Splash!

Ladies and gentlemen! Behold! Sabine is in the water. She went in today, and she is not leaking. She happily sits at the dock, and it's likely that tomorrow we'll take her to her summer home, a mooring in Greenwich Cove, RI.

This is Sabine in the slings on the travel lift. This bit of machinery is the dream of every man, as it is controlled by a remote control. They lower the boat, which is held in place by the slings, into the water. Then when the boat is all the way in the water they pull the slings out and the boat is left floating. In the last 10 years I've seen the boats we've owned launched with a travel lift at least 10 times, and it never ceases to amaze me.


This little propeller moves the whole boat, that is when the sails aren't doing it.

This is the fix that the fabulous men of Brewer's Marina in Cowesett did. You can see the stern tube toward the top of the picture, in the center. Then they poured fiberglass resin over the tube to seal it in there. In a boat you have to be creative with your space. All this stuff, the stern tube, the black exhaust tube at the bottom of the picture and whatever else is in there that I cannot identify with words other than "thingy" all sits under the bed that Todd and I sleep on. Between the stern tube and the bed is a compartment that holds six batteries as well--these batteries are what makes cold beer in the fridge, lights at night, and running water when we want to brush our teeth.

The shiny substance in this picture is ocean. Ocean beneath the boat. Not in the boat, beneath the boat--this distinction didn't exist last summer.

Sabine at her temporary slip.

All we need to do now is finish cleaning the interior, flush the antifreeze out of the water system, change the oil in the engine, and move to our mooring.

Can I get a hell yeah?