Maiden Voyage

The wind came up, and with it rain and a nasty little chop, so we figured it was a perfect time for a first trip. We cruised slowly south down Lake Washington to the Starbucks at Carillon Point.  The motion was easy and we took turns napping down below on the bed. I have the high-thrust motor and propeller (13.2 inch diameter), and it has incredible torque. I was backing out of the marina and got too close to another boat. Shifting to forward and gunning it a bit reversed the boat direction instantly.

At hull speed, about 7 miles per hour, she hardly kicks up a wake. She cruises at that speed at 3000 RPM, or about half-throttle.
 

Anything above that and she starts to squat and makes a nice wake. I took her up to 11 MPH briefly, and I guess she’ll do 13 or 14 if needed.

 

According to the GPS, we went about 17 miles that day, and used up less than four gallons of gas. About 4.5 miles per gallon. Not too bad for a 6500 pound boat!

Launched!

Friday morning after blintzes and tea Meryll and I drove the boat to the marina. Ross followed and took pictures.

The TraveLift was reserved, and they got right to work in the rain.

 

The moment of truth:

And she floats!
 

The motor started right up. Everything just worked. Meryll, Ross, Barry, and I piled in for a short loop around the end of the lake. 

Out of the Shed

On Thursday morning I rented the 1-ton pickup truck and then the trailer from a different rental place across town. I started removing the deck under the bow of the boat. Ross showed up around 4 PM. Meryll, Ross, and I went right to work pulling the boat out. We called it a day about 8 PM, with the boat on the trailer next to the house.

Ross put the numbers on to make the boat legal:

We jacked the boat up and cut the deck out from underneath:

I backed in the trailer and we used a come-along to drag the boat onto it. This step actually took hours. The trailer was too high and we had to dig trenches for the tires to drop into. The boat bottom was too flat for the trailer so the bottom ran into the trailer wheelwells so we had to jack the back end up and stuff sheets of old decking on top of the rollers to keep from crushing the wheelwells. All the neighbors showed up and gave us advice on how to do it better  🙂

During this time we had the road completely blocked. Meryll spent a lot of time asking people to drive around on the side streets:
 

 

 

It was raining and getting dark  when we finished. I’d never seen it from more than a few feet away.

It was a good day.

Oh Gnats!

While painting the doors in the back yard last evening a cloud of gnats came by.

Here’s the scene of devastation this morning. Oh, the humanity! Death toll in the hundreds.

Official!

I took a huge stack of receipts to the registration office and got official. The receipts were to prove that I’ve already paid all my Washington State sales tax on the stuff that went into the boat so I wouldn’t have to pay it again to get it registered.  It took a while to complete, but Julia behind the counter was helpful and pleasant. I think it might have been a nice change for her from the usual car stuff she deals with all day. The $411 in excise tax was a surprise. I still don’t know what that’s for.

Meryll did all the accounting, and put all the receipts in envelopes for me, and provided me with a printout of all the costs. Nice to be married to an exceptionally organized person. Thanks!

Pocket Galley

The pilothouse seats in normal position:

Lower the seat backs and slide the seats forward:

Flip them up to reveal the galley. Standing at the sink, you have almost 9 feet of headroom above:

A new whistling teapot and some old plastic camping dishes. The sink has a folding spigot and pressure water. The stove is butane for safety:

Flip down the aft-facing cabinet door and prop it up as a dining table:

And it’s snack time (nom nom nom). Lots of storage under the sink and stove. Room for two, or a cozy three at the table, sitting on the edge of the bed:

Doors in the closed position. They need to be finished, obviously:

An interesting note – the hole in the center of the lower panel above is one that I drilled when making the bulkheads almost four years ago. The hole is at the intersection of centerline and designed waterline and every bulkhead had one. I lined up all the holes with a laser level to be sure the form was straight before adding the hull panels. Now I want to find someone who can carve a compass rose around it.

Here’s a picture from December 2007. I’m installing a bulkhead. The laser shone through all the holes from stern to stem, and made a tiny cross-shape on the stem piece: