Paisley's Jet Skiing post

My dad and I left our slip at Norview Marina on Broad Creek and headed out onto the Rappahannock River to a cove up river early one morning. We went so fast it felt like it was only one minute until I got to the cove. I had to sit in the front of the jet ski. I saw a big sandbar. We had to be careful not to beach the jet ski. I told dad to not flip us. It was so much fun. I wish I could do it again.

Neptune Festival

We decided to head down to Virginia Beach for the day to look at the North American Sandsculpting Championship. I have to say I was blown away by the Sandscuptures. They were beautiful. Sabastian and I talked quite a bit about the Gods and Goddesses from Percy Jackson and how all Greek and Roman mythology is still used today. There were mermaids and mermen sculptures along with the traditional castles and then the out of the box sculptures. We all voted for our favorites and while none of our picks won we did pick some that placed.

Paisley's entry on Crabbing

My experience with crabbing. First I get the bait. It is called Menhaden and it stinks! Next, we chop the Menhaden and put it in the pots. Then we wait about 5 hours and then we pull up the pots. In three days we have enough crab to cook. We steam the crabs for one hour and then we pick the crab so we can eat them. The crabs are so sweet it melts in your mouth.

Aug 18, 2010

Male

Well, plans change. I was going to wash the boat down top to bottom to get it looking good. However it has been storming all day long. Guess the boat will get clean on Friday.The kids have been doing well with completing their homeschooling work! Sabastian made a crab out of play-doh and Paisley made a crab by painting it and then decorating a mat. We caught another 10 keeper crabs and these will go to our fellow live aboard Jimmy 2 slips over from us. Jimmy has been buying the bait and teaching Sabastian some basics of crab fishing! Everyone here at Norview has been helpful and very knowledgeable.

Cooked Crab on a plate

Jet Skiing by Sabastian

Jimmy, my dad, and I went out on Jimmy's Jet Ski's early one day. It was one of the funnest things in my life. First, it was cool when we went onto plane because it squeezed your face. Next, I like to just cruise around. You are feeling the breeze. Finally, I think everyone would have fun. That is what I did.

Knots

Self-Stopped Coil

Slipped Over Hand Knot

Double Overhand Knot

Slipped Figure-Eight

Sept 23,2010

Yesterday Paisley, Sabastian, and I packed up our backpacks and headed out on bikes in search of the public beach we were told about. We didn't ask where it was considering there is only 3 miles of land to the north of our marina we were sure to be able to find it or not in our case. Miss Paisley had the lead on bikes followed by Sabastian and then me. We were in search of a spot to play in the sand and take pictures. As we continued down the road we kept seeing signs saying private property keep out everywhere. We finally found one gentleman(Joe) out on his golf cart and inquired as to where the public beach was. He commented that it is all private property but said that we could use the beach in front of his house. I thought it was very nice and kind for Joe to share his private beach with us. The kids and I had fun climbing on the rocks and Jetties. The kids wanted to make a sandcastle and dig to their hearts content but, did not want to leave big holes in Joe's beach which I thought was very thoughtful of them. After playing for a while we packed up in search of another spot to play in and dig but we did not find one. I think I need to plan a trip to Buckroe Beach or the ocean front so the kids can dig to their hearts content. The Neptune Festival starts tomorrow and the big sandcastle sculpting contest is this weekend. Maybe we can fit it in somehow.

Max

Max our 10 1/2 year old Basset Hound is doing a wonderful job of being a salty dog. As far as Max's life experience goes he only  knew of life on land. Andrew and I were wondering how he would do living on a boat and I think both of us were very surprised as to how well he transitioned.  Max loves wandering the marina and saying hi to all of people here. He knows who will give him treats and love and makes a bee line for them when he sees them or picks up their scents. It is very cute. Max has been on many golf cart rides and his ears flop in the wind and looks like a regal hound dog in his rightful place in the passenger seat. We also borrowed a center console tender for a day. Max graciously wore his dogie life jacket.As Andrew and Sabastian were driving the dingy out of the boat ramp area poor Max ran into a sign on the walkway and scared himself so bad that he fell into the water. Thank goodness he had on his life jacket and he was on his leash. It was a quick dip and only got his back legs wet. He recovered quickly and boarded the tender gracefully.Max whimpered until he got the bow seat as he did not like sitting on the floor of the tender. Max loved the ride and did better than we thought.

Sept 20, 2010

I did my best to surprise Andrew with installing our new faucet in the galley. I successfully removed the old faucet. I did get all of the parts together for the new faucet but I was missing 2 gaskets and needed 2 new couplers to complete the job. There was a small leak that I could not solve and Andrew did come home to a boat with no running water and that is not what I wanted at all. I wanted to show off my skills of completing a pluming job. I still have so much to learn. Andrew did get the job completed after realizing that I put the plummer tape on backwards and we needed different gaskets. We are now enjoying a nice new faucet.

Paisley's entry on Golf carts

My family and I borrowed a golf cart from some friends named Bob and Lynda. The second time my dad let me drive the golf cart to bring it back. Now I am going to tell you what it feels like to drive a golf cart. It is easy all you need to do is press the go pedal to go and the stop pedal to stop when you need to stop and the parking brake when you need to park. It was so fun. I loved doing it I wish I could do it again.

Sabasitan's entry on Crabbing

Male

Mature Female

I am writing about Chesapeake Bay Blue Crabs. First, I can tell you how to tell the Jimmy from the Sookies. The boys are the Jimmy. The girls are the Sookies. The girls have rounder outline on their apron than the boys. Next, I will tell you about the males. They guard the females from the predators. The reason that the males guard the females is that at every full moon the girls shed their shell become soft shell crabs and are vulnerable to being eaten. Finally, I like to eat the crab that I catch it is fun.

Kids and Andrew running the transducer cable from the thru hull up to the flybridge

Broad Creek aquarium

Hurricane Earl Party

views of Broad Creek during Hurricane Earl

Hurricane Earl on F dock

Boat issues as of Sept 14, 2010

We believe we solved the mystery as to why we were taking on so much water. Apparently, when we hooked up our fresh water hose to our boat the gasket was not as tight as it should have been. We were filling up our boat to a dangerous level of water and had the potential of being a sinking at the dock story! Andrew and I are no longer letting the fresh water come directly into the boat unless we are doing dishes or taking showers. For most of our daily activities using our 60 gallon fresh water tank is more than enough.
Andrew installed our new AC pump and it has been working great. Our manifold had no issues and is working just fine. Andrew also added the foam mount to our aft AC unit and it is now a quiet hum and no longer a loud unit while running.
Our next few tasks are to find and install a fresh water gasket, replace the transom shower hose and nozzle, decide and install mini blinds in the salon, replace our canvas on the fly bridge, aft deck, and replace  main windows, and replace our forward hatch.

Sept 12,2010

Inconceivable moved back to C dock on Sunday morning at 8:00am during a rain storm. Sabastian's 10th birthday party was a success even with all the rain we received. We had Godo, and Pappap and Uncle Dan, Grammie, and Papa, Uncle Warren and Aunt Elizabeth,Cousin Jonathan and cousin Aubrey, Jay and Philip Andrews, and Chad and Jesse Hudson on board. The three boys sorted the crabs out of the pots and then I steamed them over at the Oar House. The adults enjoyed the crab picking while the kids watched some TV over in the Pirates Den. We had lasagna for dinner and a Yoda cake for desert.

catch up

So I am a little bit behind. We had Hurricane Earl pass us by with not much fan fair last Friday, Sept 3rd. I moved the boat from our covered slip to the floating dock so that we would not cause any damage to our boat. So instead of a hurricane party we had a croquette/ pot luck meal with 5 other boating couples! The kids also had a fire safety drill with Bob in the proper use of a fire extinguisher.
 Then this past Monday our boat was taking on a dangerous amount of water( which we now believe is coming from a leak in our fresh water lines coming from the pier) and our automatic bilge pump was not working.We discovered that the switch for all of our bilges were cut off. Due to the large amount of water in our forward bilge our ac pump was under water and died on us. Andrew installed the new pump and now we are waiting and watching to see how the new pump works out. Our next project is to install the rubber mat under our aft ac unit to cut down on the amount of noise. I know I am looking forward to having a quieter ac.