Keeping her linens dry

I found while leaving for our first journey I was thinking about what to take. What to take and leave on Moondance and what to take and bring back home. I dont want to carry things back and forth. I wasn't sure how we could store stuff on Moondance while we were away. I read several blogs and found people used a lot of plastic containers. So I ended up buying a few to try them out. I considered what our experiences were, what we would be doing while on Moondance and keeping her tidy and clean. What I found that sticks out the most is......We are on water 24/7 ....... So I found I needed to keep her as dry as possible inside the galley and in the cabins. How to do that, we found that cotton machine washable rugs we great.  I could hang them out on the rails with clothes pins to dry if they got wet or I could toss them in a dryer at a marina.  So what I decided was rugs were important so all the rugs stayed. I will also take more rugs when we return to her in March.  About towels, absorbent towels were great, but took a long time to dry. So how many towels did we need?  I think I decided six is a good number for two people. We only had two and that was a challenge to keep one dry to use daily.....Sheets and blankets for our beds was another thing to consider to use and store on Moondance. But how and keep them dry?
 I thought that one large plastic container for sheets, one for blankets, one for towels and one for misc. other cloths would be enough to store stuff while we were away.  I'm not sure what we will return to find, but I hope everything isn't musty from the moisture of being on the water once she is put back in.
I also hung damp rid bags one in each of two of our cabins. I will also take xxlg airtight bags next time just in case.
We didn't have trouble with a lot of dampness in our main cabin, maybe because our bed was above the water level. However the spare cabin bed I made up just in case we had family on board did get damp, however that berth is below water level. Not sure if that's why.
Life Is a Good, Sail On !!!!

Stay tuned

We will be blogging about all of Moondance"s repairs/upgrades. So stay tuned as we share with everyone about all she is having done in the next couple months. From entertainment upgrades to band aides on the hole she sustained when hitting the dock in Sebastian. :) as well we will share with everyone where we plan to go when we return to her late March.
Life Is Good, Sail On!!!!

Feeling wired

Although John loved being on Moondance and the learning curve associated with her, he is wired. He keeps referring to a much known actor as he describes how he has been feeling the past three weeks.  Remember he has enjoyed Moondance aka Training Wheels a week longer than me :) If you read our traing wheels blog post you will get a better idea of why John has been feeling like this.  :)
Life Is Good, Sail On!!!!

Missing Moondance

It has been a long day of travel for us as we are traveling back to the northeast.  I can't help but feel a little sad missing being on Moondance. Even though we had some difficult and sometimes challenging situations the past two weeks she was becoming our home away from home.  We were able to find a lot of really cool boat stuff to decorate and spiff her up.  I decided to use sail flags and anchors as our decorating theme along with dark blue and reds and a bit of yellow of course. There are a lot of different online stores I was able to find that sells boat stuff. It has been fun.  We decided Moondance could really use some new rigging.  So we requested them to replace her rigging with solid colors red,blue and green. That way when we return and I'm learning to sail her I won't get the sail lines mixed up. Kinda like what I do in my classroom color coating :) things to stay organized, John liked the idea.  I'm looking forward to seeing all her bright new colors.
Life Is Good, Sail On!!!!

Moondance is at the marine hospital :)

We had a nice trip today.  We motored up the ICW and went thru the lock at Cape Canaveral. We saw lots of dolphins and manatee. It was sunny and nice especially nice since it has been raining for the past 3 days. We went to Scorpion marina. The people there are very nice.  They pulled Moondance out of the water with the large marine crane to work on beautifying her so when we return no more problems with showers, pumps electric, etc....:).....The men at Scorpion marina helped us with choosing new things for Moondance. She will be all fixed up when we return late march.

We decided to take a cab to a hotel at cocoa beach for the night and get a taxi in the morning to the airport in Orlando. With this snow storm we will probably be delayed at some point but we are headed north.
 It has been an awesome trip, not what we expected but we are learning a lot. We have also meet some really nice people.
Life Is Good, Sail on!!!!

Logo

This is a picture of our logo. It will also have a few stars :) when it is done. John has been working with an artist from Miami who creates boat logos. We are excited to have it put onto the boat and have our name changing ceremony. There is a ritual which includes breaking a bottle of champaign over the boat in honor of Neptune. Not certain the whole story but will blog about the ceremony sometime during our march trip, when we plan to sail farther north once all the repairs are completed.
Life Is Good, Sail on!!!

Rain Rain go away

It has been a real adventure the past several days. The weather is not good, there has been a lot of rain. We have not left the dock in several days. I wish it would stop raining. Tomorrow we are going to Scorpion marina at the Cape to have Moondance aka Training wheels taken out of the water to be painted, our logo put on among several other things including fix the main sail, new refrigerator and check the stove so we will be ready for our long journey this summer. Not to mention the list if electronics including radar to check weather.
I am going to add a few pictures. This Picture is of our lifelines. I took this while heading into the Atlantic the day we could not get the main sail to go up and I was REALLY scared.
Life Is Good, Sail On!!!!