One Week, a Lifetime Ago!

Day 8, June 5, 2019.

Just one week ago, we left Ottawa.

It feels like a lifetime and on a different planet.

As expected, I woke up all sore and achy. Going up and down the ladder is especially painful, as is laughing!

For some reason I didn't sleep very well at all last night which resulted in being completely daze-like today.

It was cold and drizzly all day. I was wearing my down jacket and three pairs of socks! Where on earth is summer here?!

Matt's main goal today was to remove the forestay from inside the mast so that we can take it to the sail shop for inspection and likely, replacement.

I worked alongside with him, helping with tools and brainstorming

Apparently it's called 'rubber ducking' in the IT testing world, where you talk out loud about what you are doing. The intention is that you will come to conclusions that you probably wouldn't have if you were trying to figure it out all in your head.

I realized at this moment what this whole week has been like: one great big escape room!

Where puzzles and obstacles are presented to you at various intervals and you have to work together to solve them in order to escape. In our case, it wasn't so much escaping but rather achieving an intended goal.

There are multiple puzzles and obstacles to overcome before actually getting to the real goal with boat work. And that's if you have the right tool!

After finally retrieving the forestay and coiling it into the car, Matt continued working on the mast boot while I washed out the mast step.

I gave my body a much needed rest today, read up a bit on our GPS system, made sure I ate and hydrated regularly and even had a cheeky nap around midday.

We can't believe how much we have learned already in just one week.

We are using our brains in ways that we aren't used to. We are also using our bodies in ways we are not used to.

This brings great knowledge and information every waking minute. This also makes us very very tired. So much information, decision making and problem solving, being constantly ON.

Tonight we had to get some tools at Canadian Tire in Bridgewater.

It felt good to be in the car, driving. Just a simple act like driving felt so good and liberating. It is something we can do and do well. So there is no need to really think, except to be alert and obey the rules of the road. But we know those already, so it is simple.

We are in the deep end of this steep learning curve.

During our drive we discussed how we felt after this one week.

Matt said as long as he felt like he was checking off at least one item on the to-do list everyday, then he is happy.

For me, I feel that just getting to this point of moving onto the boat was a milestone. We didn't know how long it would take, but we did it.

I feel that after our boat work is done (enough) and we get in the water, we will have achieved another milestone. Again, we aren't exactly sure how long it will take, but we'll get there.

After our Canadian Tire shop, we popped into the Harvey's next door and used up the rest of my voucher. They closed right at 9pm so we grabbed our food and ate it in the parking lot. Classy.

Tomorrow they're calling for incessant rain and wind. 

Tomorrow we tackle putting the transmission back, getting new starter batteries, doing a flares inventory, dropping off the forestay at the sail shop, cleaning up the electrical wires at the mast, getting a second opinion at our rotten bulkhead and maybe even do a load of laundry.

If we get one of those things done, it will be a good day!

Matt removing the jib furler.

This is the furler for the jib furling line.

Collecting the jib sheet from the furler.

That black thing is the mast boot. That sits just at deck level. The mast boot 

is there to prevent any water dripping down into the inside of the boat.

Harvey's parking lot dinner date. One step up from laundry room dinner date!

Beautiful crescent moon tonight.