. He also can build devices to let you view your shots from the ground. Brooks also sold me several kites for different wind conditions, winders, and string.

First KAP Attempts

On Thursday, the weather looked perfect to make my first attempt of aerial photos of Joyner Marina (where we keep Tahina right now). This is hard to believe, but I've been so busy for the past several weeks, I had not even opened the boxes for the kite camera equipment which arrived nearly four weeks earlier! It's really sad when a gadget geek like me can't even open the box when it arrives. As soon as I got to Tahina, I tore open the boxes. I carefully looked over the manual, and began setting up the equipment. Brooks even supplied me with batteries, so it was actually good to go. It only took me a few minutes to set up and experiment with the controls and take my first shots on the ground.

I grabbed the kite and asked someone to help me set up. (NOTE: I had previously practiced flying the kite - see photos here). There was a small crowd of folks watching me set up and asking what I was doing. Unfortunately, we never got far off the ground. The wind was dying. I even went back to the boat and got the bigger - lighter air - kite. But, the wind continued to die and we only got a few test shots. (See the slideshow below).

The next day, the winds were much better. With some help from Sue - the Joyner Marina dockmaster - I soon had the kite flying and the camera up in the air. Unfortunately, I again learned a valuable lesson: make sure you put the lens at the widest setting for aerial photos! Later in the day, I got the widest lens I have (a 10-20 mm wide-angle), and flew the kite even higher. I at last got some of the kinds of shots I was hoping for.

Below is a slideshow (I encourage you to choose View larger slideshow) with photos of the equipment, our first attempts, and several much better shots after I got some experience. I will also show later how some of the photos will look in Google Earth. But, I'm hoping to get Google to process some of these images and put them in Google Earth itself. Back in 2006, I worked with Google to take some aerial photos (from a plane) and you can view that in Google Earth still today. Anyway, it was a lot of fun - and hard work - flying the kite and learning the "ropes". I look forward to delivering many similar photos to Google, as part of our partnership, over the next five years in all kinds of exotic locations.

I've been working on processing photos and video this morning. Below is a slideshow of photos from the Beaufort anchorage during some sunsets/moonrise. And, some photos from our passage off the coast of North Carolina (about 15 miles off shore). I'm also uploading a short video (see below) showing some of the sailing (which show how it can get a bit bouncy when going 8 knots on choppy seas).

And here is the video clips showing us sailing Tahina 15 miles offshore. We were going about 8-10 knots in choppy seas. The ride wasn't as bad as it looks:

We are making the transition from house to boat. And, it's a lengthy process. The house is up for sale, but we still have a few nooks and crannies with stuff to clear out. This week we came home on Monday night and have been busy working on processing.

Our worse location left in the house is the garage which has been stock full of junk and furniture we either want to keep, sell, or giveaway. We also had all the usual garage junk on the extremities. This week I did pickup truck loads to Goodwill, recycling, dump, storage, and the hazardous waste dump. I got all the oils, old paint, paint thinners, anti-freeze, and other stuff you can't dump at the landfill. I was surprised and alarmed how much "hazardous" materials we had out there. Thank goodness no one lit a match! We also processed most of the stuff in the attic and the last remaining closet (I think). Anyway, lots of progress, but still more left to do next week.

Also this week, I continued to process our digital media library. My friend Andy has been helping me acquire our new computer network for the boat. We started experimenting with the new stuff and testing it with the media. Karen has been working on final selection of our travel health care.

This morning, I'm going to be headed back to the boat (Karen will come later after a dentist visit). This weekend I hope to finish some projects postponed at the boatyard, set up parts of the new network, and experiment with the kite aerial photography equipment. We also plan to move the boat out on the water to test equipment and get Karen more practice driving Tahina.

Next week we come back to Raleigh for my trip to the dentist, more garage cleaning, visits with friends, and a wedding.

The next 2 weeks will probably be like this - back and forth - until we are finally ready to move on the boat and final preparations for departure. We are still looking to leave near the end of October/early-November.

Today we are releasing our new logo for the Tahina Expedition! You can see it in the banner at the top of all the pages. The previous design of our site was just something we threw together. This time, we hired a professional to help with the design, and we are thrilled with the results. We were hoping to capture the flavor of world travel, sailing, mapping/Google Earth, and our expedition all in one symbol - and we really like the results. Let us know what you think!

Here is a taste of what our boat card will look like:

Thanks to alitaylordesign for the great work on the designs!

View Sail from Beaufort to Carolina Beach in a larger map

Finally, after three weeks in Beaufort for our work at the boatyard, we were ready to depart and return back to Carolina Beach to our favorite marina - Joyner Marina. The winds were SSW when we had dinner, but were forecasted to turn to the NW sometime after midnight. I researched several web sites - but, my favorite for winds is PassageWeather.com. They have a new NOAA wind data model called NAM I wanted to try out. Based on the NAM model the winds would shift to the NW about 3 AM. So, after waking a couple of times to check local conditions, I got us up at 1:30 AM to depart.

We quickly weighed anchor (since we had prepped the boat for departure before dark), and began our motor out the channel. As we were exiting the mouth of the channel a barge under tow was coming down-channel. We moved out of his way and then re-crossed the channel trying to find calmer waters. The waves were about 4-6 feet and choppy as we were heading out. With a full moon out dodging a few scattered clouds were able to see the waves pretty well. Once we were beyond the shallower waters the waves were a bit less choppy. We then raised the sails - but, we double-reefed the main because the apparent winds were above 20 knots since we were going to be close-hauled.

I put the auto-pilot on WIND mode which means it tries to hold course on a given angle of the wind. We set it at 42 degrees off the starboard side. If you look at our track, you can see that the winds did indeed curve to the northwest because our track headed more and more to the SW as we hoped. Although we were a bit south of course for a while, I expected the winds to shift more north later in the trip, so we didn't try to tighten up any further.

We put up our new corner-piece to our wind/spray dodger. This helps protect us from the wind or spray at the helm seat - especially on a close-haul like this. It worked great! Once we were on course, Karen went back to sleep for a couple more hours sleep.

We had clear skies the rest of the night and the moon was bright as could be. Since it was ahead of us, I had the clearest view of the water ahead of the boat at night I think I've ever had. I could have avoided a buoy or other floating object if I had seen one, and could easily have seen any boats. But, the night was quiet - except for the winds. Around 4:30 I was getting tired, so asked Karen to take over until sunrise.

The seas and winds started settling down after sunrise and we had a delightful sail into Wrightsville Beach. By the way, Tahina was pretty much in top form with freshly cleaned and painted bottoms. We were doing 9.5 knots in 10-11 knots of wind for the final parts of the run. Awesome! Since it was low-tide around 2 PM, we couldn't go in the Carolina Beach inlet (which is very shallow at low tide). So, we entered at Masonboro Inlet and motored down the ICW (Intracoastal Waterway) for the final 8-10 miles. We arrived at Joyner Marina about 2:10 PM.

This will be our home for the next month or so until we are ready to depart on the big trip. We have many details to work out before we are ready to leave, and we have to make sure the weather is right before we sail out to Bermuda. We expect late-October, early-November is still the target time-frame. But, we'll leave when we're ready.

After two and a half weeks of hard work, with a long list of accomplishments, Tahina finally went back in the water on October 1st at about 5 PM. Karen and I worked side by side all week finishing some pretty intensive manual labor including: waxing the sides and underside of the boat, scrubbing the bottoms of the two hulls, and finally painting the bottoms. There were also numerous side projects and several trips into town to buy parts and supplies.

A couple of other boaters in the yard heard about our plans on Monday to leave by Wednesday and said we would be lucky to be done in 10 days. But, we managed to complete the bulk of the projects by Thursday. We postponed a few smaller projects since they didn't require being in the boatyard and out of the water.

Here are a few pictures of the final stages. The boatyard wanted to get us in the water on Thursday because they had a full slate of other boats on Friday. So, we had to rush to finish up on Thursday afternoon. But, you can see the progress in some of the pictures. Warning: you should definitely put protective clothing when applying anti-fouling paint! And, masks when working with the wax are also a must. If we ever do the painting ourselves again (a big maybe) we'll definitely get completely covered. That paint is nasty stuff.

On Wednesday, after a particularly hard day of painting, we had a nice dinner with the couple who own "Don't Look Back" - John and Bobby Jo. We went to the venerable old Clawson's at Beaufort Town for dinner.

After we got back in the water, the first thing we did was check the new thru-hull holes for the ground-plate. No leaks! That was a big relief - otherwise we would have had to pull out to fix it. We immediately left Jarrett Bay Boatyard and headed down the ICW to Beaufort to anchor. Along the way, we were very pleased with how fast Tahina was with her clean bottoms. We were easily going 1 to 1.5 knots faster on one engine at lower RPMs than before.

It's a shame we were rushed after dropping anchor. We had to immediately get the dinghy out because our friends on Don't Look Back came to pick us up so we could go get our cars. Karen was leaving to drive home to manage some business at home.

All I can say is we were thrilled to be done with the boatyard, and back in the water. We think Jarrett Bay is a great facility, but Tahina is meant to be in the water!