by Judy Handley | Jul 22, 2013 | Cape Cod, USA, Sailing Logs Year 8 |
Day 261, Year 8: Mellow Monday
Date: Monday, July 22, 2013
Weather: Overcast and a Tad Cooler, High in the Upper 70’s
Location: Eel Pond, Woods Hole, Massachusetts
I can’t remember the last time Mark and I have been together on Windbird for a whole day with no major agenda. As Jonah would say, “Nice.” Then he adds, “Yeah, baby.” And he says all of this with a forced deep voice. I have no idea where he picked this up, but I’m passing it on. Anyway, today I pretended that I was out on some tropical island and did our laundry in a bucket and hung it to dry on the life lines. Mark launched into another boat project—replacing the small bilge pump. The other day he rewired the large bilge pump so that it works properly again, and after today, we have both bilge pumps working. He then started investigating the refrigerator cooling system. In the last couple of weeks it has been cooling sporadically. Some days the refrigerator temp is in the upper 30’s and then it heats up to 50 degrees F. A day or so later it goes back down again. After multiple checks, he is pretty sure that it is the compressor, so we ordered a new one that will arrive on Friday. After a lot of price checking, which required a trip into West Marine to check his sales associate’s price, he ordered an Alder-Barbour from West Marine. The good thing is that he can install this himself. We had a bit of a falling out with the one and only air conditioning-refrigeration repair guy on the Cape last year when our heating and air conditioning system blew up just after his visit to repair it. Since he is recommended by everyone we talk to, our system was probably just ready to bite the dust, but it would be uncomfortable having him come to work on the refrigerator. So let’s hope Mark can get this done without help. Otherwise, we might have to go without refrigeration until we get back to South Carolina. And that does not sound like a plan I’d like to live with!
On our way into town to do the West Marine price check, my favorite osprey was visible feeding her baby in the nest along the beach road into town. Yesterday I could see both the momma and the baby, but I didn’t have time to stop and get a photo. I got a photo of momma (at least I think it was the momma)today, but will keep trying to get the baby before he flies away. This nest is on the top of wooden post right beside the road and it has been so much fun watching as the baby gets bigger.
by Judy Handley | Jul 21, 2013 | Cape Cod, USA, Sailing Logs Year 8 |
Day 260, Year 8: The Joy of Grandkids
Date: Sunday, July 21, 2013
Weather: Mix of Clouds, Sun, and Rain
Location: Eel Pond, Woods Hole, Massachusetts
What a joy it was to have Sam and Jonah spend the night on Windbird. I had to get up with Jonah once during the night for a bathroom and drink of water call, but other than that, both boys slept like little angels all night. Sam is an early riser and he quietly came to the aft cabin to get me up around 7:30 am (an hour later than usual). Mark and Jonah slept until just after 8 am, and once they were up we started formulating our plans for the day. It rained overnight and was still raining when we were doing our planning, but we didn’t let a little weather get in the way of having some fun beach time. The decision was to go Stoney Beach in Woods Hole during the morning, go back to Windbird for lunch and nap for Jonah, and then go back to Stoney Beach for the late afternoon. Both boys were happy about that decision, so off we went. We snorkeled, rode on the boogie boards, and loved every minute at the beach. During the morning, a couple of teenage girls gave Sam and Jonah two sea stars they had found. Sam gave them a ride on the boogie board and then we returned them to the rock jetty where we thought they must have come from originally. Both boys wanted to know the function of the orange dot on the top of the sea star. I wasn’t sure, but after checking on the internet I found out it is called the madreporite. See the note below.
We didn’t have much time in the afternoon, but Jonah got braver as the day progressed. He is a little timid about putting his head underwater, but ever so slowly, he is progressing. At 5 pm, we had to hurry to the car and go to West Marine to pick up Granddad. Mark and I took the boys home, spent a little time playing with Oliver, and then headed back to Windbird. Windbird was a little quieter without the boys and we look forward to the next overnight.
Note: According to ‘Answers’ on the internet, “The bright orange dot in the center of the body is called the madreporite. This organ pumps water into the sea star’s body. This pumping action creates suction at the end of hundreds of tube feet, located in paired rows on the underside of the arms.”
by Judy Handley | Jul 20, 2013 | Cape Cod, USA, Sailing Logs Year 8 |
Day 259, Year 8: Overnight Guests Aboard Windbird
Date: Saturday, July 20, 2013
Weather: Mostly Sunny and Windy, Still Hot
Location: Eel Pond, Woods Hole, Massachusetts
We have overnight guests aboard Windbird tonight. Just before I went to pick Mark up from work I got a call from Heather saying that both Sam and Jonah were anxious to come spend the night. This is a first for Jonah, but he rose to the occasion, had a great evening, and is now sleeping like a little angel. Both boys wanted to be here after dark so they could see the comb jellies light up at night, so that gave Jonah the extra incentive to be brave enough to stay without mommy and daddy. We had a great light show—in sky with heat lightening and in the water. I held an oar so it was just skimming the water as we motored around Eel Pond in the dark. I was afraid there was going to be too much light with the almost full moon, but it wasn’t a problem. Those ctenophores put on a good show for the boys. I got a message from Jed last night after posting my log giving me additional information about the comb jellies in Eel Pond. “The specific ctenophores (members of the phylum Ctenophora) in Eel Pond are Mnemiopsis leidyi – another good example of words starting with different letters (pronounced ‘neem-e-op-sis le-ee-d-eye’).”
by Judy Handley | Jul 19, 2013 | Cape Cod, USA, Sailing Logs Year 8 |
Day 258, Year 8: Two Stubborn Screws
Date: Friday, July 19, 2013
Weather: Sunny, Hot Weather Continues; Very Windy in the PM
Location: Eel Pond, Woods Hole, Massachusetts
Good sailing friends of ours, Heather and Jon Turgeon, are currently in Fiji. We met them at Shipyard Quarters Marina where we lived in Boston before sailing around the world. Heather and Jon are much younger than us and are in their second cruising year sailing around the world. We got this email from them a couple of days ago, “Hey Judy, while we are sitting here at Ono Island in Fiji getting blown around we were looking at your blog of Thailand. I did find a small error (or maybe Thailand is more exciting that I am thinking) that Mark was working to “remove two stubborn screws that are holding one last wench on the mast”. Now, that is what we need–a few wenches on the mast ;-).” I guess I’d better be more careful of my spelling. It was a winch, not a wench, that was being held to the mast with those stubborn screws!
The weather here continues to be hot, but I’m reminded that it is not nearly as hot as many other places. And today there was a bit of relief from the wind. Mid-afternoon the wind started blowing about 20 knots and that has continued into night. Tomorrow night we are supposed to get thunderstorms and then the weather should cool down just a little for two or three days. Technically, we are not having a heat wave as the temperature has not stayed constantly in the 90’s, but it is definitely hotter for a longer period of time than normal here on the Cape. And it looks like the hot weather will continue next week after our brief reprieve.
Mark worked at West Marine today and Sam (who spent the night on the boat) and I headed to Heather and Jed’s early. Heather had to be on the air at 9 am, so we arrived there at 8:15 and Heather and Jed drove to Woods Hole to work while I stayed with the three boys. We played inside for a bit, but then went into the backyard and filled the inflatable pool they have in order to cool down and have a little water fun. Heather came home right after her hour on the air, and we enjoyed the late morning and early afternoon with the boys. Oliver went down for a nap right on schedule, but Jonah has been resisting sleep recently and did that this afternoon. I finally had to drive him around to get him to sleep at all. After nap time, we headed to Woods Hole to Stoney Beach with a stop at West Marine. Both Sam and Jonah have expressed an interest in snorkeling, so Granddad sold them dive masks and fins. Sam hit the water in Woods Hole and just took off like a natural. Jonah had fun wearing the fins, but is still resisting putting his head in the water, so snorkeling is a bit of a problem. But every day, he makes a bit of progress.
I invited Heather, Jed, and boys to Windbird for dinner. That way they could spend more time at the beach and not have to worry about going home to cook. Jonah and I left the beach early and came to the boat to cook. We had spaghetti and crabs (given to us by a work colleague of Mark’s). Tomorrow Mark works at West Marine and I stay home on Windbird to clean. We have been way too busy having fun recently to worry about boat cleaning, but the time has come.
I’ll end with a story from my trip into town this morning with Sam. We were talking about the comb jellies that he made a touch tank for on the beach last evening. The Latin name for these jellyfish is Ctenophores (pronounced teen-a-fours). I asked him if he knew how to spell this, and of course, he didn’t. But like me, he thought the word began with a ‘t’. This led to a whole discussion on how to spell words and then I asked him if he could figure out how many syllables there are in the word ‘antidisestablishmentarianism’. I was counting them on my fingers for him and we got to ten. That brought us to the end of the word, ‘ism.’ I asked him if he thought that was one syllable or two and he replied, “It sounds like two, but since there is only one vowel, it must just be one.” I was blown away by what he learned in kindergarten about the English language. I must give the public education system a ‘thumbs up’ for that one.
by Judy Handley | Jul 18, 2013 | Cape Cod, USA, Sailing Logs Year 8 |
Day 257, Year 8: Too Much Sun
Date: Thursday, July 18, 2013
Weather: Another Sunny, Hot Day in the 80’s; Cooler in the Evening
Location: Eel Pond, Woods Hole, Massachusetts
Sam, Jonah, Ollie, Mark, and I went to the pond where the boys have swim lessons first thing this morning. One of Sam’s best buddies, Sebastian, was there and that made the morning even nicer. By 11 o’clock, the boys and I dropped Mark off at West Marine and headed to Woods Hole to pick up Heather and head out to Devil’s Foot Island for lunch. We go there taking the dinghy under the draw bridge and heading across Great Bay to the little islet. We went there because there is a shady place on the beach, but today an artist was working in that area and there were nasty, biting flies in the shade. And kids don’t want to sit in the shade anyway, so there we were, playing in the water in the mid-day sun. It’s a great beach for exploration—lots of life in the water—but we stayed too long and just simply got too much sun. At least we’ll blame the turn events on the sun. What had seemed like a good idea simply went pear-shaped mid-afternoon. When we got back to the boat, Heather was supposed to go back to work while Jonah and Oliver took a nap. But they resisted (and that’s putting it mildly) and we ended up having to head back to Heather and Jed’s with all three kids. Sam was terribly disappointed as we had said we would go to Stoney Beach in Woods Hole after naps, so at the end of the day, he decided to come home with me and spend the night so he could make a late evening visit to Stoney. Sam and I bought take-out at a local Chinese restaurant and had dinner on a beach in Falmouth while we waited for Mark to get off work at 7 pm. When we picked up Granddad, we all headed to Stoney where Sam played until the sun went down. Mark and I just sat and watched. Heather called just before Sam went to sleep to have him say goodnight to Jonah. Jonah was very sad without his big brother, but he just isn’t quite ready to come spend the night without mommy and daddy. “But Jonah, we miss you. Maybe next time you’ll come with Sam.”
by Judy Handley | Jul 17, 2013 | Cape Cod, USA, Sailing Logs Year 8 |
Day 256, Year 8: Change of Plans
Date: Wednesday, July 17, 2013
Weather: Another Sunny, Hot Day in the 80’s; Cooler, Lovely Evening
Location: Eel Pond, Woods Hole, Massachusetts
Educator Harry Wong always says, “If you don’t have a plan, you’re planning to fail.” But I will add to that, “Plans are made to be changed.” Today was one of those days. I’m not sure I remember what my plans were, but whatever, that’s not what I did. Heather called early this morning to tell me that Ollie woke up in the night with a 102+ temperature. I had offered yesterday to come into town to help out during swim lessons this morning, but last night she thought she needed no help. This morning, she thought differently with a sick baby. So Mark drove me to the park and dropped me off so he could go to a dentist appointment and then back to the boat for a business conference call. Heather and Jed dropped Sam and Jonah off at the park and I stayed with them for swim class while Heather and Ollie drove Jed to work. Heather didn’t think Ollie would feel good enough to come down to the pond. She thought he would much rather just sit in his car seat. But when Heather returned to the park, she side swiped one of the heavy duty gate posts at the entrance to the parking area which put a nasty gash in the passenger side door to the van the entire width of the door. This surely was not in her plans for the day. She was obviously shaken but needed to make phone calls to deal with the accident. Ollie’s temperature was actually just a little better and he wanted to go in the water. So I played with Ollie in the water while watching Sam and Jonah. Swim lessons were over by this time, and they were just enjoying the water. Swim lessons have been great for Sam. There are usually only four or five boys in his 9:30 am class, so they get lots of attention. Plus the fact that two of the boys are a little older and Sam loves doing everything they do. So all of a sudden he is like a little fish–swimming and going under water. Jonah had tubes put in his ears in May and he is just not liking the idea of putting his head underwater—so swim progress is a little slower for him this summer. But he’ll get there. All three boys had a lot of fun in the water while poor Heather talked on the phone dealing with the accident. But at least she did get to enjoy a few minutes of beach time before we left. She had planned to bring the boys to Woods Hole for lunch today and to spend the afternoon, but instead we went to her house for lunch. Heather and Ollie desperately needed a little sleep, so I took Sam and Jonah to do some errands and then drove about 25 minutes north to the auto body shop recommended by the dealership where they bought the van. They will not be able to begin repair work until next week after the insurance adjuster sees the van on Monday. They estimate they will have the van for about two weeks, so Heather and Jed are going to have to rent a car. Their second car is the Ford Taurus that we drive and both cars are busy full-time.
When Sam, Jonah, and I returned, Ollie and Heather were up from their nap and ready to head to Woods Hole for the Marine Biological Lab’s (MBL) 125th birthday party. Ollie’s temp was up and down all day, depending on how long it had been since he last took baby Tylenol, but he was hanging in there and didn’t want to be left out of the action. So I dropped Heather off with all three boys at the MBL party site and then headed out to Windbird to cook dinner for everyone. With all the fans running inside the boat, it was actually delightfully cool inside, so once the Goldstones arrived after attending the MBL party, we ate inside hiding from the still burning hot evening sun shining into the cockpit. We had a delightful dinner together and then went to shore for an ice cream dessert. So the turned out just fine, even with Ollie’s temp and Heather’s encounter with the gate post.
Tomorrow should be a work day for Heather and a Camp Oma day for Sam and Jonah, but we are going to have to adjust plans for tomorrow as well. Ollie will not be able to go to daycare because of the temperature. But if he is doing as well tomorrow as he did today, I will take all three boys to swim class. Mark doesn’t go to work at West Marine until 11 am, so he is going to the park to help out with Ollie during swim lessons. Then we’ll take Mark to work and head to Woods Hole. By this time, Heather will have put in a couple of hours of work and she will take off to join us for a lunchtime trip out to Devil’s Foot Island. We’ll come back to Windbird for naptime and that way Heather can go back to work for a couple of hours. We’ll figure out the rest of the day once we know how Ollie is doing. One thing is for sure. No matter how bad he feels, he will be a happy little guy being included in the activities of his big brother. He is definitely happiest when he is able to tag along with the big boys.
