Hello! It’s been a while, let’s do a quick recap-

Hurricane season runs from June to November, and this year we’ve decided to stay put for the season. We’re currently docked in Cape Canaveral, Florida, and are using this time to do some work on the boat.

The past three weeks have been full of projects for us! To give you a quick run down, here’s what we’ve done:

• Deep cleaned and waxed the fiberglass in starboard bathroom 
• Cleaned up the wiring behind nav desk panel
• Redesigned nav station panel + installed new equipment (new stereo, touch screen monitor, new VHF radio) 
• Drove to Miami to ship a sail to our friends 
• Drove to Ft. Lauderdale to check out the model of our new helm seat 
• Delivered doughnuts to our favorite marine service provider
• Reorganized the port forward cabin 
• Refilled propane tanks 
• Polished some of our stainless steel 
• Installed bilge alarms 
• Met with upholstery company about having a few new cushions made

In between these jobs were lots of trips to the hardware store (the cashier called us “regulars” the other day) and waiting around for Amazon deliveries. To pass the time we tried out some new recipes (this one was my favorite), started watching Schitt’s Creek (it’s hilarious), and drank a lot of beer… “diet beer” according to our latest YouTube comments.

Let’s chat about our navigation station panel project— This was easily the most exciting project we’ve had so far! Here’s a little before and after photo for you…

We’re still waiting on the new grey panel to come in the mail so don’t worry, we’re not keeping it bright blue… The biggest change we made was adding a touch screen monitor. This monitor connects to our server, and can be used to plan routes and track various metrics onboard. 

We also replaced our stereo, and upgraded our radio to Vesper. The Vesper system connects VHF radio to the AIS, includes an anchor alarm, and has an alert system that will warn us if the wind significantly changes or if we get too close to another boat.

Overall, we’re super happy with how everything came together, but it wasn’t without its speed bumps. In typical boat project fashion, we discovered several other issues along the way and even broke a few things in the process. So, the project ended up taking us twice as long as we anticipated and made a huge mess…

As a whole, Cape Canaveral and Ocean Club Marina have been good to us. The people we’ve met here have been so nice, the food has been good, and there always seems to be some drama to keep us entertained. 

The most exciting bit was probably the SpaceX launch debacle. They restrict areas of the ocean for some of the launches because they never know exactly where a rocket will land. These restricted areas are the talk of the town for days before the launch- the Coast Guard makes announcements about them practically every hour- but there’s always one or two boats who ignore the announcements (or are just clueless?) and end up in the restricted area before the launch. When this happens, the Coast Guard typically hails them on the radio and directs them to a safer area, but this time in particular, a yacht had entered the restricted area MINUTES before the launch. Here’s how the convo went:

Coast Guard: Captain, what is your safest maximum speed captain?

Yacht Captain: 18kn

Coast Guard: I’m going to need you to be going 18kn East immediately. You are in a restricted zone, there is a SpaceX launch currently going on.

Yacht Captain: No, we’re actually trying to head into Port Canaveral.

Coast Guard: Negative Captain. You’re going West at 18kn until the launch is complete.

*launch gets cancelled at T-minus 20 seconds because the yacht is still in the restricted area* 

Fast forward 30mins- the yacht pulled into the fuel dock at our marina, and was instantly approached by two Coast Guard boats announcing that they plan to board his vessel. Supposedly the Captain got a stern talking to and rumor has it there was a fine issued…

In other news, Snapper season opened up here this weekend, man was that a show. HUNDREDS of fishing boats left port at sunrise each day, and came back in flocks each afternoon. They pull their boats out of the water at the park next to where we’re docked, clean their catch, and toss the carcasses back in the water. 

They seem to have had a successful weekend!

Hurricane Elsa ended up being a non-issue for us. The storm broke up once it hit the western coast of Florida, so we got a bit of rain and some lightning, but nothing serious! Thank you for all your kind messages checking in. ❤️

That’s all I have to report! We’re still on schedule to haul out August 3rd, but the bulk of what we need to do before then is cleaning, so I’m not sure when I’ll have something else worth writing about- stay tuned!☺️