Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Continuance in Seattle


















I've been in Seattle about 3 weeks now, but really its been more like one and a half, because I just went on this week long trip aboard Augusta, a 40 ft sloop owned by a friend of mine's father. I'll be leaving this place in about a week and I have a ton of projects to work on, but life for me is excellent right now. I took some pictures from the sailing trip, so here they are...
We went from Seattle northbound, stopping at Smith Island to see some eagles, then we headed up into the San Juan Islands, and finally went over to Bellingham. We brought some Hulk gloves for fighting.
I also went up to Bellingham to visit my dad, and saw his solar power plant he's built, and it looks really good, despite the cloudy weather. And I took out my friends from the East Coast, Lyra and Andrew, for a sail. Andrew looks great in the captian's hat.

The projects I want to complete are going to make my boat awesome. I'm going to re-make the Bowsprit for Altair, putting in one that is 4 feet long, and then transferring the Genoa (big front sail) on its roller-furling out to the end of that. I'll still have my normal forestay, so the boat is as strong as it used to be, but I can use it to fly two jibs at the same time, like a Cutter rig.
I'm also building a Dodger, which is like a windshield for the boat, but its made of cloth instead of glass or hard plastic. I've already bent some stainless pipes for the frame, now I need to make the cloth part. It will make things much warmer and dryer while sailing.
And the third thing is to make a Wind Vane. The one on Augusta really impressed me, and I think I can copy it pretty easily and make one myself. Its design is this, but it costs $4595 to buy one, so I'll see if I can make on for less.
If I can get all that done in the next week I will be much pleased.

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