Last of the stuff

The boat needs a good washdown, but will have to wait for that until Sunday. I'm at the house going through STUFF and trying to whittle it down.

I went through my clothes, which ended up being pretty easy to do. Down to two rough totes total of all of the clothes I will keep in the world.

I procrastinated by cleaning the refrigerator out and scrubbing a couple of shelves and the lower drawers.

Still stuff around and it's still slightly depressing to be amongst it. One guy came by looking for deals from garage sale Kris had posted. He rooted around in a bin of tools and then slipped out the door with something suspiciously droopy in his pants pocket. Do I care if something gets stolen? I guess not.

Ended up posting the table and desk for sale. Those are tough ones to part with. Kris's custom-made desk; designed and built for her by her friend John and given as a house-warming gift.

My 8x3 family table that Kris and I created so many good memories around.

Meanwhile, the boat stuff is probably too much. We are inches above the painted waterline. We will being the process of weeding things out and off from there, now.

Hana hou!

Line out!

Big week on the boat. Whuh? You say? Week One, big? Huh....

Yeah, smarty pants. We made it to the home moorage, moved ton'o'stuff onboard and sent momma off to the east coast of da mainland for worky-work.

Daddy got to catch up with his old irish rugby mates and meet their island friends at the Outrigger Canoe Club. And, whaddya know! Everything is the same. Maybe slight differences. Kids getting older. The nights ending sooner. Final final, actually much closer to Final than we'd ever imagined. But, spectacularly, Louise's abs look spectacular.

Aloha nui loa!

Kewalo Sunset Okinawan Sunrise

Spent the day working from the boat (boring); with a 4a start time. Oy! Later, ran over to the Div of Boating Recreation and got the boat ownership transferred to my name; and made a deposit at the bank. Kris dropped me and ran out to the house to meet someone who was buying a table and some chairs.

I also looked at bicycles. We are trying to figure out what sort of auxiliary transportation will work best on the boat. And it's probably a good idea to get some funky little city/fold-up type bicycles. Researching that!

As we headed off to dinner last night, had to stop, back up and capture this picture of the beautiful sunset.

We were off to meet with our friends Alton and Sharie at the great little Okinawan hole-in-the-wall restaurant Sunrise. Dinner was excellent; especially the pork and yakisoba.

All washed down with some nice BYOB sakes.

Afterward, we rode over to Via Gelato and had some sweet treats to wrap a nice night on the town.

Aloha!

All Work and Some Surf...

Surfed the point at Kewalo Basin Park, today with a dozen of my closest friends. Always crowded, but thinned out from the weekend.

When I got it out, there were some nice sets coming through, and I got a couple of nice drops and turns. But after about twenty minutes, it shut off. We spent a long time sitting; watching the dive boats out past the end of the channel and off to the sides. Looks like a pretty popular spot for the diving crew.


Lunch over, back to work!

Two Strikes, Five Dresses

Apparently, you can't live aboard in Kewalo Basin. So, we leave every day.

You also can't SUP in the basin, which makes sense, but I saw a couple of people take off in the morning heading out of the basin and into the channel. So, of course, when I paddled around I got in trouble.

Since then we've been less conspicuous. We took a walk this morning through Ala Moana Park and had breakfast at the Harbor Pub, where Kris was delighted to find that they welcome dogs in the bar and restaurant.

The park is full of families this Easter Sunday. Here in Honolulu, everyone brings the whole family and does the whole day in the park, ohana style. It's pretty cool.

We ran out to Kahalu'u and cleared out the cupboards, provisioning the boat and getting closer to emptying out the house. It's been a long process, downsizing our lives. I'd like to say it's liberating, but that's a little glib. Moving out of a house, and onto a boat and doing it consciously, with no plan to go back, is also a stressful and disorienting process. The things we spent so much time wanting, working for, acquiring, making part of our lives, are reduced to their essential thing-ness, all marketing desires removed. The questions we ask ourselves are:

Have we used it lately?
Do we need it?
Do we already have it?
If we have it, which one is better for the boat?
And, the clincher, will it fit?

It's shocking to find how many things we had in duplicate; measuring spoons, cookware, utensils, all sorts of household goods. And our clothes. Wow. when we started to simplify, we realized that we had too many of each thing; pick a hoodie; choose five dresses; ditch the Carhart vest and pick a rain jacket.

Books. Oh, tough one. For the record, my poetry collection was hard to whittle. Clemens Starck made it; he's a guy I had the good fortune to meet and work with while at Oregon State University. He belongs on a sailboat in Hawaii; we will sail with his finely crafted juxtapositions as companions. I always think about how Clem described his writing process and I can imagine him rehanging an old door, removing it from it's frame, rebuilding the door in the way it required; working over a line of poetry in his head, until that line was right and then off to the next line; building on the previous line, constructing a thoughtful collection of ideas, reflections, and images into a whole that opens a portal in his readers' mind.

W. B. Yeats will be alongside all three of Virginia Hamilton Adair's collections. The bard and a couple of dozen books about the Pacific, including people, places, and travelogues, from Mark Twain and R. L. Stevenson, through Paul Theroux.

Heavy winds again today, so we sit alongside the pier.

A stop at Sandy Beach on the way back to the boat for an afternoon surf session and then left on Kalanianaole Hwy, instead of our usual right to the old land-based home. Re-orienting ourselves to a life afloat.

Back in Kewalo Basin

Pulled the for sale sign off.

They lifted us at about 1345 yesterday afternoon, and Kris immediately painted the four spots that we couldn't reach while she was on the boat blocks; so, that's how that works, curious minds.

They wheeled the boat over to the launch area and put out a ladder for us to climb aboard. As they started to pull the ladder away, our navigator, the yacht broker, showed up and quickly climbed onboard.

No incidents as we were lowered, started up the engine, checked to make sure cooling water was flowing out, and backed out of the lift zone. Forward, back again, and we were off.

A short, six-mile cruise and we had her at the slip.

The biggest challenge will be docking. We did okay with a third hand onboard to help. Kris and I will have to learn to work it together. In the future, we'll probably put Kris at the helm and I will be the deckhand for docking. We had a little bit of a mess-up as the bow started to blow away, pushed by the strong trades. With John helping, and some leverage from his line on the dock, I was able to move her forward and back a few times to get her closer and then pull a line over and secure her.

View from our slip.

She's got a half-dozen spring lines in place, too, to help with the bouncing that goes on in the slip. I guess when South swells get going, this corner gets some rocking and rolling.

View from our slip, with anuenue. 

No sailing yet. We will wait for lighter winds.

Trades are whipping today, keeping it cool here.

We walked across the street to the Kaka'ako Farmer's Market at Ward Warehouse and got a couple of fresh-baked croissants from the hippies with the oven in the bed of their pickup; washed it down with a pineapple, apple-banana, honey, cream smoothie, and listened to some Hawaiian music.

Beautiful day!

Striped!

We pulled the tape off the waterline this afternoon and took some shots of the hull with a fresh couple of coats of bottom paint. Cheehu!

Kris did a very nice job of laying down some super straight tape lines. Maybe next bottom job we add a little racing stripe...

Aloha!

First Night on the Boat

Yes, I'm in the yard, but Father Neptune made sure to whip up some wind and get this baby swaying on the hard, in the yard. Yo.

Kris went home late last night to spend the night with her dogs. I'm pretty sure she would have rather been here, even though the accommodations are a bit on the spartan side.

I made a late West Marine run and found out our neighbor in the yard works there. Her partner has been busting his tail underneath their boat for the whole time we've been here, stripping the hull down to wood. She found out right at the end of the shift--I was last customer--that the store was requiring a meeting. She asked me to pass the word to Jamie (labor) that Anne Elise (management) was going to be a little late. She said, "He will worry about me, on my bike."

I knocked on his hull and passed the message. He said, "Yeah, I do worry. She's on the bike."

 Awoke to a big beautiful waning gibbous moon, as well.

Today is a day for hull cleaning, scrubbing and painting! We hope to get two coats on today; the third tomorrow morning; and float again tomorrow afternoon.

Aloha!

On the Hard

For the record, it's Admiral Kris who keeps smirking and saying, "Living on the hard!"

I know. Hard to believe, but true, nonetheless. 

Powder blue seventies eye shadow for your nails?

We are into the yard work now. Spent the day inspecting the hull, repairing a couple of minor things, doing some cleaning, and beginning the sanding process. 

I took a couple of aluminum kick plates (for lack of a better name) off the aft end of the pontoons. They were each about 1 1/2 foot square and added on by a former owner; not original equipment. 

Attached by three screws each, I removed them, cleaned up underneath, and filled the holes. 

Fortunately, our friend Rodolfo came by and pointed out a couple more cracks in the hull (minor now, but potentially bad if missed), and I will be able to fill those early tomorrow before we start the clean-up process that will precede our first layer of marine anti-fouling paint. 

 This is nasty stuff! Sure, it looks cute under my nails; giving you all flashbacks to disco-blue eye-shadow from Saturday Night Fever, but it's full of heavy metals. That contradiction is no joke! This stuff is bound to be nasty and lethal.

The concept here, is that paint loaded with copper will leach the natural bio-cide throughout it's lifespan, discouraging (killing) little marine creatures intending on making a home on our hull.

The forward injector on the Yanmar 27 is leaky and I sent a picture to my mechanic in Oregon, in hopes he can make a trip out to help me get that one sorted out. Not a crucial issue at the moment, but one that will certainly have to be addressed at some point.

Aloha!

Survey Says...

Whooo! What a day! Exciting, stressful, happy, nervous, tired, and a whole bunch more, I'm sure. We went through the survey this morning and hauled out L&C this afternoon. Lucky for us that the previous owners are honest, hard-working folks, who shared all that they did with us and are leaving us setup with an above average boat. 

Here she is flying free of the sea:

The biggest outstanding issue is the age of the standing rigging. Although in good condition, it doesn't appear to have been updated in the boat's lifetime. Since manufacturers recommend a lifespan of 6-10 years in the tropics, that means we are eight years past due date. 

The one issue is a missing bolt on the starboard diamond stay-arm. This will allow for it to slide out of place and could result in the mast failing. We can address that easily, and quickly. 

The water heater appears ready for an overhaul and there's an exhaust pipe, coming off the Yanmar 27 manifold that is due for replacing. 

Currently called Grape Soda and hailing from Honolulu, we will keep you all updated with the name and location. 

Looking forward to much more of this...

Aloha!

September 2008

I just looked back at where this all started, captured in a blog post from September of 2008. It all started from a blog originally titled Surfer on Dry Land, and meant to help a cold, wet me get motivated to be more fit living in Portland. 

That evolved into Love and Coconuts. And now here we are!

Survey Tomorow!

Well, after a long month, it's almost here. Tomorrow morning we will meet the boat surveyor at Grape Soda at 8a. We are paying a little extra to have him inspect the rigging aloft, as well as the standard hull and equipment survey.

As Kris and I are less experienced with the sail and mast rigging, it seems prudent to have it all checked. Also, seems a good opportunity to ask questions and take lots of notes walking around with a guy who knows these things and gets to look at them often.

Cheehu!

Boat Boxes

We have reduced most of what we own to this corner of the house. What's sitting here is the most that will go on the boat with us.

Bit Champing

We are really excited to get sailing and having a hard time waiting for this last week prior to sea trials and haul-out and our future as boat owners. 

We decided to go for a sail this afternoon on the Waikiki sailing catamaran Maita'i. 

Advertised as a Tradewind Sail, we were instructed to show up at 2:45 on the spit of sand between the Hale Kulani and the Sheraton. 

It turned out to be a perfect day for sailing off Waikiki. The trades were blowing in patches and we ran back and forth out there on this 44' multi-hull with it's 32' beam, topping 15 kts at one point, on a boat with a hull speed of 25 kts. 

Now we are even more excited to get on our own boat!

Aloha!

Kewalo Poke

Gave up the car to our visiting mainland friends today and had them drop us in Kaka'ako. We worked for a few hours and then went to Marukame Market and got all of the parts to make ourselves a poke bowl for lunch. Walked through Ward Warehouses to Kewalo Basin and assembled our lunch in the park, under the watchful eye of Sister Marianne Cope. 

With some fancy grape and fruit punch cans of tea, and a little iron-rich marinaded choy sum, we sat a hundred feet away from the boat-to-be, and feasted on fresh ahi poke with limu, onion, sesame oil, and green onions, all over a bed of white rice with shoyu. 

Abscond!

I am absconding. Ha!

I will attend the sea trials and boat survey on April 14, close at the hip of our marine inspector. And then, with the boat on the hard at Ke'ehi Lagoon, I will head to the airport and red-eye out of town for a week-long work trip.

Returning six days later to a freshly bottom-painted new home.

I feel a little guilty, although my income is what's keeping us afloat at the moment; and K knows I'd rather be there putting hands on that boat myself, rather than relying on friends to help her out.

Not to mention, I detest red-eye flights.

Kewalos

Kris and I tried out the Kewalo waterfront for it's office potential this morning. I was able to get my work done at a nearby Starbucks (with weefee) and handle a quick conference call from the park on my phone. We are in the process of switching our phone plan over and adding the personal hotspot option, which we hope will handle our working-remotely needs.

I launched from the point by the boat passage and paddled around to Straight-outs. Caught a few waves and paddled straight back in. Wasn't too painful getting out of the water, but certainly not a fun place to enter/exit. I foresee dings. Ugh.

Stumptown Departure

The moment Portland became the Portland that Portland is now was precipitated by a witty little Keno commercial in the heady, early days of Oregon's lottery era. I copy/paste another guy's rendition of the little one-man, two-figurine, as it unfolded on our TVs in-between the things we intended to watch:

INT  CHEESY  RETRO-LOOKING COCKTAIL BAR  EVENING

A somewhat disheveled, more than somewhat goofy-looking YOUNG MAN in his
late 20¹s sits alone at a table. He appears quite bored as he sips his
drink. It is one of those tropical cocktail monstrosities that come with
an umbrella and small plastic figurines. Awful lounge piano music comes
from somewhere in the bar.

The YOUNG MAN picks up the two figurines, a MERMAID and a SCUBA DIVER, and
begins to play with them, in a Gen-X, ennui-ridden sort of way.

                         YOUNG MAN
                   (In a bad French accent,
                   brandishing the SCUBA DIVER.)
               Come wit¹ me, Goddess of the Sea, and
               explore see depths of zee great cocktail.

The YOUNG MAN turns toward the MERMAID, in his other hand.

                         YOUNG MAN
                    (Now, as MERMAID, in an indignant
                    falsetto)
                Get away from me, you Frogman!!

                         YOUNG MAN
                     (SCUBA DIVER again)
                But I am Jacques!! World-renowned
                oceanographer and TV star!!

                         YOUNG MAN
                      (Back to MERMAID mode, lovingly now)
                Oh Jacques....
                      (Suddenly indignant again)
                Let¹s see how well you swim!!

The YOUNG MAN uses the MERMAID figurine to knock the SCUBA DIVER figurine
into his drink.

                                               CUT TO:

XCU: The SCUBA DIVER floats slowly down to the bottom of the glass.

                         YOUNG MAN
                     (O.S., as SCUBA DIVER, sounding
                      perplexed.)
                Curiously, my tiny plastic body does not
                float so good.

                                              DISSOLVE TO:

The OREGON STATE LOTTERY LOGO.

                    CYNICAL-SOUNDING ANNOUNCER
                  (V.O.)
                Keno, anyone?

                                              FADE TO BLACK.

THE END.

Of course, this being The Moment, is purely my opinion.