At the end of the month, we plan to move aboard Tomahawk. We have so much left to do to get the boat ready and we continue to have obstacles thrown at us.
Recently, our Zodiac got stolen. The person cut the ring off of where it was patched to the boat, leaving our lock on the dock. Luckily, we had just purchased a new Walker Bay hard shell tender. The new tender has a wheel in the back (stern), but it isn’t enough to carry it all the way from where we have it in storage down to the water. It’s several city blocks of sidewalks and pedestrians and traffic.
But we don’t want to leave it at the public dock overnight after all our other negative experiences.
Once we move onto the boat, we will be keeping it with us except for a few hours during the day. With a lock, it should be fine (knock on wood).
We’ve also ordered a new outboard engine. It’s a 5hp Tohatsu with a five-year warranty. If we maintain it properly and run it regularly, it should give us lots of use and peace of mind. And it puts up the value of our boat for resale, especially if it’s still under warranty at the time. The Walker Bay would too, but we plan to keep that when we upgrade.
Speaking of upgrading, we have started looking at bigger sailboats in the 35-40′ range. Last week, we took a trip to Nanaimo to check out a C&C Landfall 38 and a Hunter 35. In the morning before we got on the ferry, we visited a Catalina 36, the big sister of Tomahawk. All were appealing, but requests for advice led us to understand that we need an offshore boat, even though we don’t plan to go offshore for a few years.
That eliminates the Catalina and the Hunter, which were both built for cruising in sheltered waters. People have crossed oceans in them, but people have done that in rowboats too. We would prefer something designed for that purpose.
So within the next few weeks, we have to get or build some sort of cart for the dinghy, haul out Tomahawk to clean and repaint, take the old motor off and install the new one, and clean the boat inside. We also have to sort through our stuff to see what we will get rid of, put on the boat, and put in storage.
So much to do, so little time! If we can’t do the haul out this month, we might have to beg a friend to let us sleep on their couch for a few days in July, so that we can get that all done.
