Teak Madness

There comes a time in nearly every boat owners life that they must confront. What should we do with the teak? You can ask 100 sailors what they would do, and get 100 different answers. Answers range from emphatically saying “NO TEAK!” to “You have to lovingly touch up the varnish weekly, its a…

Weekend at Anchor

Are we dragging? I think we’re dragging. Crap, we’re dragging! The wind was blowing 40+ knots, other boats in the area had started heading home, and we had just started dragging our anchor. This was after we had already settled in for the afternoon and had popped our first bottle of Champagne. After weeks…

Small Successes

There are times that it seems like we are stuck in a loop (cue Westworld theme). During these times I have found that if you look for the small things you might find that life is better than it feels. This week was a good example of that. While it may seem like we…

Pier People

Living in a marina is an interesting experience to say the least. I’m not sure I can even come up with a good analogy becasue it is so different. My first though was trailer park, but while some of the odd stereotypes are true, its just not right. Maybe suburbs, but that’s not good…

Firefly Redeemed

A few months ago we started having some battery issues. Specifically, we no longer had anywhere near the capacity we should have. Our battery bank is rated at 465Ah, but we were only getting about 50. We’ve been working with Firefly directly as well as through their distributors and I’m happy to say that…

Closing Distance, Constant Bearing

Sailboat racing is an interesting sport. Things move really slowly, until they don’t. A few weeks ago, Shannon and I went out on Nemesis, a race boat that we often race on, for some spinnaker practice. This was in preparation for the Bay Cup I race, an annual two part race out in Galveston…

Lets go fly a Kite!

Of the many sails we have for Nymeria, one is a spinnaker. Its a very pretty, usually brightly colored giant downwind sail. We have never flown it. Honestly we are probably just scared, but also we have no experience with it. Its not a simple sail to fly like many of the other sails…