This is the beginning....

Dear Friends and Family,

It's official, as I write to you tonight from our new home the S/V Sanibel. We are moved out of the rental house and living aboard. Although we had planned to be anchored in Charlotte Harbor this weekend, we have decided to stay on the dock at All American for a few more days. We'll push off on Monday and anchor in Charlotte Harbor for a month. The boat is not quite as organized as we would like, but that's ok, because we still have time.The majority of the push and purging is over, however, just in the few hours we've been on Sanibel we are finding more things to be purged.

My girlfriend, Melody and her daughter, Summer came to visit us last weekend. They helped me pack things up to take to the Goodwill and took a load to Sanibel. We had a nice time. Our neighbor, Monica helped me take furniture to the goodwill and a load to the boat. Everyone's help was much needed and greatly appreciated.

Daniel bought a one way plane ticket for February 19th. He'll stay on Sanibel with us for a week for so and then drive Jimi's truck to Sidney, Nebraska where a new job opportunity awaits him.

Molly is on the boat and doing exceptionally well. She's getting comfortable, sleeping, eating and exploring on occasion.

Things we could miss - a larger living space, regular hot showers, and TV.

I'll try to write again next week with a quick update.

A couple of weeks ago we tested the engine, the autopilot, the windlass, and the genoa sail on the canals. Here is a short video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=55g_cnXsxVo

Love everybody,

Lorie & Jimi

From defense to offense

Out goes some of our gun arsenal. In comes these two trolling reels. With the spear guns we already own, the fish are going to feel our presence. At least once we figure out how to use this stuff.

It was a difficult decision to get rid of most of our gun collection, but much of the world already sees Americans as a bunch of cowboys still in the wild west and the last thing I want to do is show up in Panama in a boat with half-a-dozen  guns and be labeled a gun smuggler.

We float

Dear Friends and Family,

Christmas was wonderful especially since Jimi gave me (my very own) digital SRL camera. Yes, that was great, but the better part was just being able to spend time with my family. We soaked up every moment of the five and a half days. While in Nebraska, the weather didn’t get above 15 degrees. Can you believe it? It was sooo cold. After the extremely sad trip home we arrived in Florida to wonderful eighty degree weather. Love it!

We gave our notice to the rental company that we will move out on January 31, 2013. This makes our move official and there’s no turning back now. We have to be ready or at least moved out and with no other place to go, we WILL be living aboard.  I’ve lost count of how many goals we have now accomplished – but I know it’s a lot and here’s another one down.

Work commences: I made a nice Sunbrella cover for our grill to protect it from the elements and I completed the cockpit pillows (finally)
.

On January 2nd, Sanibel was launched. It was an exciting day. Here is a link to the video. (turn your sound on). The video is only five minutes long, but the launch took an hour; And added to that we hung in the slings

for almost an hour while Jimi painted the areas he couldn’t paint while on the blocks. So total time waiting and watching was about two hours. Our anticipation rose.

I tore the house apart going through anything I could (stuff we weren’t using) and staged a ‘get rid of pile’ and then I began moving anything I could aboard. For example: all the clothes I’m taking with me are aboard, all our towels except one each, and some miscellaneous bathroom supplies, etc.

We took 25 gallons of fresh water the boat everyday to fill up our 140 gallon fresh water tank. We’ll clean the tank with a mixture of bleach, drain it and then refill it with the fresh water we’ll use.

I fought a sore throat for one week from the day we got home until it finally hit me and I had the flu. I was laid up on the couch for three days while Jimi continued work as usual without me. It has now passed though I still have a dry scratching throat and a teeny cough that comes on suddenly out of nowhere. Ricola really seems to help.

Our friends from Colorado, Brad and Ellen had an overnight layover in Miami on Friday the 11th, so we went down to spend the evening and night with them. It’s always so enjoyable to see friends knowing we’re so far away from everyone. We had a great time. They are going South to the Islands for Ellen’s birthday. Happy Birthday Ellen!

Jimi is trying to hook up our self steering wind vain. This is something that couldn’t be mounted until we were in the water because we didn’t know where our water line was. He’s now waiting on a couple of pieces of aluminum to complete the project.

Jimi finally hooked up the stern light and the anchor light. He has tested the water systems; the fresh water pumps and the salt water pump work just fine. We had a slight issue with the routing of the vent hoses for the toilets, but he has gotten that worked out and all is fine now.

We took Molly to the boat – YAY – she did very very well. She explored the inside for about twenty minutes and then walked around the parameter of the deck peeking over the side to the water on occasion. After her 360 tour, she recognized the companionway to the inside and tried to go in. This is a good sign. It shows that she sees that as a safe and preferable place to be.

Jimi has ran and tested the engine in place a few times while tied to the dock. It starts right up, runs well, and changes gears without problem. At this point he is very pleased with the engine. He has plans to take the boat off the dock and motor it up and down the canals to get a real feel for it and let it stretch it’s legs (haha).

Jimi uses his spare time to list items for sale on craigslist and Ebay.
Be sure to watch the launching video and here are some pictures of the inside.

Love everybody,
Lorie & Jimi