Tank Replacement

Island Queen has two 75 gallon stainless steel tanks for fresh water. The port tank is under the bed in the aft stateroom. It leaked when we bought Queeny and we fixed it right away. It was easy to get to and didn't provide much of a problem. The one on the starboard side began leaking and so it was time to pull it out. It was a lot more trouble to get to. It was built into the cabinetry or should I say the cabinetry was built around the tank. I had to cut the front of the cabinet out and part of the bulkhead between the cabin and the storage hold to be able to get it out. I ordered a new plastic tank to replace the stainless one as it was beyond repair. It will took 3 weeks to get the new one so we lived off one tank until the new one came in.
The new tank was a little smaller in capacity, 63 gallons instead of 75. I was able to get it a little taller than the old one so that made it shorter in length which allowed for a new storage place that we did not have before. I was able to buy a teak louvered door secondhand for $10. I stained it to match the existing drawers. I think it turned out really good. I still have a little bit of trim work to do to cover up where I had to cut the cabinet, but all in all I am happy with it.

Looking Forward

Well it looks like Sharon and I will be here in the Keys for another year. We had wanted to leave this April but that is not to be. I need to get some work to build the cruising kitty up before we leave. Also the church we go to here is starting an addition on their building and I have committed to help them with that. All in all their are worse places to be stuck for a year, 70s and 80s in the winter and 80s and 90s in the summer.

BIG TRIP

On or about April 5th I will be leaving with a friend to take his sailboat from here to Galveston bay. It is around 700 nautical miles across the gulf. It should be about 7 to 10 days. This will be the furthest offshore I have been an a small boat. I am looking forward to it. I have always wanted to do an ocean crossing. This will be a taste of offshore sailing. It will be interesting to see if I like it or not. Sometimes we want things and work hard to get them and then find out that that is not what we wanted at all. And sometimes at a great price.

We have reactivated our spot tracking device. That means the link at the top of the page will take you to a map that shows where we are. When the map comes up it is zoomed way in. You have to use the slide bar on the left to zoom it out to get the big picture.

Storm Tonight

We are having a storm today and tonight. It actually looks worse in the pics than what it really is. They were predicting 35 knot winds and had tornado warnings, but turned out to be not too much excitement.