Well good news is we made it back from Mackinac !!!

Bad news is we ended up with a DNF in the race…   but before that, we had some good news!

A slow start had us in 18th place of 18 boats..  Only getting the boat a week prior to the race had the crew very green..  Also the only front sail (jib) that we had to use was from the previous boat, and just 3.5 feet short!!!!  ok.. enough excuses.. we had a slow start!

In the first 12 hours we were able to pick off more than half the boats..  up to 8th place!  Not bad eh!   Front runners were in sight, this is certainly a Fast Fast Boat!

At about 2am….Timbo was off shift trying to get some sleep down below… the boat was cruising over 8 knots all night…

When all of a sudden….

We were quickly awoke to the boat being dragged sideways through the water,  and soon after the sound of the spinnaker exploding..   hummm.. guess thats the alarm clock… All Hands on Deck..

It was a gruesome sight arriving on deck…  sail material everywhere..   lines in the water..  Crew were fairly quiet, knowing exactly what must be done…  get the sail back onboard before it get tangled up with the underside of the boat..

Knives at work, the shredded sail was shredded some more and brought back onboard..   No one hurt, Jib sail deployed and we continued on.

Morning brought some bad news, the halyards for the remaining sails were compromised and it was unsafe to continue on without going up the mast for a good look sea.

The decision was to turn around  :(

Well, that didn’t stop many of the crew from making it to Mackinac..

Planes were deployed, as were ground crew vehicles and the end of race Party continued as scheduled…

Wasn’t the finish we wanted, but for only getting the boat a week before the race, we proved she has lots of potential with more prep work.

Getting excited for a sailing trip to the North Channel in a couple weeks…    It’s supposed to be better cruising than the caribbean!

Have a Great Day!

Timbo

Well the year on the water is starting to pay off..  for Allie anyway…

After putting in a full shift at a local Car detailing shop.. she returned home to help out on the race boat (2 days to go!)

Standing up on the bow I asked her to tie a bowline knot on the cleat for our safety harness lines (jack lines)..

Just as she started to move up to the bow, a group of guys showed up..  They were out for dinner, returning to their 70′ mega powerboat..

They overheard our conversation and in a happy mood they suggested one of their crew could do it better than Allie, as they had just taught him that knot this morning.

Smiling, I agreed this would be a good test of his skills….  Leading him onto the boat and up to the bow, the contest was about to begin…

Now there’s no reason to just test each other’s skills without a little wager..  Im pretty sure the crew was well off.. Their smallest bill was $100 bucker…    So bets were laid…

Soon enough we discovered their crackerjack star had forgotten the knot,  and  Allie had the jack lines secure..  This wasn’t quite good enough.. ..  The knot was undone, and retied with her hands behind her back..

So.. up $120.00, next job was sunglasses recovery…

Scuba gear snapped on..  a quick dive surfaced with the lost glasses… and another mitt of cash in her hands..

Revenue Canada will be looking for the tax on that one Allie!

Our Racing guest from St. Thomas USVI showed up today.. Brian…

He’s used to driving on the left hand side, so we figured he would be a natural to drive the Automax right hander Honda truck..   oops..

He doesn’t fit too well, does he?   Seats all the way back!! ha

Race boat is RaceReady as is the Crew…  wish us luck!

Sea ya in Mackinac… and oh ya..  Have a Great Day…

TiMbo

Well it’s that time of year again…  Racing across lake Huron in the 2014 Bell’s Beer Mackinac Race.. It runs from the base of Lake Huron..  across her (200 miles) to a small island called Mackinac.  

We have a new race boat this year… called White River
For you racing people, It’s a 41’ CnC with a few new tricks on her..   Hydraulic boom vang, and back stay..   
We don’t expect to place too well, as the boat only arrived last week and we don’t have proper racing sails yet..  but should be a lot of fun…
There will be 9 crew, including all from last year and a special guest from the Islands..

The crew has been working very hard to get ready for the race..  Installing tons of electronics, safety gear, lighting, etc..  
We’ve only had one training session out in the lake, but we were able to fly the spinnaker through multiple gybes without losing anyone overboard

You can watch our progress live on the website… its an app called yellow brick
Here’s a link

http://www.bycmack.com/main_tracking.cfm

The race starts Saturday Morning… The link will become active Friday afternoon.

Have a great Day!

Timbo

Big Trip this weekend… almost 10 miles or so!!! ha!
Anchored out in our old stompin grounds of Brights Grove… on Lake Huron
Had a lot of fun running into many folks we haven’t seen in a year or so
Many people came up and said “Is this Kozyboat?” so that was pretty fun!
Beautiful anchorage with calm south winds… and of course the price was spectacular at “FREE”
Great times with Great friends… will certainly do this again soon!

Have a Great day!
Timbo

Island Dancer is HOME….  to Bridgeview marina

Island Dancer ntered the Welland canal at 10am Friday…. there are horror stories of it taking 17 hours… then others in just 4 or 5…
Calling Welland Canal control on channel 14, they advised me to stop at a marina and call them on a land line..
I radio’d back a few minutes later to clarify which marina… and then they started asking the key questions… have you paid.. do you have 3 adults on board.. etc etc..
So in the end we didn’t have to stop and were put right into the system,… awesome!
The locks were fairly simple.. Raise about 45 feet in each one (8).. the first 3 were no issue… Then came Number 4…
With only one other boat going through, the first few locks we had good separation… The lock is 1000′ long and were 54′… spacing them out is a good idea.. isn’t it?
Pull up.. pull up… says the operator to Timbo…OK.. now we are 10 feet from the cruise ship… nice…

Then the fun started….Wholly crap…
The lock operator must have thought we were a 1000′ laker… It would have rose no quicker if they just opened the gate…

I had to run the engines at high RPM just to keep the cleats from pulling out of the deck.. we were on a RIDE!!!
Getting to the top I had a word with one of the operators… Is there a way to fill a little slower next time ??
Of course the answer was certainly not… thats a slow as we can go…

Entering the next lock we had a Girl operator.. Now Island Dancer was placed 900′ behind the other boat… and it filled about a slow as nice bubble bath…
What a change! I was sure to give her our appriciation when we hit the top!

At 5pm we found ourselves cruising out into Lake Erie!! Time for AutoVanHelm to take the wheel… He loves to steer through big open lakes!

The wind went to ZERO.. the lake was Glass… motoring along over 8 knots all night and all day Saturday…
That was until a new noise arose…. Timbo was just jumping into the shower… what the hell is THAT??
Running up to the deck Robin already had the starboard engine slowed down.. its running fine.. but the noise is different.. kind of like we just got a new loud muffler installed..??
Nothing obvious in the engine room… fired it back up.. sounds great.. rev it up… no something is different.. it’s louder…
Looking in the water it became obvious… as we slowed down.. a long 200′ nylon rope floated to the surface… Ahhhh Ha…! That would do it!
Appears we ran over some debris.. its not a net.. just a very long line..
Tried the motor in reverse.. but it just started winding the rope up.. forward same story..

ALLIE!!! Time to go DOWNSTAIRS!!!!

Being in the open lake.. and likely a very chilli open lake.. Timbo suited up also….. Nice have scuba tanks on board.. its a long way down to the props.. For Timbo anyway…
I put one toe in first.. hummmmm… The water actually wasn’t that bad…
Allie suited me up in all the scuba gear.. pushed me off the deck with a splash.. then threw her gear in the water.. She put her’s on after jumping in just to show off…
Taking a peak under the waterline there was no surprise to see the line was wrapped many times around the prop.. And a secondary line wrapped around the rudder!

Our starboard engine was fine.. so we could continue on.. but at a much slower pace.. and going up the St. Clair river would be a crawl! Lets fix this now!

Thanks to Ray setting me up with a fine collection of very sharp knives.. we had the line off, back on the boat and underway less than 30 minutes from the first noise ..…

If we don’t run anything else over, or run aground too hard.. we should make Sarnia Sunday morning, or early afternoon… Its going to take more than a rope to stop us now.. ha!

Have a GREAT DAY!!!
Timbo!!!

Quick Post on Facebook and next thing you know, buddies are showing up at the marina (With BEER!)
Whats the chances Gord and Sandy were ‘in town’ for the day when normally out west…??
Great fun with Chris, Michelle, Steph and of course John and Vanessa feeding us all day…
We don’t have any Canadian money yet… and haven’t seen any in a year.. is it still colourful??

Well time to drop the dock lines and head up niagara falls… going to need a good run at her eh!

Next stop… SARNIA (I hope!!!)

Have a Great Day!
Timbo

You won’t believe this but we Found Canada!

Talking to customs we had to think just how long we were gone… 300 days!

Why didn’t someone tell me it was still cold here????

And found my old Sailboat FatFish!! It was locked… but Johnny forgot to take the key out…
Overnight sail was smooth to St. Catharines… We came in way too early and had to drop the hook for an hour or two before entering the harbour..
Time to find a TIM HORTONS!!! and a Canadian Tire!

Have a Great Day!!!
TIMBO

Bernie walked up with a coffee this morning looking at the rig on Island Dancer..
He smiled and said… WOW
Bernie is the head of stepping masts (installing)
I somehow found a smile, wondering what I was getting myself into…
This boat is SMALL in the caribbean… whats the big deal.. lets go!

Bernie: “There’s no way my rig can lift that mast…”
Timbo: “Really.. so Bernie… what are we using then? ” –  There was NO way the mast going to be horizontal on the deck after today…. I love putting confidence back into the experts… he’ll figure out a way!