Happy New Year to all of our Patrons! Part 2

Last week we talked all about the repairs we hope to have done to Calypso before setting sail in a month or two. Next up are the repairs that we need to have done professionally. I’ll go ahead and jump right in!

1. Get the AC serviced.

We just aren't certified to do that. The AC unit is okay but it’s just not as cold as it could be. I think it needs a coolant refill.

1. Replace decals for our boat

These are on each side of the hulls and the back. They're falling off we think from our trip north. We are so excited that we were able to find somebody! I thought it would be like $3,000 but it was only $300. ((yay for a win!)) They're getting made right now-- we were able to get the original file from the first owner, which is the owner before John.

1. Re-upholstering our cushions

They're getting done right now while we're gone. That was $3,000. This is something that should have been done a long time ago, but we decided to hold off. We knew it would be expensive but finally bit the bullet. The main reason for this was because there's a really good place in St. Augustine we wanted to use and we are in the area. They're also doing our canopy repair, and our back seat cushion repaired.

1. Our outboard needs to be serviced.

Ideally, we would want to replace it with a Mercury, but nobody has them because of COVID. The company has slowed down, reducing the amount produced and everybody bought them up. The one we want is a mercury 20 horsepower with electric start, so we would just push a button and it starts. Right now, we have a yellow 20 horsepower, which always has terrible problems starting. So, no surprise, that is our problem. We're just going to take it off and send it to a professional, like Yamaha to have them rebuild it.

1. Get dive compressor serviced

That's about $800 serviced through a Brownies company. We're going to do that as we head down the coast to Fort Lauderdale. If we don’t do it like that, we would have to pay them hourly to drive to where we were. Since we're going that way across The Bahamas, it makes sense. We will also get our dive gear done then as well. This is important because we love to dive The Bahamas.

1. Re-do side paneling

These are the walls that surround the cockpit to keep you warm. Some of that needs to be redone.

1. Replace our starting batteries

There's one for the engine and there's one for the generator. Their lifeline AGM batteries and they're really good, but they are probably about four years old and just don't charge anymore. So we went ahead, the generator one was fine. We don't use it as much, but, uh, since we were buying the engine ones, we went ahead and bought the generator one as well.  We are going to replace all three. So they're sitting in Florida right now waiting for us. Those were about $300 each.

1. Fix the windlass.

The windlass is a pulley machine, basically a winch that pulls your anchor chain up. I've noticed recently over the last couple months that it's been giving-way. Sometimes it works wonderfully, and other times I’m babying it or trying to help it along. I don't want to be stuck up there trying to anchor manually and then end up hurting myself because it’s a lot of heavy equipment. I read online that this is pretty typical and normal for the windlass. The main issue with that is it's epoxied into our boat. So, we can't just take it off and replace it or fix it-- Jeremiah literally has to chisel away at the epoxy. This is probably going to be the most pain in the butt job.

Phew, are you tired from reading that? I cannot wait to get all of this finished! It's definitely overwhelming for us but we are making it our first task for the new year so we can begin the cruising season with Calypso feeling perfect! We are taking advantage of the moment we are in right now and getting all of it done while we are in the US. It works well because COVID is going on in The Bahamas, and the weather really doesn't get good until about March.

Living on a boat definitely has perks but It's not all sunshine, bikini and cocktails. You really do have to get work done. I feel like it's more than living in a house because of the environment we live in. Things are always breaking and we get a list this long about every 3-4 months but we wanted to share some of the more difficult parts of living on a boat.

Now that you know our first New Year’s resolution, we want to know yours! 

P.S. The above picture was taken over Christmas in Steamboat Springs at Strawberry Hot Springs. It's the closest we could get to feeling like home by being surrounded by water during the holidays with family and friends.