September 2, 2008.

Today’s the day we were supposed to get back in the water and things didn’t really get off to a quick start.

The other day when we signed up to go back into the water nobody asked for payment and we never thought about it. This morning rolled around and we realized that they’re probably not going to put us back in the water until they’ve been paid. So Christy walked over to the office at 0800 only to discover that the office doesn’t open until 0900. When 0900 finally rolled around Christy paid the bill and the woman told her that the yard guys were busy after the long weekend and we might not be going in until tomorrow. Crap.

That’s the problem with a big marina like this one, sometimes one hand doesn’t know what the other hand is doing. From our boat top perch we could see that the while the yard was hauling a few boats they weren’t really all that busy. So we kinda just hung around and waited until we finally saw the big lift headed in our direction.

The lift was straight forward and we were back in the water in ten minutes. While the boat was still in the slings I jumped on board to check for leaks. It’s pretty much standard procedure when you put your boat in the water but we had the added incentive in that I had just repacked the rudder and prop shaft packing’s. I also did some plumbing under the waterline while installing the watermaker. It all looked good and the slings were dropped and we were pulled from the lifting well and tied to the wall.

Actually, it all went well until I turned the key, nothing. Damn it, damn it, damn it. It was only a slight inconvenience though as I just went below and arked the starter and had Veranda running once again.

After letting the engine warm up Christy slowly backed us off the wall while I fended. Once clear of the huge steel sailboat behind us, we switched spots and I backed us down the fairway, and spun the boat neatly around so we could tie to the dock. Due to the combination of a 3 knot breeze, ineptitude, severe misjudgment, witnesses and the sun in my eyes, I screwed it all up. We came to a perfect stop, parallel to the dock, just not near the dock. Damn. It took an extra couple of minutes of maneuvering and buffoonery but we ended up safely tied to the dock without injury to anything but my pride.

Right after a quick lunch I set about troubleshooting the “turn key, no vroom” problem. I’ve had a lot of experience with starter problems in the past and I’ve finally learned that it’s important to find and fix the problem before the starter “fries”. In the past it was corrosion creeping into the starting circuit that’s been the culprit. Since the boat has been sitting for a month it seems to be a reasonable assumption. So I disassembled and cleaned the system one connection at time. Fortunately, that seemed to do the trick and the engine started easily when I was done.

So, as they say, tomorrows another day. We’ll head over to the pumpout and then its south to Solomon’s.