The beginning of the end

It is with mixed feelings I announce the sale of the MV Partnership II, aka, the floatie as I like to call it.

It has been sold to a nice young father of two. I didn't expect it to really happen after all we've had plenty of hull kickers. It isn't so easy for people to buy a boat let alone a live aboard for banks don't like to touch 'em. (Yes, Ocean Escape, I do concur.)

I would have been happy to remain on the floatie but alas Greig and I have some unresolvable lifestyle issues that neither of us are willing to compromise on. I did just that for a long time and it wasn't working for me. One boat was always enough. Six, too much. I dunno...is it just me? Am I really that much of a buzz kill? Is it really incredibly selfish on my part to want to do something else other than put all my energy into derelict ships and a revolving door of roommates who, more time than not, have serious anti-social or substance abuse issues? Yes, and for every "bad apple" there were two or three that were stellar and whom we consider family to this day. Renovating the boats, working a full-time job and a part time job was about all there was room for. But I wasn't doing it for me and so it left me fairly unfulfilled. The renos on the floatie were the most fulfilling for me and validated what I knew already that I really could do lots of it myself. I just needed time to get to it and that was on the short end of the stick. Life is too short to be doing things you don't really wanna. And I wanna do many other things.

It seems that Waterlogged is coming to an end. Greig has asked that at some point I will go through and make a proper book of the whole adventure. But I have mixed feelings on that too for there have been some incredibly painful things that Greig and I have been through as a couple. Great examples mind you on what NOT to do in relationships and how to kill them. And others have been hurt too but we've all made our respective choices so nobody can play blame game or victim cards. Maybe I'll self publish something through Lulu. A year or so ago I went back to review some of the posts and of course, one story inspires three others that I never got around to writing. It also was painfully obvious how much editing is required too. Mistakes notwithstanding, this has been a wonderful way to journal the whole affair and it just so happened a few people dropped around to read it and I made a few extra friends along the way. Thankfully too, should that time come I 've lots of editor friends who'd probably be eager to point out all my errors, bad grammar and spelling mistakes.

I'm moving ashore in a too expensive rental suite in a house, with a yard, that actually will let me take Tobias. I can walk to work and park that durn car! When I find some balance and equilibrium back in my life I may start on the Hari Mai, unless of course it sells too. Truly, it's been my favorite boat of the whole bunch. Maybe I'll start a blog about that boat yet.

One of these days I'll finally shut down the Bowie site but I have to ask my web collegues on how to archive all that in a way that doesn't keep the url active, yet present as a reference point for the US-PCS class ships.

I had a dream about the Bowie last night. I am not one to ever remember my dreams, much as that frustrates me. In it and for some reason, we were down in front of Mitchell Island out on the river in front of it. I was on some boat. I looked over to the Bowie's stern and I thought it was looking too low in the waterline and clearly taking on water. Somebody better get that pump in the Laz going! Then it suddenly started sinking fast. My first thought was fear that somebody was on it and the only person not screaming was Dave L. cheering at its demise. It went down in the stern like an orca whale spyhopping and it rolled over and floated underneath us and drifted with the outgoing tide and river current. We poked at is uselessly with our pike poles. Then I woke up, with an incredible feeling of sadness. It was just a dream and is floating fine last I heard annoying Rolly still with its presence. Go Bowie Go!

Thanks all, it's been ducky.

Ghostly apparition

"Hey!" He hollered from upstairs. "Grab the camera and run over to the portside of the Express and get a load of that!"

I grabbed the camera and popped on to the Express and gazed out into the foggy morning mist to see this floating up the river on the incoming tide.

Clearly it had taken on water by the way it was listing and who knows how long it has been floating along. My money is that someone took advantage of a foggy dark morning and the incoming tide and set that adrift to get rid of it.

I didn't recognize it from any marina either down or up river from us and tried to zoom in close.

Greig, now dressed, decided to investigate in Wee Skiffy but alas, by the time he got even close all he could see was the roof... going under the log boom.


I think it was a much neglected Cruise-a-home.

Boats burn in Coal Harbour

Three boats were ablaze this morning downtown in Coal Harbour. This article on CBC's web site has more details.

Having been through a fire on the Express, they are so very scary. Thankfully we had fire pumps on the dock and got two hoses on it before the Richmond Fire Deparment arrived with their trucks, and Greig and company managed to have much of it out. Still, all that fibreglass would have made for a much more toxic affair than our old wood subchaser.

Thankfully, no one was hurt. I am always amazed at the insipid and inane comments often left by people on such posts.

More photos on CTV's site here:

Some TLC for a Grey Marine

Yipee! I am happy for we have found someone to weld cast and the Hari Mai's engine can finally be repaired. I know that Streak can go fast, fast. But given my druthers, I'll take the slow easy cruising of the the Hari Mai over zippy-go-go anytime. Plus, it is just a cooler boat all the way around.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Clearly...not enough action?

By the fact I have 11 comments regarding an electric fence indicates yer all bored, or apparently fascinated with electric fences. It wasn't even boat-y and I only wrote it to throw a bone into my dearth of postings.

Sigh...well here is some new "action" from our little hole in the river.

This place trumps the old one by the fact that in spite of all the log booms in our vicinity, we just don't have the logs attacking us like they did at Mitchell. Yea! Fighting with dead heads for two hours every night was just no fun at all. Still, we need wood to burn and there is lots of crap to clean up around here too that doesn't involve having to haul logs out to buck up and split and most of it can head straight for my woodstove. There are remains of older docks up on shore and so we are recycling lots of the wood there for planks on the docks that are, well, so rotten a small child or toby, my cat could fall through it. We've got a fair amount done and I got ambitious with the pressure washer and finally got to one of my list items from May. Yes, from May.

The upstairs railing around the floathouse is covered in rather unsightly cedar shakes. Yes, I would love to replace it with something different and gain a few more inches of walkway space up there. But I have to live with what I've got for now. So I attacked it with the pressure washer and did the front, starboard side and across the stern. Alas, the dock between me and Mt. Kleeman was removed to make room for the Malcite's arrival and so Mt. Kleeman is smack right beside me. There are some overturned docks about and when Greig finally feels ambitious enough to tackle turtling them to their upright position we can slide one of those puppies between the floatie and Mt. Kleeman. Then I'll arm up again and hit the shakes on the port side and give them a good scrubbing.

Gawd, was I ever filthy from that. A lovely brown woody sludge covered just about everything so I had to do a final rinse of every surface with just the garden hose. I am ever so thankful that this sunny weather holds and continues to cooperate.


I carried on with washing off some of the new dock planks too and when that is all "done" I guess we'll have to throw down some anti-slip device (probably chook wire) as it will all get terribly slippery as soon as it thinks to get a bit frosty around here.

And if this weather holds, maybe I'll get some painting and staining done!

Zappity-do-dah

I was back home in the interior visiting my folks and one recent add-on in Dad's garden is this spanky new electric fence. With so many deer about and in trying to keep bears away from the fruit tree he decided to make this wee investment.

He was having trouble and the whole thing seemed to be bedeviling him a bit as he didn't think any current was running through it. On my last afternoon there I had put in my request to take some of his bounty home with me. I had my dibs on beans, tomatoes, cukes, peaches and apples from the Gravenstein tree. (He's also got Northern Spy, Red and Golden Delicious, and Fuji's). The Grav's are my favorite though for eating even though they are a cooking apple mostly.

Mum and I tackled the beans, many of which were too big and woody and destined for the compost bin. I had filled a bucket and headed back out of his netted garden to go dump the first pail. The gate didn't open all the way, due to the slope of the ground and so I had put the metal bail of the bucket against the wire of the electric fence. We were in the garden and I thought he had turned off as he was frustrated that it wasn't working.

I eased myself around the gate and grabbed the bail on the bucket and discovered to my surprise that yes, the fence well and truly was working.

"Hey Dad!" I hollered up from the garden, "Are you still thinking you're fence isn't working?"

"Ya!"

"It is now! I just got bit!"

"Wonderful!" he hollered back.

Gee...thanks Pa! Glad to help.

Waterpod

Tugster posted a link to the Waterpod but I missed it until my friend and our old roommate Marcus sent me a link to this video on Facebook.

I have always thought that as land becomes more scarce and sea levels rise that we must find alternatives in our lifestyles and these folks should be applauded in their experiment here. Municipalities on water all over should be taking more proactive approaches rather than maintain a "head-in-the-sand-itis."