5-11-08

Mindy and I had a great time at this years WCTSS Cedar Key gathering!  We arrived three days before the event to meet the other early arrivals, and then we stayed a few more days afterwards to do a little cruising aboard our new boat ENIGMA, another Matt Layden design that made it's debut in the 2006 Ultimate Florida Challege.  Along with a few others, we were a little worried that the high fuel costs might deter many people from trailering their boats to the event, but our fears were unwarranted as there was a record number of watercraft at this years get together.  The weather turned out perfectly, and everyone had a super time.  Even our talk about micro-cruising seemed to be well received at the Saturday night cookout. The only problem I had was that my legs got sunburned while I was busy looking at all the wonderful boats and talking to all the fine folks. Next year I'm definitely going to wear long pants. More of our pictures from the event can be seen here.  You can also view many more photos from the 2008 gathering at the WCTSS photo page.


(Click to enlarge)

4-15-08

Good news!

We had such a great time last year at the WCTSS  boat gathering in Cedar Key last year that we will definitely be returning on May 3-4. For those of you who have never been before, this is an opportunity to meet other like-minded people and to enjoy the beautiful gulf.  Motel accomadations are probably pretty scarce at this late of date, but why not just sleep aboard your boat like we are doing.  In addition, we will be giving a little talk after the Saturday night cookout about our cruises to the Bahamas.  We think that this will be a great opportunity to answer questions for those of you who are contemplating a trip to the islands or just want to know more about cruising aboard small trailerable boats. See you there!

2-22-08

Over the years we've gotten quite a few inquiries regarding the micro folding dinghy. One of the frequently repeated questions was where to find #4 Duck cloth for the hinges.  Originally, we sourced our fabric locally from a tent/awning manufacturer, but they no longer carry this heavy weight material.  Luckily, a sailmaking friend of ours pointed us to an online supplier at FabricsandVinyl. The only problem is that you will need to get 3 yards of the material to make a continuous hinge, which is much more than is necessary for one dinghy. In fact, for $30 (including shipping) you will have enough cloth to make 9 boats!  Therefore, it may be more economical for a few people to buy the material together, and then to divide it so that they can make a few boats apiece.

1-01-08
Happy New Year! Well it was a busy Fall for us, and we did a bunch of work on Swamp Thing .  We finally got around to adding the bottom to the little boat and we completed most of the interior work. However, it became too cold to do any more glassing on the exterior so we'll have to wait until Spring to finally finish her up.  



As for Little Cruiser, we refinished the floor boards, made some new cushions and started work on our latest sail. Of course this time we built a proper loft floor in the greenhouse to facilitate the sail's construction.



9-13-07
Mindy and I just got back from a trip to New York where we attended her cousin's wedding. The affair was beautiful and everyone looked fantastic in their elegant clothes.  A few candid photos of us and her family can be seen here.  Afterwards,  we got to take a short "cruise" on the Staten Island Ferry into Manhattan. We visited South Street Seaport, which I hadn't been to in years, and we hopped aboard the subway to go shopping uptown. We ended our excursion of the "Big Apple" with a wonderful authentic chinese dinner on Canal Street.

 

9-5-07
Today we updated the Famous Small Boat page to include more information about Wayne Dickinson's God's Tear and Webb Chiles' Chidiock Tichborne I & II. More importantly, there are two new websites about these adventurers.  Webb Chiles even posted some of his books and other publications in pdf file form for free at his site.  To learn more about Wayne Dickinson and to see lots of nice pictures of his sailboat go here.

Lastly, we thought it might be a nice idea to actually trace the path of each of our voyages aboard Little Cruiser on maps produced using Google Earth. These are presented in our Trips Page.  Just click on "Route" to see them.

9-2-07
We hope everyone is having a nice Labor Day Weekend Holiday (in the U.S that is).  We got started on some more boat related projects the other day. To begin, pillow cases were made because the old ones were well.... passed it.  Obviously we couldn't just go out and buy some nice fresh ones from Walmart since the pillows along with all the cushions aboard Little Cruiser are custom sized to fit our tiny boat.  However, the new ones ended up costing nothing but our time because we had the fabric on hand. Mindy seemed especially pleased with the color, a dark deep purple.  I think when our fabric samples arrive in the next few days from Outdoor Wilderness Fabrics , she'll probably match the pillow cases to some purple fleece material from which we'll make a new mini blanket.

 

At the same time, I began work on making a backup solar controller.  Presently we use a Cirkits SCC3 20 Amp controller. This has worked well for the last few years; nonetheless, we thought that should it ever fail in the field, it would be simpler to replace it with an identical unit rather than experiment with something new.  The SCC3 was ordered online, and we received it after only a few days wait.  As might be expected from a quality kit, everything was there and I was able to begin soldering right away. One thing I noticed was that the design had changed slightly with the addition of two resistors and the removal of one diode; however, the printed circuit board was the same size, which meant that it would fit in the small wooden housing under the floorboards.  Assembly took a few hours, and the controller worked flawlessly when tested the next day with a 10 watt solar panel and an old SLA battery.  I have to say that the thing I like best about this unit is that you can control the float voltage by adjusting a small potentiometer.  This is especially important with SLA (GEL) batteries since they don't like to be constantly overcharged.  Ours is set to 13.8 volts by the way.  In addition, there is a single bi-colored LED that tells you everything that is going on. RED means that the solar panel is producting electricty and the battery is charging. When it starts flashing RED-GREEN, you are getting close to the float voltage. Solid GREEN means fully charged.  No light means no juice is coming from the solar panel.  Finally, there is a switch to equalize the cells, which basically means that it will over-ride your float voltage by +1.5 volts until it is turned off. This is done periodically to insure that all the cells are charged equally. 


Testing, new controller, and old one aboard Little Cruiser.

8-26-07

Not much has happened since our enjoyable cruise in May to Cedar Key.  Swamp Thing has remained untouched sadly and Mindy and I have been busy with work and various other projects.  However, now that summer is almost over, we are beginning to think about what to do for a nice winter cruise.  Therefore, the other day we pulled the protective tarp off Little Cruiser to check out her condition and to give her a nice wash down.  Afterwards, we slid the hatch open and climbed aboard to remove some forgotten items from our previous trip.  Of course we weren't terribly surprised to discover a half dozen cans of food still remaining deep in the bilge. This boat seems to just swallow stuff up!  Then there were the charts for the west coast of Florida, which we probably wouldn't be needing this winter.  In the overhead nets we noticed a few articles of clothing and some other odd and ends. Unfortunately a quick look at our LED battery meter showed us that our gel cell would not last another trip since it was no longer holding a charge despite being fed a steady supply of current from a remote solar panel. Thus, we made a mental note to buy a new one soon, and we removed the old battery.  By the the next day, the hull had fully dried,  and we examined the bottom of the boat along with the the rudder blade and the centerboard for damage.  We noted a few scrapes caused by hitting those darn oyster bars in Cedar Key, and we went ahead and filled the scars up with a thick putty made from epoxy mixed with milled glass and microballons.  Overall, though, the little boat didn't look too bad. We'll probably give the floorboards a fresh coat of varnish in the Fall, and we'll definitely need to make a new sail and a nice Sunbrella sail cover to protect our handy work from the strong tropical sun.  


5-12-07

Well, we're back from the annual West Coast Trailer Sailing Squadron (WCTSS) meet at  Cedar Key, and all I can say is WOW! I've never seen so many amazing small boats in one place, EVER! There were beautiful sailing canoes, both high-tech and traditional; small production and home-built trimarans; sleek and swift proas; nine sharpies including our own; beamy wood cat boats; a fleet of Sea Pearls; several plywood cruising catamarans; an EC 22 and a Core Sound 17; a Montegomery 17 towing a Bolger Cartopper; two Drascombe Coasters and a Drascombe Scaffie; a large traditional fishing dory; a ton of production and owner built-kayaks; a Kruger solo canoe; lots of dinghies and row boats; a Skiff America 20 and an incredible assortment of day sailers like the beautiful Melonseed. I'm sure I've left out many boats, but we simply were overwhelmed by the mob of sea craft that covered the beach entirely at Atsena Otie Key. We just couldn't take it all in! Moreover, we got to meet lots of the sailors we've been corresponding with over the years, and we had the privilege to speak with quite a few well-known people like Sven Yrvind, Meade Gougeon, Graham Byrnes and Hugh Horton. To top things off there was the incredible barbecue cookout Saturday night and the entertaining guest speakers (Sven, Graham and Noel Davis/Furledsails.com) afterwards.  If you want to see some really great pictures posted by the founder of the WCTSS, Ron Hoddinott, you can check them out here.  There are also some really nice shots of the event at Sealpearlboats . Lastly, I  asked Matt Layden in person for an official answer on whether he intends on making the 12' Enigma and Enigma 460 plans available, and the answer is "yes." However, it may be a while since he is quite busy with several other projects at the moment.

4-26-07

Well, it's official!  Mindy and I will be taking LITTLE CRUISER to Cedar Key for the West Coast Trailer Sailing Squadron annual get together on  May 5th and 6th.  This year's event is one not to be missed as both Matt Layden and Sven Yrvind/Lundin plan to attend.  We will be arriving a few days early to do some relaxing cruising, and then we'll get to meet all the other sailors on the weekend .  Since LITTLE CRUISER will not be carring her usual 3 months worth of stores, we'll have plenty of room to bring along our new micro-folding bike.   See you all there!

Now that the weather has gotten warmer in North Carolina, I've been heading out to our local lake at least once a week to get some fresh air and to be on the water.  During the hour it takes me to paddle the 4 miles in my kayak, I usually listen to the weekly Furledsails.com podcast on my Ipod Shuffle.  I've found this little mp3 player to be perfect for my needs since it is very small and relatively inexpensive.  Interestingly, both the ear phone and the player fit into 35mm film canisters which are quite waterproof.  I usually pack the two in my life vest pocket, where they stay dry until I'm ready to begin listening.    

3-09-07

 Matt Layden does it again-! He is first in his group (class 4 solo) at the 2007 Everglades Challenge. This year he used an 8' pram which really put the competition to shame! So how does he do it year after year? Well, he simply sails his boat to it's maximum potential hour by long hour and day after long day.  Eventhough he doesn't get much sleep during this 300 mile race, he still is always relaxed and comfortable in his easily driven micro-cruiser. Little energy is wasted keeping his diminuative craft moving, and he knows how to cheat the current and how to work every windshift to it's utmost advantage. Bravo Matt!