Monday February 26: It's a Whole New View ...

So we did make it out overnight last week - everything was working well again. Until it wasn't ....

The small Honda 2000 wouldn't start when we woke up in the morning. No real problem for us as we can always just start the engine (which has it's own battery) and use that and the inverter to cook and recharge the house battery bank.

It's usually so reliable. Pull the chord and it's up and running. Only now it sounds quite weird. Like there's no compression in the cylinder.

Internet forums to the rescue! There was a post from a gentleman describing EXACTLY what was happening to us: ran fine at night then nothing in the morning. Turns out the intake valve was stuck open so of course no compression in the cylinder. Solution was to remove the carburetor (easy to do according to Steve) and then pull the chord as you are squirting carburetor fluid into the engine.  Didn't take more than 5 minutes or so and we were back in business! Next time we'll know ...

Work continues on the dinghy. First Steve sanded and wiped down the bottom. Then applied two coats of the paint. Flip it over and repeat for the top side.


The worst part was painting the inside of the tubes. No way really to stand up and do that. This again after sanding and wiping down with acetone. Two coats. Pain in the back ....


Especially compared to having a chair in which to sit. This was so totally my kind of job!

Another two coats of paint on the topside and almost done.

Of course there was great help from neighbors - Paul, Colleen, Cindy, Randy and I think Flint - when the dinghy needed to be moved, flipped or hauled into the shade.

Everyone here is always willing to lend a hand when needed. I think that's why we love it here so much - super folks that are always willing to lend a hand. I'm not sure how we were so fortunate to land here 8 years ago. No doubt our People watching out for us :-)

Final step: paint the FL registration numbers and add the current year decal.

So the dinghy is now ready for the water. It's still holding air nicely. Maybe we can get another 9 years out of this thing!





My left thumb is now declared 'done' so it's time to pull my bike out. The last time I rode it was fall 2016. When it became apparent that having one thumb and index finger on each hand didn't give me enough control, Steve folded the bike, put it under the front bunk and there it has lived since :-)

Even being under the bunk did not prevent the rust from forming on the chain, in particular. So rusted that Steve needed to use pliers to break the links apart.

With a liberal application of chain oil, it wasn't long before it was declared "safe" to ride! We have become SO SPOILED having our Keys Kruiser here. It's going to need to be a conscious action to ride our bikes anywhere. But critical. Once we move to Guppy this summer, bikes are our only transportation .....

An unusual spurt of energy hit me the other day so I decided to polish the stainless on the flybridge. It was driving me crazy and is something that I can easily do so I did.

I'm much happier :-)

Old view from the flybridge

So as of today we now have a new view from the flybridge!



Randy wants to paint the side of his boat but their slip wasn't wide enough to accommodate the small boat Steve was using so we decided to swap slips - not sure how long but it's really no issue - there is no bad view from this side of the marina :-)

We are now docked on the starboard side rather than the port. All we really have to do is make sure we go out the correct door!

New view from the flybridge