Homeward Bound

 Baja Naval Astillero in Ensenada Mexico 

Our boat was launched yesterday after thanking the 30 boatyard employees with a Pizza Lunch. Traversay III looks brand-new, with her gleaming white paint and renewed navy stripes. We estimate it will take several weeks to reach Victoria. At least, we have enough provisions aboard in case we are in for a 'Long Haul'.

'Matterhorn White' top coat

L & M.A  with Bianca & Gabrielle

Traversay III with 'Flag Blue' stripes & Lettering

 

Baja Naval Mexico

 We got here to have our boat painted on May 13 after a 10-day passage. It was a rough trip along the coast until we came abreast of Cape Mendocino California. We had several equipment failures. Fortunately,  Larry had purchased a spare starter motor in 2008 and it worked perfectly. Unfortunately, when the auto-pilot failed, 1 of our 2 spares also failed.

He's now attempted to fix them Had Garmin followed the RIGHT to REPAIR regulations when they purchased Nexus Instruments, he could easily have written the code to fix 2 of the three instruments. He has attempted to repair this board with extra parts he had by intuiting  what needed to be done. We will find out whether our spares work when we set off for Victoria in about a week.

We are happy to be getting the painting done here for the second time. We got here exactly 10 years after our last visit because our steel boat needs to be re-painted regularly. Mexico is terrific because normally it doesn't rain, the mast doesn't need to be taken off and you don't need to rent a shed. We need new paint ... once the paint gets 'thin'sea water can creep under the paint and start rusting. 

Painting Traversay is a lengthy process because there are 7 coats of paint. She has 2 grey primer coats and 3 of glossy 'Matterhorn White'. In between some coats, everything around that you don't want painted gets masked (including all nearby boats who might not like Matterhorn White). Between many of the coats there's sanding and vacuuming. The work stops for rain and we're now stopped. The boat still needs it's navy (Flag Blue) stripes, lettering and 2 coats of  black anti-fouling bottom paint. 

Primer Coat

Glossy Top Coat

Leaving Notes

We’re in position to leave tomorrow. The weather is looking good for the first few days of the trip and we’re mentally prepared for the onslaught. 

I’ll be putting on a scopolamine patch … a medication that has various unfortunate side effects (like a dry mouth and extreme tiredness) but keeps actual sea-sickness at bay. We are fully provisioned for the trip. The cranky autopilot seems to have been cajoled into working again.

Even with our finances, our wills and our meds in order, I always have the same Leave-taking emotions and those are harder to quell than mere sea-sickness. I miss my daughters … they both loved sailing as kids. Of course, Alice has been gone (dead at 25 of a brain tumor) for over 18 years now, and Hope is ‘locked in’ at her home in rural Ontario. She and her husband Darin are caring for 4 children, 3 cats, 2 aged female horses, 4 ageing chickens and a psychologically-challenged Doberman. Hope’s oldest daughter (age 18) is working and living away from home, but the youngest child is only 6. 

I still ardently wish Hope could come on this trip as it’s likely to be our very last offshore trip.  I can envision how much she would love looking at the birds, looking at the sunrises or sunsets, seeing the differences in the wave patterns, and doing the actual sail-changes and physical work of sailing during her watches.

This photo of Darin and Hope on a calm day at sea says it all.

On our way to Mexico SOON!

 

We plan to leave for Mexico once the winds and weather are favourable ... we hope to leave around May 1st.

Before leaving, we want everyone who reads this to learn something important about Traversay III and our treatement of the Sea. Traversay was built with two tanks ... one for sink waste and the original tank for toilet waste was replaced with an oversized tank.  This tank is known as the blackwater tank. While we're in port and here in Victoria, we pay to have our toilet tank emptied on a weekly basis. Every civilized country has rules about waste and Traversay follows them.

Once we're far awy from land, we empty our blackwater tank into the Sea.We are not reaponsible for much black-water waste in the ocean. 

WHO IS THE GREATEST DEFECATOR INTO THE OCEAN? 

To find the answer click here

Home again ... Victoria British Columbia!

 

The Essential Galley Companion by Amanda Swan Neal

Pender Harbour 

We’re about to leave the beautiful wilderness behind along with the underwater critters, eagles, whales, dolphins, and even a few other similarly wilderness-addicted fellow sailors who shared some spaces with us. 

 Luckily this time my re-entry into Civilization will be much easier than usual. That's because I'm looking forward to Shopping ... Not for clothes ... but getting into Full-on Grocery shopping. In central Victoria I'll be able to search for some hard-to-find ingredients not available in Northern BC. Our friend the beautiful Amanda Swan Neal has tested all of the recipes in her new book over the course of her 345,000+ offshore miles with family and later on with the International Mahina Expeditions. I estimate that there are over 1000 recipes in this collection. To it she has brought her incredible intelligence, her savvy and her well-researched knowledge to tickle and delight every palate. With this book, Amanda will keep us all healthy and vibrantly alive … even while we might be encountering less-than-optimal conditions at sea. To that issue she’s included an excellent chapter on sea-sickness. 

She has numerous tips for stretching or diminishing the recipes to feed from 2 people to a crowd, she tells us how to keep provisions fresh, how to arrange a large or a small galley, how to shop in Foreign lands (she has visited 80 countries) and she tells us how to cook some fabulous standard Authentic  cuisine, or  local food bought cheaply at a market in a distant land. You can cook a real Provencal Beef Stew or a delicious Canadian Maple and Ginger glazed Salmon. In Polynesia you can find out how to make Coconut Creamed Taro Leaf. Further along, you might even try making the Fijian Curried Octopus. 

For the more practical cook, she includes less expensive tips for making your own peanut and tartar sauce, dressings: such as Miso or Thai and she includes 10 different spice mixes. Do get the paperback version of this book (all 390 packed pages for only $31 CDN on Amazon). Paging through a Kindle version would be quite tiresome, and she has left space at the end for you to attach some of your other favourites. 

A favourite aspect of this book are the personal accounts she includes ... her youthful experiences sailing with her family, her stories on passage as a Competitive sailor in an all-woman Team and on the Whitbred and Sydney-Hobart Races. She generously includes recipes from some of the many boats she and Mahina have ‘broken bread’ with. 

 This book and its priceless knowledge should really be devoured BEFORE you set out. Displaying even more wisdom, you should internalize Amanda’s precepts BEFORE you even BUY a boat. 

However, if you’re like me and you love your good old boat – and after all Traversay’s been our home for 23 years - this book will make you look forward to introducing some new ‘licks’ to that old repertoire you have already been playing for too many years!

A cloudy day

 

North Kent Island

In the anchorage, the day started well  ... at 6 a.m. the sun shone brightly. However, by 8:00 the fog had rolled in and there was a total white-out. Later and even as the fog dispersed, it was unreleningly cloudy. 

 Undeterred, we jumped in the water and into the amazing colourful world Beneath. I marvelled at the beautiful plumose anemones ... Larry captured some amazing photos. The World Beneath is spectacular here in Supernatural British Columbia!

plumose anemone

Clown nudibranch with eggs

Our Underwater World