Mike and I were talking over a late breakfast this morning. I was explaining that I had gone to sleep last night considering how many thru hulls we could get away with filling in and fiberglassing over, planning in my mind the best approach to take on that project and wondering if I could handle some of that work myself since Mike is back to doing a full time job. The other part of my brain was consumed with choosing fabric for the salon, perseverating, as I am wont to do, over colors, patterns, textures and fiber contents. It’s the kind of decision I like to luxuriate over for weeks. While I ruminated about that, Mike began talking about replacing the steering pedestal and rebuilding the entire steering mechanism because it’s old and needs attention. This project would involve replacing the steering pedestal with something beefier that would allow the steering pump to be up close and personal in the cockpit so it could receive regular love and attention more easily. My contribution to that plan was that if we were going as far as replacing the pedestal, I would like a folding steering wheel, please. He agreed. Our voices droned on over eggs and sausage and suddenly I realized I was feeling better than I had in weeks. Yeah, I was HAPPY to be talking about boat projects, even though I regularly recognize that talking and doing are two different things, indeed. It felt really good to both of us to be back in the planning phase of big projects for Galapagos.

That’s right, this is a photo of our deck, which is not green. In the Pacific Northwest Winter, to have a green deck is normal due to the amount of rain. How do we keep our deck so clean when we are not power washing her weekly? The answer is in one of the photos below.

I’m not going to lie: coming back home has been very hard. Yes, we needed a break, and yes, we needed money and to be with our kids through the pandemic. Galapagos needs a lot of work and it’s easier to do this work here in the United States, at least so far. We speak the language and we have all the tools and supplies that capitalism offers right here. All this is true. But the reality is that we are very different people than we were when we left the dock the first time and finding contentment in this kind of life is a challenge. There is so much emotional adjustment, not to mention the physical adjustment, to going back to living the workday life where you have weekends off. We are grateful that both of our kids have traveled extensively and they know exactly what we are up against.

Since we docked the boat in Olympia we have had very little time to spend working on her. We feel, most days, like we kind of just walked away from the life we were living. Sometimes it’s hard to even feel connected to that couple we were out on the open ocean. In the salon today I came across an issue of 48North, the one with my article about stopping in Canada on the way home. It felt like someone else must have written that article, not me. Since September, Mike started a new job, we sold a house (which took a lot of time, energy, and money), we had the holidays, and the country has political chaos and violence which affect both of us deeply.  Covid-19 and the shutdowns and general sense of unrest and dis-ease in the very air we breathe underpins everything we do, just like I know they do for you.  We are also remembering in our very bones how dark it is here. And how wet.

It’s a strange life.  We know we are doing all the right things, and to be honest, all of what we have accomplished so far has gone incredibly smoothly. Amazingly so. Mike got a good job very close to home, I have a job starting this week. Our home sold very quickly for an amount we still have trouble believing. We have a lot to be grateful for and we know it. But still, most nights I dream of the boat in some way.

I brought some fabric samples to play with. I have about 40 more being delivered sometimes this week. These decisions are either really easy (like when I chose the Galapagos fabric because it was pretty and it was 5$per yard), or really hard. There doesn’t seem to be a middle ground. I like too many things. The truth is that all of these coloful fabrics make me feel happy.

So today the sun was shining and we were talking about plans and it seemed like just the right kind of day to go down and hang out at Galapagos, maybe do a little tidying up and preparing her for new salon cushions. Days like this make us feel better and keep me from being such an avid doom-scroller on my phone. We started her engine and tested Mike’s new noise-cancelling headphones. Game changer! The drone of the engine makes people very tired and is over stimulating lots of times, especially if you have to run the engine for many hours. We would have loved to have these when we were cruising so I imagine we’ll be getting a pair of them for our next trip.

I call this look “PNW Who-Gives-A-F*** Casual” Did I comb my hair today? I simply cannot be sure. The noise cancelling headphones are great, though.

I don’t really have a cohesive blogpost to put out there today, but I did feel the spirit move me to post something, anything, to get back into the groove. And it’s nice to feel that little nudge to write, even if it’s faint and unformed.  It’s hard to do decent posts without the use of my photos application, which is broken beyond repair. It’s only one of the many ways my poor Macbook Air, which is old by computer standards and has been used in a marine environment for 4 years, is breaking down on the inside. So the photos will be pitiful since I have to take them with my phone and do a workaround. Kind of pathetic, really. But these photos are of a few of the things going on aboard Galapagos right now. I will market these as ‘raw and unedited’ and that will make them more exciting for you.

And then there is this side panel for the dodger. Has it seen better days? Most assuredly. And I’m not even bothering to show you the other side, which is one that I did by hand when we were living aboard before we left the dock. It’s LONG past time for these to be replaced and I met with a woman this week who is making new ones for us. Tremors of excitement! We will have windows that zip open 3/4 of the way so we can get to the winches. We will have cockpit sides that fit correctly!  It’s very exciting because we used these, as bad as they are, all the time out on the open ocean until we got into seriously warm weather.  Up here, they protect the cockpit from being soaked all the time.

The answer to how our deck remains so clean is sitting right there in the cockpit. It’s a product called ‘Wet and Forget‘. We used this so much at the house during the winter and it kept algae from growing on all the cement patios and sidewalks around the house. It works. So one year when we still had the Cal 34, we decided to try spraying this stuff on the topside of the boat to see if it would control the green algae that takes over during the rainy season. It worked very well. Cleaning up the boat in the spring was a snap. And we also liked that the boat stayed pretty all during the worst part of the year. It’s safe to use on all kinds of things.

The days are getting longer. It’s the time of year when PNWers believe spring to be just around the corner (It’s not. But you cannot convince us of that. After all, the hardware stores are selling primroses in full bloom now. That’s the first sign.)  We talk about coming back home to Galapagos to live aboard, at least most of the time, in the spring when it’s warmer. Meanwhile, we are back to planning and preparing, just staying connected with our boat and keeping that dream of sailing off again alive.

You know, Facebook is a great archive of memories. Regardless of how irritated I get with that application, I do like being able to pull up memories to see what I was doing on this day in year’s past. Pulling up today’s memories I discovered that this is the 3 year anniversary of doing our final provisioning for the passage to San Francisco. We were in Friday Harbor, where we took delivery of our headsail. Three years. It hardly seems believable.

These have been three years of hard wear on Galapagos. Using a boat the way it’s intended to be used makes it work hard and things start giving up the ghost. Lately it feels almost comical. Today I noticed that one of my collapsible silicone bowls has developed a crack. My yogurt emerges through the crack and threatens to drip onto the table. This is the second bowl of a set of three that has done its duty well but is just worn out. Probably it’s not real silicone. Probably it’s just plastic. Who knows? We have used these bowls every single day for over 3 years (because we lived aboard before we left the dock). I guess they have earned their keep.

I am reminded most fondly of the trip we had bringing this boat from Astoria up to Tacoma. Because we were still learning about the boat systems, especially the exhaust riser for our then-new engine, Hiram, we literally skidded into the dock in Tacoma just as the riser broke for the second time in that trip. It absolutely broke in half just as we came to a stop.  I don’t think this landing will be quite that dramatic. So far the riser on that engine exhaust is the one thing that is holding up well after three years.[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQ4V_-GY3PM[/embedyt]

We joke that now we have a boat that we could advertise for sale as ‘kept her owners safe for a three year cruise and is ready to go again!’. Laugh. Out. Loud. Not only are we not selling her, but if you are in the market for a boat and it’s advertised in that vein, bring your calculator to add up replacement costs for every single thing on board. Be sure to check their silicone bowls because they will surely be worn completely out.

You might be wondering what else is giving out on this fine vessel we call home. Here’s a short list:
1. Our battery charger – no longer charges at the dock. Must run engine or use solar panels. Will be replaced by the charger of Mike’s dreams; a Victron Multi-Plus. That’s a charger/inverter combo that would also make my wildest dreams come true. We’d be able to just plug things into the regular plugs on board. Whaatt? What magic is this? After living aboard for this long, my bar for thrills is super low.

2. Our Force10 stove – The burners only work on high now, and even then the big one is barely hot enough to keep my pressure cooker going. The oven is a joke and must be babysat continuously to be sure the temperature is not either too cold to bake anything or a blazing 500F. I am not making that up. I still manage, just, to bake bread and other assorted goods, but believe me when I say I have to sit by the oven door and keep checking that temperature gauge. Ridiculous. Either fix or replace. We are not sure yet.

3. Our toilets – they are the Wilcox Crittendon big old fashioned bullet proof types that eventually wear out because everything does even though Michael rebuilt them both before we left. They will be replaced. We’re just done with them. Electric fresh water flush is coming to Galapagos. Be still my heart!

4. The entire rig – that’s an entire post by itself, or three. We are a sailing boat again but our trust in any part of the rig has been destroyed and pulling the mast and replacing all the rigging and hardware is one of the main reasons we are here. This includes all halyards and lines, sheets, everything. All of it. That’s right, we are made of money.

5. Our hand held cheese grater, the kind that grates parmesan cheese. Broken beyond repair. Sad. Already replaced while we shopped in Port Townsend. This was a big deal.

6. Every stitch of clothing. Michael will just be throwing his pants away. Between his lack of haircut in months and his clown pants, well, I don’t want to talk about it. He still shaves and I am grateful for that. I have already disposed of many articles of clothing but cannot seem to part with some of my sun-faded tshirts because they still remind me of warm water and sea turtles. I’d like to say they smell like sunshine but that’s a bridge too far. My heart bleeds.

Because this is more interesting than a photo of my shirt.

7. Every cushion in the salon. They are disgusting. To be fair, they were not meant to last this long anyhow. We just ran out of money to spend on things like cushions and decided we could either go with what we had or work longer and never leave the dock. We chose wisely.

8. Mike’s favorite volt meter. We have multiples. You cannot have too many volt meters. But it’s sad when your favorite tool wears out. And speaking of tools, I’ll just include right here the hand held vacuum that goes with our Ryobi rechargeable tools. It’s going to give up any second now. Hard use. Very hard.

9. The switches on the electric windlass. When we landed on Vancouver Island to drop anchor in a safe harbor, the windlass switch failed. It was straight up a corrosion issue. Mike has fashioned repairs but both switches need replacing. One does not want to raise an 85 pound anchor and big chain by hand.

Fixing the windlass switch. Could have been watching sea otters, but no.

10. I’m leaving this blank so there is room for whatever decides to break tomorrow. Will it be the shower fixture that already leaks? Will it be yet another door that stops closing correctly? Will the chartplotter give up? Will the spigot for fresh water on the aft deck finally break off? Will the light in the aft bathroom finally stop working altogether? So many juicy possibilities.

We are slowly but surely making way to the south sound, trying to make the most out of the last drops of summer. We’ve been living in summertime for the last three years. I know you feel sorry for us as we shiver in our fleece. We spent a lot of time in Port Townsend, remembering why we love that town. Next stop was Port Gamble, where we had two very lovely days and wondered why we had never visited by boat before. We’ll definitely go back there at some point.  Last night we were in Blakely Harbor with a 180 degree view of Seattle’s lights. I tried hard to enjoy them as they were very pretty from a distance, but the truth is I never missed Seattle even a little bit. Today we will carry on down Colvos Passage to Gig Harbor where we started this trip over three years ago. We said a tearful goodbye to our kids right there at the guest dock.

After Gig Harbor we’ll hang out on the guest dock in Tacoma for a day or two. If you are in the neighborhood, come down and say hello. I wish we could invite you onto the boat like we would have before. But even so, we’d be glad to see you from a respectable distance. Alas. What a world we are living in. Re-entry is hard, folks. It’s just hard.

The nights are getting colder out here. We were socked in with dense fog at Port Gamble. Yesterday afternoon I was wearing shorts. Today it’s sweatpants and polar fleece all the way. Fall is on the way and we keep our fingers crossed for a slip on the guest dock at Swantown in Olympia. They don’t open that dock until after Labor Day. We’ve been on the waiting list for a slip since December, but with the Covid-19 thing, the waitlist is not moving much. Clap your hands real hard for us, spit and spin, pray, and do all the things to send us good joojoo about finding a temporary slip for us to skid into for the winter. We’ve got a lot of projects to get started on.

When the October issue of 48 North hits your inbox, look for an article about our landing in Canada after our rig failure. You’ll get all the scoop about it there.

S/V Galapagos, standing by on channel 16.