Friday, October 1, 2010

Rain, rain go away

September 30, 2010.

Rain is defined as---Water condensed from vapor in the atmosphere and falling in drops from clouds.

Yes, rain. It's been raining steadily for 24 hours with the promise of at least another 12 hours to go. We’ve had that lovely combination of wind and rain. What makes this bit-o-rain so special is that the winds from the south have driven a lovely windblown tide up into the bay.

So, while we were trapped on the boat all day, we planned to do a few boat chores. I had already run the wires for the fan, light and solar panels in the new dodger but had left the lower ends coiled in the coaming for a rainy day job. Running the wires down through the boat from the coaming to the electrical panel involved the removal of quite a bit of the headliner in the salon.

As luck would have it, we woke to water dripping from the ceiling, so the ceiling's removal became a “2 birds with one stone” kinda thing. Unluckily, the drips made their way into our closed computer, which will not power up, this computer holds all our life, all our pictures, navigational software and all out bookmarked favorite places etc. Crap. I removed the track for the curtains and several trim pieces to allow a few of the ancient ceiling panels to be removed.

The leak turned out to be from a neglected screw hole leftover from the old dodger. I dried the area and slapped on some duct tape to await some drier weather for a more permanent repair. After that was done we pretty much sat here and listened to it rain. And rain it did.

We can usually take an easy step, slightly up or down off the boat and straight onto our finger pier. Just after dinner this evening I went out to check on the boats in the marina and found that our toe rail was now 5 feet above the dock. I went back inside and checked my phone for missed messages to see if God had called and left a message about us needing to build an ark. WTF?

We were at low tide and the windblown tide combined with the rain had us 5 feet higher than usual. Fortunately, the wind died early in the evening and the water started to recede even though the tide was still “technically” rising.
We had water knee deep on the approach to the docks and several of the dinghies tried to float away. I rounded up and secured the loose dinghies and adjusted the lines on a few of the other boats here in the marina.

Fortunately the rain finally let up, the wind died and the higher than normal tides disappeared by morning. So, I would have looked pretty foolish if I had started on that ark……

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Now you get to add the cost of the leaky screw hole and dead computer to the $3992. It's a boat thing.
Glad you're safe and 'almost' dry. Oh...and pass me a piece of that duct tape.

S/V Veranda said...

We call this particular laptop, Lazarus. He's been resurrected before and we'll see if he's got one more miracle left.

Randy said...

Hey we were watching it all go north of us and seen you were smack dab in it. Good way to look for leaks.Sorry about the pc.

S/V Veranda said...

After 2 days Christy tried the computer 1 more time and Lazarus rose from the dead. Since then I've backed everything up....

Randy said...

Ah we made it but what a ride down the Chessy yesterday, We got a slip back up in spa creek at a condo that friends are staying at, really cheap. We r here for a week. have a few things to repair and catch up on but ready for the next leg.

S/V Veranda said...

I emailed you my cell number.