Annie's 2021 Summer Cruises

I woke up at 6:00 and thought about getting up in order to get am early start. But I was unable to convince my body that this was an good idea until about 7:00. The morning was beautiful. I drank coffee, updated the blog and mopped the bugs off the deck. At 8:00 I shoved Annie off for Geneva. Kerry offered to get up and help but the departure was really easy so I encouraged her to stay in bed, which she did until 10:45.  The trip to Geneva was 37.9 miles. It took 4 hours and 25 minutes, averaging 8.6 knots. Flat seas made for a very nice trip. It was hot though so I had a fan blowing on me all the way, unusual for me. I passed the time reading, speaking to friends, sitting outside and listening to the radio. Very pleasant cruising. Kerry made tuna fish sandwiches for lunch. Because we left from Forest City YC I cruised much closer to shore than when I leave from Vermilion. I saw places I was not aware of, like the Northeast Yacht Club, an anchorage area at White City Beach and the ...

We left the air conditioner on last night so I had a pretty good sleep in the cool air. At 6:00 I was wide awake so I went into the club to update the name and picture of one of our board trustees. I had done it before but misspelled his name so I had to open up the frame and change the picture and name tag. Jimbo came in at 7:00 and we started our coffee session. He was meeting a wifi tech at VYC. Our plan was for coffee at 8:30 but we were there much earlier so stayed and visited. Later Kerry and I showered and did all the things necessary to get us and Annie ready for a cruise. We pulled out about 10:30. Rick Simpson gave us a tour of his beautiful new Back Cove 42' before we left. Wow - what a gorgeous boat! As we were leaving, one of our members was diving for an expensive bottle of bourbon ($110) that jumped overboard. He survived the dive but, sadly, the bourbon was not found.  The trip to Forest City was perfect. The seas were like glass so the trip was very smooth. We cove...

We got to bring the grandkids to VYC for an overnight on the boat this weekend. It was a work weekend for Anne and also Nate's frat weekend so some serious babysitting was needed for Saturday. Anne brought them up Friday and picked them up Saturday night. We needed to be here because of a VYC Trustee meeting and also a Taste of Vermilion Party we had signed up to attend. We got happy meals for the kids dinner on Saturday.  We all had a great weekend.  Friday was rainy and stormy so Anne arrived later in the day and we got to introduce her and the kids to the dining pleasure of Rudy's, our favorite Vermilion restaurant. On Saturday we had special order donuts for the kids bought by club manager Gary, grilled hot dogs and hamburgers for lunch, a boat ride, some beach time and the nice dinner. It was fun for all. Kerry and I were pretty pooped at the end of Saturday just trying to keep up with and control of Aubrey, Andrew and Grayson.  The kids behaved well, for the most pa...

I could hear the waves slating against the hull when I woke up, indicating that the breeze had picked up. The boat was pointing North when I got up to check. All this confirmed my suspicion that we would have a rolling trip home, and that we should be leaving sooner rather than later.. I decided to have a couple cups of coffee and post the blog update. The generator ran fine with no water intake issues. Then I planned to pack up the kayak, cook the two leftover hamburgers for lunch on the way home, get Kerry up and split. All was going to plan until Jimbo called while I was packing up the kayak. He said he figured I would be staying another day. I asked why. He said because of the 7' waves on the lake. What? Not yet he said, but forecast for the afternoon.  Well, his call gave me a greater sense of urgency. I skipped the hamburgers and went directly to getting Kerry up. She popped out of bed really fast when I told her why. In a short time she had the boat packed to travel - plants...

Last night ended like today began  - with me trying to get seaweed out of the generator water intake line. I noticed that the water coming out of the generator was less than normal as I charged the batteries last evening. I took the strainer apart and cleaned out a bunch of weeds. Initially the flow of water was OK, but quickly clogged again. So, I took the strainer apart again. It was clean which meant the water intake line was clogged. I went to bed. So early today I attacked the problem again, without success. I tried to get various wires through the hoses and fittings but could not get the water to flow normally, although I did get some seaweed out. Finally I ran the main engine to put some amps back into the batteries. At 7:30 it was time to fish with Kevin. He picked me up  in his dingy which has an electric motor and lithium battery. That seems to work well but the prop kept getting covered with - you guessed it - seaweed. Fishing was pretty unsuccessful. It was windy a...

The thunderstorms finally did arrive last night. We heard distant boomers about 2:30. I looked at the radar and saw they were way out in the lake and no danger to us, so back to bed. At 4:30 we again heard distant boomers, but they got no closer so I stayed in bed. It was totally quiet with no wind or waves. Then about 5:00 we heard the wind pick up and felt the boat swing. We saw lightening too, so we knew it was our turn. Normally I just stay in bed for storms. However since we were not sure how well our anchor was dug in, I got up to watch and make sure we did not drag when the wind blew hard. We didn't. As far as thunderstorms go, I would rate it as a C- (no complaints here, though). It just had medium winds and rain and almost no thunder. i did use two tools to help assure me that Annie was not moving. First, I had our searchlight ready to go. I could shine it on the shore and visually determine that we were getting no closer. The second was a GPS tracking device in my phone n...

We came to Vermilion yesterday to spend the weekend at anchor. The weather appears to be favorable for the weekend with the only risk being a random thunderstorm or shower. We came up on Friday to go to lunch with the Karpinskis and Gravinos. We went to the Treasure Box 2 restaurant in Freemont, Ohio. It is quite an eclectic place. They have fabulous fried perch and a pound is only $21. A pound is a lot of fish! It was our first trip there, and we loved it. Kerry raved about how good it was, which is unusual for her with perch. Julian is getting ready for a big operation to remove part of his colon next week so we were happy to see he and Lynn and be able to wish them well. Today started with coffee in the club house with Jimbo at 8:00. I had an apple fritter from the ASPS PIB rendezvous last week that we shared. Jimbo was in heaven. Afterwards I helped Jim route the edges of 4 big poles that will be used to mount new wifi antennas down the docks. Wifi at the docks is really poor and w...