Has the boat yard called yet?

NO

But this has given me some time to contact Silverton's Owners Group and get a lot of great responses..

One fellow asked for some pictures and because of this we found something...

Above picture is Port side looking back...  What you see is the rudder shaft at the very top, the seal attached to the big nut and below is the "jam" nut...see pic below...

Again, you see the Starboard rudder shaft, the seal connected to the large nut and the "jam" nut...

So what's different....  Jam nuts are supposed to be jammed up against another nut like in the lower picture...

We'll have to see if it leaks while underway, but I've loosened both jam nuts (one was loose already of course), tightened down the large nut with the seal above it and then retightened the jam nuts...  This is the least of our worries, because we don't have much water coming in here...  Another owner of SOC suggested that by what he see's it might not be the rudder seals...he said look at all the mildew above both rudder shafts...if water came in the rudder seals it would run down, not up...so I'll look for water getting in somewhere else... by the way, there was mildew all around the rudder shafts...you don't see it now because I've cleaned it up as far back as I can reach...

 It's my port propeller shaft that's leaking for sure...although we had a suggestion for that too....maybe tomorrow I'll crawl back down into the hole... who knew I was a 6'4" contortionist!

Time for a dip in the pool :-)

Monday

January 9th, 2017

The boat yard said they'd call today but didn't...

Stopped by the boat yard and their pushing us off due to a lack of tech's..

Hopefully by the end of the week they'll call...

Here's our Tides Marine Dripless Shaft Seal that's not dripless anymore... 

This is where the sea water comes in, right by the drive shaft...

These photo's are for my buddy Tim (of Tim and Michell at SSYC)

Tim loves animal pictures so I thought I put a couple in here just for him...

Tim especially likes birds...(yes, I'm just kidding around with Tim)

The escort for Wounded Warriors riding there bicycles through Marathon to Key West!

Here they come....

Brought tears to our eyes watching these men and women who put their lives on the line and got hurt doing so!

A charter boat had just come in...

Pretty strange looking fish!!!

A @$%! load of crab pots...

These darn crab pot floats are in the thousands out in the Gulf and you have to drive between them for ever it seems...

Porkys BBQ place...

Joell had BBQ Chicken and I had pulled pork...

This is Dawn our great bartender at the LIGHTHOUSE GRILL located at Faro Blanco Marina and Resort...

Another transplant from the Midwest....Michigan!

This is where they care for the sea turtles...

A wall turtle...

Turtle Skeleton...

Another turtle on the wall...

Most of the turtles are alive at the hospital😀

Overlooking the pool here at Marathon Marina, waiting for the weekend storms to come in...

The pool at Marathon Marina is a salt water pool...very nice and not as salty as the Gulf or ocean...We have heard they are switching many of the pools in Florida over to saltwater.  It is supposed to eliminate adding all the chemicals.  Don't know if this is true.  

A small RV park is a part of the Marathon marina.  it only holds 8 large RV's...(here comes the storm)

We got a free boat wash about 30 minutes after this photo was taken...

Friday

January 6, 2017

We have moved from Marco Island to an anchorage in the Everglades and then on to Marathon in the Florida Keys.

Driving from Marco Island to our anchorage for the night, we constantly had to dodge these little bombs, called crab traps.  

We did see a huge sea turtle on our way to the Everglades.  It was out swimming in the gulf.  

If you run over one, your propellers can get tangled in the thick line that goes down to a big trap on the water floor.

At Little Shark River, in the South of the Florida Everglades.

 We anchored for one evening.  The mosquitos started to arrive immediately.We used a Thermacell to keep them away.  It worked great.  We were able to have a martini on the flybridge and relax while watching the sunset.

There were two cats anchored when we came in. "meow"

A motor yacht anchored right after us.  They came in a little late, but a sail boat did pull in after dark.

This beautiful anchorage saved us from rocking through some north winds.

The sunset was spectacular, but we were a little late at taking the pictures.  Must have been the Martini.

Left the anchorage for Marathon in calm seas.  Only issue were those lovely crab pots.  This is one of the crab pot work boats heading out to pull their catch in...

Seven mile bridge in the distance.  A good sight to see.  

We pulled into the Marathon Marina & Resort for gas.  This is the resort we have been calling for a reservation since April, 2016.  They knew us immediately.  We asked if they had a slip available and were told no.  We then asked them, (first Jules) about the mooring field and or a safe anchorage.  Over 25 mph winds are expected for this weekend.  She was worried for us.  There were boats anchored out in the open, because they were on the waiting list for the mooring balls.  She went and talked with a manager, Julie.  Julie looked through the big wall chart of slips and discussed it with Jules.  After a while they decided to give us the one open slip they had.  There had been some type of cancelation, but we didn't care why we got the slip.  👏  We are at Marathon Marina & Resort, for at least a month.  Wonderful.  And a great price, which is why we have been trying to get in here.

We are now working on a leakage issue.  We might have to stay in a hotel for a few days while the boat yard pulls our boat out.  Looks like the port engines "dripless shaft seal" is not dripless anymore.  We've been getting in about 5 gallons of water a day while underway...  This means getting the boat lifted out, drive shaft uncoupled from the transmission and pulled out a few inches so they can slide on new shaft seals... More on this as it develops.

Tuesday 

January 3rd, 2017

Early morning at Marco Island anchorage...

Plenty of Pink during sunrise..

Elwood's ready for a dinghy ride to the Win Dixie dock to go get food provisions and also a short walk to the doggie store for Elwood's gourmet dog food...

A quick stop at McDonalds for lunch and we meet Donna and Wally just outside...  Donna and Wally are from Michigan and before Mike knew that he said, "How about those Packers" Anyway we found out we all enjoy boating...they have a beautiful wooden boat that they enjoy cruising around on, when in the Michigan area...

Very nice talking with you Donna and Wally...

While sitting outside the Win Dixie I noticed this tree and at the top were these pods... I've never seen these before...The pods were the size of a mango.

Anyway, back on the boat, all loaded up and we'll head out tomorrow morning looking for an anchorage in the Goodland, Fl area...Maybe.  Looks like bad weather is moving in for the weekend.  We will have to be careful to find a nice sheltered stop for the weekend.  Not sure if we want to venture to the keys before then.  

Monday

January 2nd, 2017

Kay and Jim, Joell wanted you to know that we do ride our bikes...

We almost lost Elwood...

Two days before leaving Pink Shell, Elwood and Mike walked Joell off the boat, past the elevated marina office, across the street and waited for the Trolley to show up.  Joell got on the Trolley and rode it to Walgreens.... Elwood and Mike went back to the boat.  Mike decided to start loading the bicycles for our departure onto the boat and after the second one was carried up the stairs to the fly bridge Mike noticed a Trolley had stopped at Pink Shell and either dropped off or picked up some passengers and then drove away...(Joell wouldn't be back for a good hour or more) Right about then Mike thought of Elwood...the transom door was open and he hoops off by himself pretty much anytime we disembark...  all of a sudden I hear "Mike"...it's Dave the Marina manager carrying Elwood in his arms like his baby...  I told Dave that I had just got done loading the bikes and was wondering where Elwood was...he said, I know, I was watching you!  Dave was perched high atop the Marina office where he was watching over everything at the marina and said that he witnessed Elwood leave the boat, walk down the long floating dock, up the ramp to the hard (ground) and that's when he decided to intervene and pick up Elwood... 

All we can guess is that Elwood was heading to the Trolley stop to greet Joell on her return....or was heading to the marina office to get another treat from Dave the Dock Master...

we had a little talk with Elwood after that, but not sure if he understood...

After leaving Pink Shell Marina and Resort we grabbed a mooring ball just south of there...The picture shows a painter, which makes it a lot easier to grab the mooring ball.  Not all mooring balls have painters attached to them.

Looking north at the mooring field...

From the mooring field we took the dinghy over to Salty Sam's to watch the Packers kick the Lions #%&!

Tim and Michell, if you were down here with your sail boat you could deck it out like this sailboat...

Back at Salty Sam's to help the Packers Win...

I figure that when you go to a church festival you have to "drink for god" to support the church,

well isn't it the same for the Packers?  Ok, we only had two buckets of beers...between Joell and myself.

Kay, these were taken for you so you know were at Salty Sam's, aka, Parrot Key...

Leaving our mooring area this morning, back under the Carlos bridge and out into the Gulf...

More restaurants in Matanza's Pass as we head under the bridge...

Coming back past the Pink Shell Marina, heading out into the Gulf...A month was long enough.  We are ready to head out and continue our adventure.

Looking at the Pink Shell Resort from out in the Gulf...Bye Pink Shell👋

So, why would our speed stop working on our Ray Marine unit....well, after you sit a month #@%& grows on things...this is my water wheel that transmits my speed to the display...thank goodness it's removable from inside the boat for cleaning....

That's better..... Joell screamed when she saw the wiggly things living in there...

After leaving Fort Myers Beach we cruised past Naples and pulled into Marco Island to an anchorage...  Low and behold but who was there........another boat flying the looper flag... 

We had cocktails and Hors d'oeuvre's on our boat... Turns out these Loopers are from Canada...Thunder Bay!  They're Rachel and Nick Kovachis, a wonderful couple on a 38' Bayliner called Sandy Gail II !!!  They are leaving the anchorage tomorrow but we hope to run into them again!

Elwood leaves the boat again!!!

After a nice evening with Rachel and Nick, they boarded their dinghy which was tied to our transom...Nick got on first, then he helped Rachel into the front seat...then Elwood disembarked from off the swim platform right into Rachel's lap...he was ready for a boat ride we think!

we had another talk with Elwood...we don't think we're getting through to him!!!