"Good deed for the day" or "how to get a free meal"

Well we had some excitement today. Our friend's sailboat dragged his anchor while a squall piped up this afternoon. He was on shore looking for a place to watch a baseball game, When a thunderstorm started building. We were rushing around rolling up the sunshades when Arthur said, "It looks like someone's boat has broken free." Sure enough it was free and it just happened to be our friend Paul's boat and it was quickly drifting into the main shipping channel. Arthur, Stephen and I quickly jumped into the dinghy and took off. Arthur climbed on and threw down the extra anchor with all the scope it had. With all the huge military and commercial ships that come through, the channel is at least 50 ft deep. While we were trying to secure the boat in 30 plus knot winds and choppy seas, Arthur noticed a very large barge and tugboat coming our way. With the winds howling and the boats bucking like broncos, we abandoned his ship, jumped back into the dinghy and raced out of the way to see what would happen. Thank goodness the second anchor sort of held and the sailboat didn't keep drifting in front of the barge. About that time we started to get pelted with rain. We went back to the boat - this time keeping an extra careful lookout for traffic- and tried to start her. Later we found out that this didn't work because Paul disconnected the battery to charge it. While we were trying to decide what to do, we were slowly dragging towards a big dredging operation. We didn't want to sail it in those blustery conditions into the wind if we didn't have to. Especially with Arthur's weak recovering arm. About that time, a tug from the dredging operation came and gave us a tow to the anchorage. By the time we got back to MG, we were soaking wet and Stephen and Arthur had stinky river mud on them from the anchors. Our friend finally got his message from 45 minutes earlier after everything was safe and secure.

Well we did get dinner out of it and it taught us that it's a good idea to pass out your boat card when meeting people. You never know when you'll get that emergency phone call.

Sorry for any typos. I'm trying to post this from my little phone screen and it's hard to proof read

Oh no, where are we going to go now!

After being hoisted out of the water, seacock and through-hull replaced, put back into the water, hoisted back out of the water, through-hull rebedded, back into the water, Arthur proceeded to thoroughly break his arm. Now all our Atlantic crossing plans are canceled. Poor guy is in so much pain. The doctor didn't set it, he wants an orthopedic doc to set it tomorrow. I'll post a better update then

Will we ever get out of here????

We have been here at Jarrett Bay for a long time (way too long) and the end is finally in sight. We are still waiting for our replacement glass to be installed in the hatches. They were promised for last Friday/Saturday and now we're told Wednesday/Thursday. After the glass is installed in the frames it will take two more days before we can hang them. If we travel, it will have to be the dreaded Intra Coastal Waterway not offshore as we prefer. The ICW is actually a beautiful safe way to head down the east coast, but it makes a 4-5 day trip into a two week affair and with how quickly hurricane season is approaching we don't have the time. One good thing, the Spectra watermaker dealer is coming tomorrow with a new membrane and our rebuilt Clark pump. That actually worked out amazing well. Who would have thought you could have a pump sent to California, have it rebuilt, and sent back to North Carolina in 7 days!!! We were told it would take 2 to 3 weeks just to rebuild it. Spectra got it and rebuilt it and resent in one day. Thank you Spectra!

The latest drama is a suspected broken through-hull valve for our main head. The handle moves but it doesn't seem to open. At least it's broken in the closed position for safety's sake but I can't seem to not wish it was in the open position. That would make life easier. It could be that there is a clog somewhere. If it is the through-hull, I'm afraid we're going to have to be hauled out again. We just got in. I don't want to go backwards!

We did have a great success today. We had a problem with our reefing system that we were dreading and really had little hope of fixing. Just to get to the problem we had to remove all the salon seat cushions, take out a 150 pound battery, cut away the corner of the battery box and open a watertight hatch. After that we were ready for a nap not squeezing into a storage space under the seats and below the floor. The problem seemed hopeless until our friend Chris from s/v Tribe came by to say hi. Not only did he have great idea but he just happened to have the perfect part in his left over parts from his old rig. After more contortion tricks upside down on my back arm shoved into a little hole ....(I'd rather not re-live it) I managed to get the new pin back in the sheave and a cotter pin in to keep it from falling out again. I "let" Arthur secure the pin(I never can get those wires pulled apart right). It's fun watching someone else contort.

Well I am ready for bed. Please excuse any typos as I am trying to type on my iPhone. The computers seem to be taken. We really need to get a fourth.