Living Contentedly

Once again visiting my daughter in the Central West for a week, l am reexamining my life's direction. Yes sailing is there no matter what, its just whether I sail what I have or sell my house and go bigger. The central issue is the care of small animals, my daughter's cats, which really have belonged to the farm, and my son's dog, ditto. While my daughter has volunteered to mind these wee beasties, to drop them off entails a 14 hours return drive.  So, I drive out to drop them off, go coastal sailing for a month before going out to collect them. Lots of driving, loading my daughter up, stress on the cats during travel and new situation. Bad for the environment too.  Plan B is to sell the farm and my current boat and move aboard, with animals, a larger boat. Well, pretty good solution but big time delays selling farm and boat and then having to manage a large vessel.  Plan C might be to shoehorn all of us aboard my little boat. But while cats and dog don't currently sail...

Its hard being single and trying to get away from the house. My sons dog, my daughters cats and chickens had needed daily attention. So, I put some things in order for me to escape for a few days.  Chooks: A cube of water on a slow drip: this needed a soft hand to get going at the right rate. A bonus is the gentle sound of water dribbling.  A 10 litre bucket of grain with a toggle for chooks to release pellets: it took a few hours, but its like having a 24hr self serve. The chooks are happier with no drama, jistca lot of soft clucking sounds.  Electric Auto Feeder: this too needed fine running to release the right amounts. It works a treat. My son will be around to give the cats tinned food and some socializing.  The dog will come with me on my bike, boat or car.   All this makes me really happy. Knowing the pets have reliable access and seeing them more at ease, is rewarding and relieving.  BOAT WORK:  Due to chronic wet weather I have ILONA's sp...

SitRep. A chain of soggy days will give 25 hrs respite. I'm here alone with the cats, chooks and goats. Cuddy left with Joe to visit his mother for her birthday and have a few days rest. He probably has his Korean girlfriend but I'm unlikely to meet her. On a few days I head off to visit Mia, and work on her house, bricks to be precise.  Yesterday, driven by better eyesight, greater inner peace and a love of boats, decide to refit ILONA. It has only been 11 months since I last did this, but my new eyesight has revealed poor quality painting.  So, the spars are off and sanded. They will be spot painted before three coats or so.  The topsides will be lightly sanded and repainted. If I can add lacquer, I will be happy.  Internally, the bin will have it's new lid fitted (I may also remove the plug.) and have the deckboards sanded and varnished. Only then will I repost her for sale.     

My goal to chop my Honda Shadow has been abandoned. After much work and effort, she is not running well enough to continue. Chopping the airbox has upset the fuel settings enough to warrant rejetting, and as my previous carby clean cost $350, I'm not tempted. Besides, with the fuel tap on tank assembly can't to be fitted clear of the engine.  Apart from this, two things have made my mind up to abandon. One, with tight fitting carbs, complex electrics and water cooling, its too difficult a bike to chop. And secondly, I'm trying to downsize my lifestyle so I can jist ride bikes and sail cruise a lot more than I have (not) been.   A bit sad, bit meh, move on.  

After being head down with boatwork and then 48hrs of cabin fever, i woke to a this fog and a drive to go surfing.  Unfortunately, the southerly  seabreeze was cooking and with so  much standing up and a big low tide, the surf was not good and getting worse. Wanting to make the most of the trip, I changed into my swim gear and set off to slow jog for a while.    But when I reached the northern extremity of the main beach, I got this itch to keep going around the cliffs. My running suffered, the rocks were sharp, slimy or just too dangerous to traverse at anything faster than a steady walk.  I walked this stretch in the opposite direction almost sixty years ago with my buddy Scott. It was amazing how strong the memory flooded my mind. I vividly remembered one bit where it was necessary to teeter on a wet ledge over a sea tossed chasm. PTSD? Yep.  I kept pushing under rock faces that seem to continually fret away, corr...

There is a lot of vagueness here, but I hope the essence of what I write is comprehensible.  Years ago my high regard for "cockleshell" sailors blossomed through reading. I actually met the fellow intent on sailing " G'day 88" across the Tasman but he probably caused me more trsuma than good, he was rescued at sea during a cyclone and was later gaoled for the planned murders of people advertising rooms to let. I'm just glad I didn't venture on board to have a look at his little craft.  While this is obviously an extreme example of a cockleshell sailor, there have been a few odd bods on this genre.  Anyway, one good example was a fellow who successfully sailed a self designed and built 9 footer across the Atlantic Ocean. Several aspects of his preparation marked him for success in my mind, one was his single mindedness (is. focus) on achieving the goal safely. He also trialled the boat on a local lake, living in the midwest of USA he had limited access to...