Lot's of road trip pictures as we get ready for Summer 2008 Boating

Maintenance of the web site is becoming much more difficult after spending eight or nine hours a day on a computer at work. Life is good off the water with the deep pain never really getting a hold of the body this winter rewarding me for taking comparatively easy winter in comparison to freezing in aboard. An apartment, easy living with an OK job computer that moves your editor ever further from live aboard adventure and these Blogs relevance.

Boating for the 2008 season will be devoted to updating the guides probably with a small boat and trailer. A lot has changed and www.cruising.ca needs a serious re-work along with some upgrades to source imaging hardware. Unfortunately, work seems to gobble up all free time making launching and using another boat a lot of expense for little use. The Carver is too far away on Georgian Bay to deal with, and Marinas will not dictate my life. The Carver will go on display at the shop along with a couple of other boats for sale and the little trailer.

Then there is the house as a winter of someone else place was enough. It is time for me to put the distraction of house hunting and boats aside and focus on work. Soon will come the “shift bid” meaning that the job metrics need to be good enough to get the long shifts that I want leaving me three days off.

The little place is less than four mile from work crouched on the original banks of the Moria River with parking below leading to a large patio and house mid way up and the back yard cresting the top of the ancient river embankment. It is small but absolutely move in with great possibilities as the back yard is private and you see nothing but roof and skyline from back there. A little landscaping, another deck some trees and behold a hot tub oasis just like the neighbors did with their hot tub. Works perfect as the road and city below are out of sight.

Post script: 04/25/2008: The place failed to survive home inspection with it turning out it was built on timbers not a slab.

Saturday 19 April 2008

This will be the road trip back to Georgian Bay to uncover the Carver. Marine Forecast issued for Lake Ontario. Issued: 3.00 AM EDT Saturday 19 April 2008 for the period ending at 3.00 AM Sunday with an outlook for the following 24 hours. Forecast: Wind light and variable increasing to northeast 15 knots this afternoon then veering to southeast near midnight. Fair. Waves 1 metre or less. Outlook..Moderate southeasterlies increasing to moderate to strong easterlies.

Observed at: CFB Trenton 9:00 AM EDT Saturday 19 April 2008 Condition Saturday 19 April 2008 :Mainly Sunny Temperature:15.8°C Pressure / Tendency:101.5 kPa / rising Visibility:19 km Humidity:55% Dew Point:6.7°C Wind Speed:ENE 5 km/hForecast Smog advisory in effect. Today:Sunny. High 24 except 15 near Lake Ontario. UV index 6 or high. Sunday:Sunny. Wind becoming southeast 20 km/h in the evening. High 22 except 15 near Lake Ontario.

With the swing east to Kingston to pick up Chris and Diane it was a 05:30 start which brought one of those rare occasions when there was absolutely no traffic on the 401 as the sun rose. THe pick up swing took far longer than expected with the added distance from Trenton and we were already behind schedule when we hit the road. By the time we approached Highway 7 the car was behaving extremely badly running for ten minutes or until you hit a bump then dying. As we crept ever further north the problem became far more pronounced to where we aborted the trip north and headed for Chris's parents in . The situation was grim and we were never sure if we would even reach someplace to make repair with over two hours of broken down beside the road time as we straggled in at 15:30. After much contemplation and testing we decided that a sensor was causing the cut out. Whatever the issue was it would reset itself if you turned the car off. This was how we made the trip from Kirkfield to Penetnguishine.

We arrived so late as to cause real concern as to if we would have time to break the structure apart. It is a good thing I brought Chris not Sparky as his racking experience is invaluable as is his healthy body. It is impossible not to sing praises for Chris as he made it all manageable.

The final step was to try to secure the heat shield over the catalytic converter which had come loose and was suspect of somehow shorting a sensor. We must have been right as the cut out problem did not reoccur. Not fixed but we were running. Loading the trailer with the winter structure was a definite trick as the main cross frames are over ten feet long and the trailer only seven. There were bits lashed to everything, all secure but precarious looking. The shock came a couple of miles down the highway once we were out of town. You approached seventy kilometer per hour and the trailer would begin to dance so badly that there was concern that it would flip over. This issue was non resolvable whether that was the old shocks on the trailer or the center of gravity who knows but it was getting dark and there was no choice. After struggling along to Midland at sixty kilometres and hour braving the disgruntled motorists that were trapped behind rig we gave up and made the decision to drop the trailer at Chris's parents in Kirkfield and deal with it another day.

It was a beast of a drive back saved by my catching a nap on the road home as it was 02:30 by the time Rufus saw me. This is going to be a CRAZY week. The home inspector comes for the new house tomorrow AM and within days I will have to sign the morgage papers. Come 10:00 hours Thursday the Carver will show up at the shop and the place must be ready to unload and block with whatever preparation we need to make to sit it on the big trailer in place. Spring in the boat biz.

Monday 21 April 2008

Monday 21 April 2008 for the period ending at 3.00 AM Tuesday with an outlook for the following 24 hours. Forecast: Wind east 10 knots backing to northeast late this morning then veering to southeast near midnight. Fair. Waves 1 metre or less. Outlook..Light to moderate southeasterlies backing to easterlies. I could not face the possibility of Sparky help again as the is always too much collateral damage whatever the excuse. I need to sell this Carver not spend time and money fixing stuff broken in transport.

Tuesday April 22, 2008

Once again events outside of my control are dictating a cascade of decisions that have to matched action against a time frame of days. My supervisor at work is wonderful and managed to spring time off from work yesterday. Critical time as nothing had been done to prepare for the Carvers arrival at the shop on Thursday

The best part of the day was the day itself which was fabulous with temperatures over 20C. Trying to pull together blocking material and negotiate the trucker dropping the boat on the yard trailer. This is not going to happen which opens an entirely new set of issues as that is what Anthony wanted to do. As it stands at this moment, where the boat is unloaded is where it will have to stay until next hydraulic trailer lift. The good news is the long-range forecast shows Thursday is going to be nice with limited rain over the next couple of days keeping the yard solid enough for the transport.

I did finally find a auto diagnostic guy to undertake the brain surgery on the car to address the quit running issue. Something is wrong with one or more of the sensor feed backs, that much I know. But which one and where needs that state of the art auto computer to find out. However, much better as this car quitting four hundred kilometers from home has got to stop. At least there is a scheduled fix on the time line.

Marine Forecast issued for Lake Ontario. Issued: 3.00 AM EDT Wednesday 23 April 2008 for the period ending at 3.00 AM Thursday with an outlook for the following 24 hours. Wind southwest 10 knots veering to west 15 near noon then to northwest this evening. Chance of a shower this morning otherwise fair. Waves less than 1 metre building to 1 to 2 this afternoon. Outlook..Light to moderate northwesterlies veering to northerlies then diminishing to light and variable.

Thursday April 24, 2008

This was quite a day. I blew the little house off after the building inspector discovered that it was not built on a slab. In reality it sits on timbers that contact the ground which is an open invitation to rot and future issues. So it is back to the house drawing board.

Misty River arrives at the shop. This year the first use of the shop has been easier than trying to get through the mud last spring. Ben Gill was ready with more than enough blocking and building materials.

In the end everything went like clockwork, the stands worked out 100% and the Carver is sitting perfectly in front of the shop. The most important thing is Misty River is safe and sound with the shop comforting. With the loss of the house deal the concept of doing a value added in order to resell the boat is a possible. As is there are dozens of below 30' boats to choose from Twin engines in the days of $2.50 gas will being to make pensioners on a fixed income think about their fishing habits. On the other hand, Misty River with a bow thruster would be a fabulous Lake Ontario fishing boat.

So perhaps it is a concept worth pursuing as I am house hunted out right now. After blowing the house deal off the money purge wen on and bought myself brand new high end bed, which works as well as anticipated. It is time to turn my focus back to the job as the main system will be down and everything will be manual today. This means I will handle something over a dozen calls with no job aid which includes the troubleshooting K-Docs. Once before I faced this and it was terror. This time as long as none ghosted my computer with my working brains it should be OK. Just stressful.

Marine Forecast issued for Lake Ontario. Issued: 6.30 PM EDT Friday 25 April 2008 for the period ending at 6.30 PM Saturday with an outlook for the following 24 hours. Forecast: Wind variable 10 knots increasing to southwest 15 to 20 late Saturday afternoon. Scattered showers or thunderstorms developing Saturday near noon. Waves 1 metre or less. Higher winds and waves near thunderstorms possible. Outlook..Light to moderate southwesterlies diminishing to light and variable.

I would like to express my thanks from all those that wrote regarding the trailer issue. It is fabulous to hear from you all. Soon real soon everything will be back in the water.

We knew about loading and it was as close as possible. The thing already had an issue on rough roads due to the shocks (definite). It might be possible to reposition the box and put new shocks on it. However it is a couple of hundred dollar utility trailer not worth spending a lot of money on. Once it started bouncing on the springs. At 60 k it is still only a little over 3 hours if one starts at dawn on a Sunday. Then put it beside the road and collect some bucks and get a better trailer.

Sunday, April 27

Once again my thanks to you readers for writing. Advice taken and acted upon.

It was a 06:30 start to retrieve the evil tempered trailer from Kirkfield. Ballasting the trailer helped a little bit on smooth road but once there were bumps the oscillation would begin again requiring a heavy foot on the break and dropping to 30KPH before stability returned. By the time I reached the shop there was quite a lod ballast rocks. As the run progressed it became possible to predict the sort of road surface which would start the dance which was somewhat comforting. However it still ended up taking almost seven hours to make the trip to Kirkfield and back over four a half hours with the trailer hooked at 60 KPH. The good news is it was a beautiful day and being outside was a perfect change from work.

Antoniv 244 Muria The worlds largest aircraft lands at Trenton.

Living new the base is a treat to an old plane watcher like me. The latest addition to the traffic is the worlds biggest aircraft the Antonov An-225 Mriya . Watching it come in is one thing. Hearing it on run up pre take off flat amazing. The apartment is probably a half mile from the runway area yet when this one runs up and kicks off the walls of the lace actuially shake. It must be outright terrifing for the folks in the trailer park near the east end of the runway as the normal take off direction is SW. Being a couple of hundred yards from the runway would knock stuff off walls - guaranteed. The thing is humgungous there is probably rooom for 2 C5A's fuselages inside the ccargo bay.

For anyone who love aircraft it is worth a trip to CFB Trenton just to see the thing. I recommend viewing the online information for a complete discription.

The An-225 Mriya NATO reporting name: is a strategic airlift transport aircraft which was built by Antonov Design Bureau, and is the largest flying airplane ever built by the most commonly accepted measure. With a maximum gross weight of 640 tonnes (1,411,000 lb), the An-225 is the world's heaviest and largest aircraft.

Thursday 1 May 2008

Marine Forecast issued for Lake Ontario. Issued: 10.30 AM EDT Thursday 1 May 2008 for the period ending at 10.30 AM Friday with an outlook for the following 24 hours. Forecast: Wind light and variable becoming east 10 knots near noon then increasing to 15 overnight. Isolated showers beginning after midnight otherwise fair. Waves 1 metre or less. Outlook..Moderate easterlies increasing moderate to strong southeasterlies.