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.
Mindy working on the next "Trip List"
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!


Mindy riding, and the bike stored in the stern.