Touch of Class

We are back up in Minnesota.  Had to surprise our Grandson for his 1st Birthday!

Yummy Cake

Papa and Grandson

Birthday Hangover!

What a lucky boy!  It was a nice surprise for him and the rest of the family.

You all have a wonderful Thanksgiving, a Merry Christmas and a safe and Healthy New Year.  We’ll pick up the blog when we return at the end of the year and start our trip back down south.

It is getting pretty cold down here, low 20’s at night.  I know, I know, you poor soles in Minnesota have it a lot worse that we do but our boat doesn’t have much insulation so it gets pretty chilly in here at night.

Gary has to plug up our vents

One of our side vents

with foam sheets to help keep the cold out.

Foam sheets

We used these last year too so they had already been measured and cut to fit.  This is what he does, first he rolls them up

Just Roll it up

Then he slides them into the vent

Hold it up

Stuff it in

We even use sponges for some of the shell cowls

Sponges work too.

Of course if we take off with the boat, we have to pull the foam from the engine vents so they can get some air.  This is quite a common thing to do here when people leave their boats in the water year round.  We see some boats being winterized just like we would in Minnesota.  We don’t winterize our systems, even when we go back to Minnesota for Christmas.  We just make sure we have some heaters on and as the water in the harbor stays about 50 degrees, the engines are OK.

So winterizing in Iuka, MS is considerable easier than in Minnesota.  We are very happy about that :).

Well, we are off to surprise our Grandson and his parents.  We aren’t suppose to show up till December 1st but we are going to arrive on the 21st of November.  (I am posting this after the fact so as not to spoil the surprise).  We’ll be up in the fridged (is there such a word?) Minnesota for 6 weeks.  I hope we can handle it :).

I guess I was right, the master head is broken, darn.  Good thing we have two heads!

Gary had to go down the front hatch which is closest to the vacufush pumps so see what the problem is.

Down in the belly of the boat

He figures out that a set screw has come loose in the pump.  He just read an article about how you should check screws and bolts occasionally to make sure they haven’t come loose. Point taken.  But really, who’d a thought you had to check your set screws on your pumps?So he found the problem but he can’t quite get the set screw to go back in place.  And the hatches just don’t quite line up to make it an easy fix.

Other hatch by main toilet

He has to take the whole pump out just to fix a crumby set screw.   That means cutting wires, taking off hoses, putting in hose plugs so nothing leaks.  Sounds like a fun job and all just because of a little set screw.

If you are going to all this trouble, you might as well replace the hoses (they can deteriorate after a while and then, P U!), the hose clamps and the duckbill valves (these can also wear out, especially if there is a lot of pooping going on 😉 ).  The duckbill vales are located in the pump itself

Motor

So off to Lowes to get 4 make shift plugs

Home made hose plugs

Then back to the marina to pick up new hose and hose clamps.  The Touch of Class is some what prepared and we have extra duckbill values on board.

So Gary start off this project by heating up the hoses to get them to expand some so he can get the hoses off the the connections

Vacupump hose

Be sure to have a bucket ready to catch the stuff in the hoses.  Man oh Man!  That was one stinky bucket!  We had to spray a few bottles of Fabreeze around to get rid of that smell! But finally, Gary got the pump and the attached hoses out.

All out

You can see he even had to cut some power wires to get it out

Had to cut the power

There it is, the cause of this whole mess, a lousy set screw

Loose screw

So Gary cleaned everything off, changed the hoses, replaced the duckbills and tightened the set screw .  Unfortunately, I don’t have any pictures of that process.  See, I was pretending to be busy so I didn’t have to learn how do to that, cause if it happens when he is not around you can bet your bottom dollar that I am going to be letting my fingers do the walking and I’ll be hire someone to change those bad boys :).

Then Gary gathered all his tools that he would be needing to put this thing back together

Getting the tools out

Tools for the task at hand

Then he went back down the hold and re-attached everything

Back down

Peek-a-Boo, I see Gary!

One of the problems with all these tight spaces and taking an aspirin a day, is that Gary bleeds like a stuck pig.  We bought him some elbow pads to help with part of his arm, but the bottom got gouged by a hose clamp.  Watch out for those, they can do some real damage to your body parts.

Owie

I think we’ll have to invest in a full sleeve thing.  I wouldn’t want him to bleed out just repairing the boat :).

Now, everything is installed and it’s time to test the pump and check for leaks.  I flick on the master head switch and wallah!  It is working wonderful and best of all…..no leaks! Another good job by the Captain.  Hopefully we won’t have any problems with the other head for a loooonnng time :).

We left the week of the 28th to check out a bunch of marinas that will be our home for next summer into fall.  Before we left, we had the boat pulled for a bottom cleaning and some repairs.  No one wants a dirty bottom you know :).

Pulling the boat

You forget how big she is until you have some humans standing next to her.

Big girl….little humans

Her bottom was pretty nasty

Dirty bottom

Another dirty bottom picture

We were having the zincs replaced (remember the talk we had about the zincs inside your boat?).  We were going to have the zincs on the trim tabs, the bow thruster and the plate on the back.  After careful inspection we found that the bow thruster one was gone (hmmmm, maybe that is why is seemed like is wasn’t working properly), the ones on the trim tabs were not too bad, but we replaced them anyway, and the back plate was A-OK.  So after one last look and a hug, we left our baby in the capable hands of the marina crew.  We knew they would take care of our girl and fix whatever needed fixing.

We started out on our adventure of checking out 12 marinas.  Gary made the list, and I completed my anal worksheet on each marina.  A check list with things like, do they have laundry facilities?  Do they have a bath house?  Do they have Wi-fi/cable? Etc, etc.  All sorts of information that will help us decide which marina we want to live at.  I complete one of these sheets, along with taking pictures at each marina we visit, because after I visit 12 marinas, I can’t remember what had what.

We started our travels with the furthest marina, Tellico.  We have some friends that keep their boats there so we knew we’d have some good camaraderie if we could get a slip.  Too bad that marina was already full, with a waiting list.  So that one won’t do.  So on to the next.  Here are some hi-lights of those marinas

One of the marinas actually had a silo in the middle of their docks

Silo

because the Tennessee River was created by erecting damns and the flooding the land.  So the river flows over farms, roads and bridges.

How about this for a work barge?

Work Barge

Just climb right up!

This guys spruced up his pontoon boat, even went camo with it so he could take it hunting!

Camo Pontoon Boat

I think they need to get the sickle out and clean up this dock

Dock needs a hair cut

Wow!  That is a big lawn decoration

Lawn art

At this marina you could put up your own mail box so you could claim residency.  No state tax in Tennessee!

Just throw up a mail box

This guys must have partied to hard at the Halloween party 😉

Rock on Skelliton

Then we saw this boat at one of the marinas

What the heck, no bow, no stern

It looks like it is in a little need of repair

Front of boat, see the stove?

Here is the stern

See the orange raft on the top of the roof?  We think when they tried to lift it out of the water the cables must have cut right thru the boat and just sliced off the bow and the stern.  I bet they cried when they saw that :(.

Then we had a greeting party at one of the hotels we stayed at.  I think he was a sleepin 🙂

Our greeting party

Luckily for us the gas prices decided to take a little nose dive

Cheap gas.

All kidding aside, we visited some great marinas and it will be a tough choice for us to make.  All in all, we had a good time and we made it back to the boat safe and sound.  We found the boat back in the slip but found out the next day they had quite the time getting the boat in the clip.  One of the things they were fixing was our steering, it had a leak.  They had to order the part so they decided to just pushed the boat back in the slip.  Needless to say it had to be one of the windiest days ever.  The neighbor next to us had eyes as big as saucers I am told.  I’m glad I wasn’t there to watch.  Eeee, gads!

Now we just have to look through the data and decide where we want to spend next summer.

Oh oh, Gary is yelling at me to turn off the master head.  Looks like the next blog entry will be fixing the toilets!  Stay tuned….

We took the boat out for a little tool this morning after we pumped out.  Pumping out, always such a fun thing to do, watching your poop be sucked out a hose and praying that the hose doesn’t pop off and spray poop everywhere.  Been there, done that, not too much fun :).

It was really foggy this morning but the weather man promises 85º for the next few days, apparently unseasonably warm for here, but we’ll take it.   Each fall they drop the water level here to what they call their “winter level”.  Some of the homes with docks, end up with their boats sitting in the mud.   One house we saw on the river, that is for sale, has his boat sitting in the mud.  Not a very good selling point :).

This time of year, the “Loopers” are all heading south.  It is fun to check out the transient dock each day to see who has landed.  If you are like most boaters, they love to look at other peoples boats, just to see what is out there, so we try to check out the transient dock and meet some of the people.  We like to see where they are from and where they are going.  Most boaters have a provision in their insurance policies, as do we, that says they can’t be south of 31 degrees, so about Demopolis, Alabama, until November 1st.  They have to find some place to hang out until that magic day.  So some of the anchorages and marinas around Demopolis get all clogged up with Loopers waiting for the day when they can head out.  Of course, then there is the flood of boats all heading south at the same time.  Makes for interesting boating as there are only so many bollards in the locks to tie up to and there is only so much room in the anchorages, or so I’ve been told.   I think I’d wait until the middle of November to make the trek.  Sounds too crowded for me.  Luckily that won’t be our problem this year :).

Well, we finally completed our last annual maintenance task on the boat.  Yah!  Just in time before we leave to check out the marinas on the Tennessee River.  So if you want to see how easy it is to change the zincs, check out the “From the Engine Room” page.

For those that don’t give a hoot about zincs, I offer some pretty sun rise picture (yes!  I get up early enough to see the sun rise, no matter what Gary tells you 🙂 )

Sunrise 1

Sunrise 2

Sunrise 3

Sunrise 1 and 2 are taken from the pilot door of our boat looking out at the dock in front of us.  Sunrise 3 is taken from the parking lot overlooking the bay our marina is on. It has been pretty foggy in the mornings, I guess fall is here to stay.

So we’ll give you an update of those Tennessee Marinas when we return.

Oh goodie!  We get to go down into the engine room again and learn something new.  Today we are going to learn how to change raw water impellers on our Volvos (that is the engine in case you forgot:)).  The purpose of an impeller is to circulate the sea water thru the heat exchanger (which is basically like a radiator in a car), then the water goes thru the tranny (transmission) cooler and finally it exits thru the exhaust, which also get cooled by the water.  Sooo, if your impeller goes out, as in there are only 3 blades left on it, there will be a lot of items in your engine that will be overheating.  That will not be good :(.  So lets go to the “From the Engine Room” page and we’ll find out how it is done.

For those of you how could give a hoot about how to change the raw water impellers, here are some pretty cob webs from the other day when there was heavy fog at the marina.   Pretty huh?  Even though they poop on your boat and leave little black spots, they can sure make some incredible things, can’t they?

Next time we’ll be covering changing your zincs.  I can hardly wait!

Until then TTFN!

We are trying to see all the historical places around here before we leave in January.  The other day we went to the Corinth Interpretive Center.  It is another place run by the Park service.  It also was FREE!  We like free :).

As you walked from your car to the building you noticed little items cast in bronze sticking out of the concrete. Here is a canteen

Canteen

a pistol

Pistol

some spectacles

Spectacles 

and, hmmm, what is this?

What is this?

A nail?  A writing instrument?  Opps, sorry, it is just a dead worm :).

Once we got to the front door of the building there was this bronze wall of marching soldiers

Wall of Soldiers

Inside there was a cannon

Cannon

There was a cool fountain in the court-yard

Fountain in Court Yard

Of course I like anything with water 🙂

They had some exhibits, a couple of talking exhibits and a movie.  It is amazing the number of young men that died or were maimed during the Civil War, it was such a shame. The exhibits followed pretty much the information we had already picked up at the Shiloh site but as this was in Corinth, it showed more about protecting the railroad and the slaves staying in Corinth after it was taken over by the Union Army.  The museum was a little closer than Shiloh so if you only have a short amount of time to check something out, this would be your place to get some Civil War history.

If you want to learn a little bit more about it for yourself, you can go to http://www.nps.gov/shil/historyculture/corinth.htm.

Anyway, it was good to get out of the boat and do a little exploring.  We’ll see what exciting things we find to check out next.  Maybe we’ll get back in the engine room soon.  Until then.. TTFN.

I can’t believe it has been a little over a year since we left Sunnyside Marina for our big adventure.  Still having fun and making plans for next summers adventure.  Doing research and taking a road trip in a few weeks to check out the marinas.  I’ll be sure to bring my clipboard with my list of things to check out at each marina.  Don’t forget the camera for those pictures that tell all (and helps me remember which marina is which :)).  I am looking forward to that.

Oh boy!  I got to learn something new.  How to check and clean the sea strainers.  If you want to learn too, check out the “From the Engine Room” page.

Keep tuned for other fascinating tasks needed to keep the Tough of Class afloat.

Oh boy!  Now we get to actually get into the “Holy Room” as Gary calls it.  Kind of like a Man Cave, minus the TV :).  Here is the door, I mean hatch, to the “Holy Room”

Door to Engine Room

You can see where Gary hangs his ear protection and the black sign is the required “Discharge of Oil Prohibited” plaque that is required by the Coast Guard.  The ear protection he wears it when he is working down there when the engines are running, at least I hope he does or there is going to be more “what?”, “what?” going on :).  This is our only entrance to the engine room.  Some of the newer Navigators have another entrance in the Galley.  Good points and bad point to that I think.  Of course I’m the First Mate and I don’t want anything to interfere with my Galley!

But back to engine room.  Once you have descended the steps, you’ll notice lots of storage room.

Port Side

Starboard Side 2

Starboard side

The two fuel tanks are on either side of the opening (behind the white board and behind the ladder and the fresh water tank and the holding tank run down the center of the hull.  You want to make sure you don’t mix those up, that could be a disgusting problem ;).

Next we have a view of Gary’s white board where he records such things as the last time maintenance was performed on the engines and generator and the temperature of various things while we are underway. We have heard many comments about his white board, mostly a lot of “Wows!” 🙂

Gary’s White Board

Gary usually does an engine check every hour or so while we are traveling, just to make sure things are ok and to make sure we haven’t sprung a leak.

As we enter the “Holy Room” notice the carpet and rubber padding on the engine room floor.  This is adds a little extra comfort for those old knees.  The rubber padding we bought at Sears.  We bought those colorful squares for kids play areas, the underside was black!

Carpet on floor of engine room walkway

Entrance to Holy Room

As you can see we are able to store a lot of items down here.   Quite a few people that we talk to that have also sold their homes and are living aboard are amazed that we don’t have some kind of storage facility somewhere with the rest of our stuff in it.  They can’t believe we got rid of everything except what is on our boat.

These pictures are from the front of the engine room.  Notice the neat and orderly fashion all items are stowed?

Storage

More Storage

This item is called a Load Bar,

Load Bar

Gary saw it in the back of someone’s pick up and thought that it would be a great item to have in the engine room to keep things from sliding backward for those times we have to pour on the coals.

You can see this Werner ladder.  Gary set it up as a shelf so he is able to stack more items in.

Werner Ladder Shelving

When it is not used as a shelf, it makes a great little two step ladder to!  Gotta love it when you can multipurpose something.

Of course there are some creature comforts down there.  Gary has set up a fan to keep him cool, a radio for a little entertainment and he even has his own roll of paper towels! Nothing but the best for the Captain and what more could a man want in his man cave? Oh, I suppose a little fridge filled with beer, but if I did that, then I’d never see him ;).

So this concludes our tour of the engine room, we hope you have enjoyed it cause now it is time for the work to begin!

We are going to be working on some of our maintenance items for the boat.  We have compiled monthly, quarterly, semi-annual and annual tasks sheets (OCD for Gary, and the fact that I put them in Excel spread sheets for the anal in me :)) .  They are actual good checks that should be done to keep any boat well maintained and in good working order.  So for all you mechanical geeks out there, and I know there are some of you that read this blog, I will be putting some very interesting reading under the “From the Engine Room” page.  Hopefully these entries will keep you going for a little while as your boat sits on the hard waiting for you to return to it next spring.  This will be my first entry. Again, please read the “Disclaimer” post for all these entries :).  So…..if you are interested and want to learn how and why we installed a High Water Alarm, go to the “From the Engine Room” page.

Hope you enjoy it and thanks for continuing to follow our adventures.