So after a couple of months of taking care of basics, it was time to bring Ragamuffin home from Anacortes to Gig Harbor. Raggy has been sitting on the hard for some time. At 9am it was showtime and the crew showed up right on time, put her on a lift and drove off with her. I ran around taking pictures. At this point, I figured it would float, knew the engine could run for 10 seconds, and that all the lights worked and emergency equip was up to par. They stop about 10 feet short of the water and put a ladder against her. My heartrate tripled as I climbed up the 4 miles to Raggy's cockpit. I'd never done this before, never steered a big sailboat and had no idea how Ragamuffin handled.
Into the water we went and Ragamuffin fired right up. Must have been my expert spark plug replacement
The marina guy hollers for me to hit the power and reverse off. Ohhh the prop walk! I had heard about it, but now it was shoving the back of Raggy towards the rocks on the side of the ramp. She was half on and half off... the marina crew was getting alittle interested in the situation and hollering helpful advice that I couldn't hear. It finally came off and it took all the courage I had to lay some coals on her towards the very near rocks, to get some rudder stearage. Holy smokes...breath..breath.. Out she backed and the I was surprised by how hard the tiller got if the rudder hard overed. The tiller creaked and groaned...one more thing for the to do list (it later fell apart in my hands as I replaced it in Gig). Got her turned around heading out when I noticed no exhaust water flow. NOTE TO SELF: Check this after engine start everytime! Temp was very high, so I hoisted the sails at panicked sailor speed, killed the engine and my crew Nick, headed in to figure it out. The Channel was out. No way I was going in there with a shady engine. I had planned the big water route for this very reason and was very glad not to be in the channel with a dead motor.
I actually was enjoying about 2 hours of delightful sailing and googling ideas for Nick... Nick replaced the impeller which didn't help and started tracing, and blowing through stuff. Eventually he found the little elbow at the stern end of the engine on top of the manifold clogged. Crammed a screwdriver in there and POOF water out the back! Yaaaaaay! Who knows where that gunk ended up. The wind was very weak, so go Atomic Bomb! I was happy to have discovered the tank was 30 gallons. The end of day one saw us passing along Smith Island into Port Townsend and down a bit on our vodka. We ate like kings all day (Italian). The atomic 4 ran pretty good, idled a little rough but didn't let us down. Dinner and beers, back to Raggy and lights out. 1st day down.
Day 2 found us leaving early in almost zero wind conditions at first light. The Atom Bomb fired right up and now was running as if it remembered its youth. Smoooooth. Once again I admired my spark plug changing abilities. Day two was just a looong grind. Motoring along, more vodka, a Coast Guard boarding and lots of seals and porpoises. Keep left! Thats Hood Canal over there...DOH! Disaster averted. We passed Point No Point and continued heading south. Today was steak and shrimp day. There went Shilshole where I have fond memories of learning to race Snipes! Seattle sliding by... and finally we pulled into Manchester, West of Blake Island. A little dock in town served as our hotel for the night and there's a pub/restaurant right there. Beer and food ensued. We later saw no overnighting signs, but noone seemed to care and the little bathroom there was open 24/7 which was super nice. It was a rocky night, the fenders were squeaking against the dock, the halyards were banging around in some pretty decent wind and it sounded like a band from hell, with the occasional hockey check against the boards. It was 3am and I was pretty miserable, later Nick told me he was up at 3am and if I was up he was going to suggest we just leave... I was thinking the exact same thing. We just missed the fact that we were both up! So all in all a pretty miserable night at Manchester. I was very pleased with how the Mr. Heater Big Buddy was treating us. I bought and filled an 11lb propane tank and 8ft hose and it has run for 4 nights so far for 6 bucks of propane and its not empty. Just requires a open something or other for ventilation. Toasty warm! Oh, I just remembered something. While up in the tavern, I had the sensation of rocking on the boat still. It was pretty strong and I got a little concerned that if it got any worse I was going to feel pretty bad. It didn't get worse, but it didn't get better either. No nausea though, so onward!
Day 3, super early and exhausted we fired up the Atomic, it started up like a brand new one, and off we went. The picture above was Manchester's little dock. Today would be the shortest of our days and it was a good thing. With last nights lack of sleep both Nick and I were feeling a little rough and morale took a little dip. Right about then we ran out of smokes and vodka. Terrible for morale hahaha! The only thing we had plenty left of was healthy stuff. We ran out of all the fun stuff. Some rain on and off and we found ourselves motoring along the west side of Vashon Island. Familiar territory to me from my Montgomery 17. Ahh theres the entrance to Gig! A nice sight. Nick and I agreed that a 4th day would have sucked. Probably just the sleep deprivation talking. Anyway we pull into Gig and my son met us at the public dock as he hadn't seen the boat and wanted to get to Murphys Landing Marina with us. That was a nice treat, and as it turns out, very fortunate! Deep into the harbor we find Murphys and start circling around the outside getting the lay of the land, and trying to determine exactly where the parking spot was. I had surveyed this just before leaving from the marina, but of course from the water, whole different ballgame. Care was in order and I made sure to know sorta where it was before proceeding! Just about to turn into the alleyway of million dollar boats and I decide to slow a bit with some reverse...nothing! No brakes mom! ABORT! ABORT! Quick turn to starboard before the water gets really shallow and out to the middle of the harbor we go. Once again I'm driving and Nicks diving, into the engine well. The problem was the clamp on the transmission cable had come loose and allowed the cable to move and not push the lever on the tranny. We messed with it a good half hour and just couldn't make a fix out there without dropping anchor and getting serious. This is when I remembered we had picked up a human clamp at the public dock! The little man goes down, and we practice him pushing hard on the cable when I needed reverse! Score! I wanted Nick up top to catch us if I was going to crash into the dock or a boat. Never too careful on your first docking on a new boat twice the size of your last boat! I cannot tell you guys the stress I was feeling as I eased into million dollar boat alley! I land 737s I got this... I got this...positive self talk. Turns out I did have it. The human clamp worked flawlessly and Ragamuffin eased into her new house. RELIEF. That last part could have gone really bad had I not discovered the reverse thing before turning in.
So all in all, was an excellent adventure with a good friend. We learned alot, fixed alot, laughed alot drank alot and played some guitar. EPIC.
-= Jazzy