Returning to the Blog!

Since 2013 we have been on "hold" status for our departure from Kemah, TX. First, Paul has had numerous health problems, ranging from cancer, to hernia to shingles.

Then it was my turn. My annual exam turned into a major ordeal. Many tests later, it turns out I'm good to go, except for using a CPAP machine. And that says CPAP, not CRAP...but that's how I felt after I learned I needed to use one).After 2 sleep tests, it was determined that I get much more rest and fewer apneic episodes by using the machine. I have terrible sleep apnea (which I knew) and it has been the cause of my tiredness and low energy for the past several years (which I didn't know). This machine controls a certain amount of pressured air that flows through your nose constantly all night, going down the airway to prevent your tongue and breathing mechanism from collapsing onto the back of the throat, thereby allowing air to continue on to the lungs. Apparently, my throat was being blocked at night, and, because my lungs weren't getting air, my heart would do crazy things...such as; beating too fast (aka: arrhythmia), and I would wake up completely out of breath and feeling like I was dying. This has happened to me for years and it's always been scary. My doc informed me that it's actually hard on the heart to continually be out of breath. Good to know. Therefore, I'm am being religious in using my new CPAP machine. Gotta' keep the ticker going, at least for another 20 years would be good!

Here's the catch! Medicare won't pay for it unless I go in for a final evaluation in one month's time to see if the CPAP machine is helping. I got the machine on the 21st of October. We were planning on leaving October 25th (today!). Now it means we have to wait until November 21st before we leave so I can go in for the appt. Oh well, maybe the weather will be more gentle in November! At least, one can hope!!

So, here we still are...since 2012, sitting in Waterford Harbor Marina. Can't say it hasn't been good, though. We've really enjoyed our time living here. Have enjoyed our live aboard friends and we're in a lovely marina. It's all good!

A week ago we returned from a "farewell to relatives" road trip up to Midland, TX to visit and stay with my older brother, Steve, and my sis-in-law, Karen. It was great spending quality time, if not quantity. We drove up to Lubbock, TX to see my mom and younger brother, Phil, who both seemed to be doing pretty well. My brother had lost about 70 lbs of weight...hardly recognized him! Mom was talking more than normal, too! We all needed that time together. I can't even begin to say in words how important and special it was seeing my mom and brothers/sis-in-law again. They are, each of them, strong influences in my life and I love them all dearly.

Our next jaunt on the road was from Midland, TX all the way over to Baton Rouge, LA, to see our son, daughter-in-law, and grandkids. We arrived Sunday p.m. and left Tuesday a.m. Chris, our son, was in California on a job, but our daughter-in-law, Michelle, and grandkids were there to greet us. Michelle had made her homemade Gumbo for dinner, which was warming and delicious. She had also invited a couple who owns several boats over the following evening for dinner. Of course, we all talked "boats" and "boat experiences". Fun! Micelle had some books for us, which was great! We both read a ton, so appreciate any new titles and series.

Grandchildren! Once again, the illusive nature of time played tricks on our minds. It was hard to grasp how big our g-kids had become and how fast they had arrived there!! Now both teenagers, Brandon is driving, and Ashley, the younger of the two, is learning. Yesterday they were but wee little ones, crawling all over me. I miss that, yet, there is still sweetness in them at this age as well. It's a little more reserved, but the love is still there. So good to be with all three of them again. We're so fortunate to have these wonderful people in our life.

On the way home from Baton Rouge, we stopped at the Bayou Rum Brewery and took the tour, enjoying it and the 4 shots at the end. Bought us a couple of bottles of the Spiced Rum for our Sundowners on the boat and were on our merry way home to Kemah!

Now we're back on the boat, and rocking wildly due to the remnant winds of Hurricane Patricia, which are blowing strongly! Lots of rain along with it, and flooding as well. (Good thing we didn't leave today, huh?) Paul and I are spending this time buying our needed supplies for the boat on the inet. Just bought our Freya Guide book to Mexico, Belize, and the Rio Dulce area in Guatemala. I also found a good book called "Spanish for Cruisers" which may be a handy tool at some point. Paul ordered us a new drinking water faucet to go with our water filtration system and we'll be picking up some new boat batteries next week. We bought a used SSB receiver so we can listen to Chris Parker's weather reports, and Paul will be installing a new macerator pump. We're hoping these will be all the fixes that we'll need for sometime. Then it's a matter of stocking the boat with food, and away we'll go! (Knock on wood!! Break a leg!! God Willing!!)

I'll be updating the site as we get nearer to our departure date.

Until then, 

Mackerel scales and mares tails make tall ships to lower sails. 
(I like this saying, and I saw these skies recently...a good rhyme to remember!)

  

Harvest Moon Regatta: Our first

This post is a bit after the fact, but we've been busy…not only with doing things on our boat, but also house and dog sitting for friends. So here is the news about our sail in October!

We were fortunate to be able to take part in the Harvest Moon Regatta for our first time this past October. Our friends, Rick and Peggy, entered the HMR not only to race, but to also do a shakedown cruise before taking off on their longer cruise to the Bahamas this coming November. They told us their daughter and her fiancee were going to sail down with them as their crew on their boat, S/V Vision Quest, but they were going to return to their jobs in Dallas at the end of the first leg. They asked if we could drive their daughter's car from our Marina down to Port Aransas so the kids could head out on October 20th, and we were invited to take their place on the return trip. We agreed with that and took the car down on Oct. 19th…Saturday.

October nights

Last night while Paul was grilling our hamburgers, we experienced viewing one of the most vivid sunsets we had seen in a while. The reds/oranges/pinks were so intense,  I wanted to reach out and touch it. Have you ever seen a sunset that you could almost taste? That's how this was. Here are some pics:

Out of Sight!!!

Far out! Groovy!!! Too Much!!!!

There are just not enough 60's  exclamations for this sight. Paul and I came up out of our boat the other day (this is called "meercatting") and saw the most amazing thing. We both just started howling with laughter! Wait until you see this!

First overnight cruise with TMCA

Hi all,

The first time we attended the Texas Mariner's Cruising Association was several months ago with our friends and neighbors Barry and Barbara. They invited us and introduced us to the whole group, which included probably around 60 to 70 people. We had a good time and told them we'd think about whether we would join. 


We attended our second meeting several weekends ago, and we decided to join the group that evening. So we paid our dues, had a great time at the meeting, ate lots of food, visited with friends Walter and Jeannette and Barb and Barry and others, listened to a guest speaker, and enjoyed embibing in a few drinks. 

The very next day was our first "designation-oriented cruise". We sailed from Kemah to Baytown, which is only about a 2-3 hour cruise. But it was important for us to get the feel of going to a new place, dock in a new slip, and deal with the Galveston Ship Channel traffic: BIG Ships!!! Don't get in THEIR way!!! We learned how to navigate across the ship channel while attempting to judge how far away the big tankers were before we headed across. Some tankers were moving so fast, we had to wait until they went by us. After they passed,  we pulled out behind them and went across the channel. Easy, but just picking up all the tips we need for being in different places with ship channels. They can be a bit intimidating. We also had to  figure out how to get to our destination with the wind coming straight at us the entire time. For us, it was a 4 hour trip. We had quite a bit of tacking to do to catch the wind in our sails. It was an eye-opener to realize how long it took for us because of the tacking, and it brought with it the awareness that we don't have much control over time while on the water...it's all up to Mother Nature and her wind. We thought we'd probably be late arriving at the marina, since we made it there by abour 4 pm. It was fine, though...people were continuing to arrive till after 7 pm. Here's a shot of the marina...

Bayland Marina

Here are some of the boats that were there:

From left, "Mele Kai" and "Sofira"

This is Clare and Bob's 49' sailing vessel, "Sofira"

Walter and Jeannette's Power yacht "Mele Kai"

There were about 10-12 boats in the group, some sailboats, and some power boats. We met interesting folks and enjoyed our time visiting on the docks before dinner started. The theme of this particular cruise was "Celebrate National Catfish Day: Catfish Fry"...and guess what! They fried catfish! Much to my husband's dismay. Yes, that's right, he doesn't like fish!? It was fine though, as he made himself a ham and cheese sandwich, and all was well with the world. The catfish was very good, (I eat fish), and all the many side dishes people brought were delicious. (Even picked up a few recipes to add to my "easy onboard recipes" file from Pinterest. Thanks, Jeannette!)

After dinner, the commodore brought out an  ice cream maker and after waiting "patiently" (NOT) for several hours, we had homemade ice cream with peach crumble. So tasty and refreshing! Then we all hunkered down in our chairs on the dock facing due north and watched "Captain Ron" on someone's sail  under the stars. Loved it! A fun time was had by all!

Next morning, people gradually arose to the lovely sunrise, and drank coffee as we all went from boat to boat, greeting folks and looking at their boats.  Clare and Bob invited us and Walter and Jeannette, aboard their beautiful 49' boat, named "Sofira".  It was so roomy. Even has a small workshop in the aft part of the boat, which the guys drooled over. Here's a picture of Walter and Jeannette visiting with Clare...that's when Clare invited us aboard.

Jeannette, Walter, (whose boat is on the left) and on the right boat is Clare

From left: Walter, Jeannette, and Paul

 From left: Clare and Walter

me sitting at their table

From left, me and Clare

From left, Walter, Bob (Clare's husband) and Paul

Everyone was called for breakfast at that point, so we all met on the docks once again for crockpot cooked eggs mixed in hash browns with cheese. We couldn't get enough of that dish. Very good breakfast for a group of people. There were plenty of leftovers from the night before as well; bagels, toast, pie, rolls, and of course, with all that, the ubiquitous coffee! 

Breakfast is served!

Breakfast on the docks

After resting, visiting, and letting the food digest 
we each took our leave and headed back to Kemah. Paul and I arrived there after 2 1/2 hours of sailing (still lots of tacking involved due to the wind behind us...a bit nervous about possibly jibing), and on the way Walter and Jeannette passed us in their gorgeous "Mele Kai", and took pictures of Paul and me in "Sea Casa" under sail. He sent us the pictures today to Paul's email, but Paul is outside helping our neighbor. We're looking forward to checking them out. They may possibly be "the" picture for our "boat information cards". We  appreciate when people give us their cards, because I tuck them away in my business card holder for future reference. We both decided we needed to have our own cards to hand out, so I've peeked on Vista Print to see which design we want to use.  We're waiting to see if the pictures that Walter and Jeannette took will be an inspiration for our cards!! Thanks again for doing this...very thoughtful and we really appreciate it!

Here's one picture that Walter took of us under sail:

As new members of the TMCA, we are definitely looking forward to many more cruises, while practicing our boating skills and meeting new cruisers. This was a fun first trip for us. Thanks to everyone for your courtesy and warm welcome. 

The ultimate necessity...SHADE!

 We were so fortunate to have a lovely, long spring here in Houston this year. Usually by April 1st, it's in the 90's. However, this year, the hot weather didn't start until June, so it was just amazing having 2 extra months of nice, spring-like weather. Actually, February and March were in the 60's and 70's, too. So we had 4 months of beautiful weather! However, June brought some warm weather, and now summer is most definitely here in Galveston!!! The temps have been in the low to high 90's but with the humidity (which is always high in all of Greater Houston area) they say it "feels like 100 or 105". In June, we started in earnest to design a shade canopy to go over the boat. Paul did the drawings, being the mechanical engineer designer, and we discussed how we wanted it to be over the boat. Did we want it low, which meant we wouldn't be able to walk upright on the boat, or did we want it high to take advantage of all the outdoor space on the boat?

Our New Boat Name

Hi everyone,

Well, after two months of not posting on our blog, (more now, since this post was originally sent out July 1st, and it wouldn't save onto our blog site for some reason...hopefully this doesn't happen again) it's time to update with some pics of our boat proudly bearing her new name. She is now our "Sea Casa". Our Sea Home. Mi Casa es Sea Casa!!!