sittononthebeach.com

I had no idea the Harvest Moon Regatta involved nearly 200 boats, and was such a big event.  We sailed en-masse’ with more sails than commonly seen together which was picturesque in itself, now add the fact the race involved a night sail under the full “harvest” moon… and the experience went from unexpected to unforgettable.  Night sailing just before Halloween was really fun!  You almost expected to see witches ride their broom in front of the moon across the glistening night sea.  “The Harvest Moon Regatta” is an annual event that courses 150 miles South from Galveston to Port Aransas Texas. 

The dark 2 foot seas found the fleet constantly adjusting lines to eek out the best performance from the excited skippers of the more than 100 different boat designs.  I thoroughly enjoyed the passage on the awesome luxury Yacht owned by a fellow Bahamas cruiser.  Alternate Latitude was the envy of the fleet. 

As the race began, we all looked for that last knot of speed from the moderately tight sails easing along the gentle start provided by prevailing 8 to 10 knots winds.  Looking at the map, you’ll see the Texas coastline from Galveston South on SE prevailing winds can be a pinch…. We were ready to tack to sea after the committee boat, but held our point to see what luck would bring us.

I was invited to tweak the sails and help drive the Voyage 440 catamaran owned and operated as a charter boat by Captain Steve Schlosser.  I have tens of thousands of  catamaran miles under my keels having sailed the Bahamas on bareboats for 10 years, then on our own Seawind cat “Sea Yawl Later !!” after buying her a few years ago.  “Alternate Latitude” is now stationed in Galveston Bay but leaves this month for the British Virgin Islands.  The boat is 25’ wide 44’ long, weighs 10 tons with 4 queen sized beds, 4 bathrooms and just about every amenity imaginable. 

Needless to say, our sailing adventure was not as “adventurous” as some of the fellahs sailing open cockpit 30’ go fast boats in full foul weather gear… they got splashed every 4 minutes sitting on hard fiberglass with a tiller in one hand and a flashlight in the other grabbing energy bars as they could to survive the ordeal.  We…. On the other hand….. each had queen bed accommodations, our own bathroom and dined on Fillet Mignon with a loaded baked potato at the races end.  Seven sailors shared the duties…. so fatigue was never a factor.  Our “race conditions” were never more luxurious.

It normally takes 27 to 30 hours for a cruising boat to make the trip.  This year we had decent winds at the start, but sat through a 5 hour period where our only progress was the speed of the current, then found our wind and finished in style. 

The night helmsman Matt saw winds drop from 8 knots to zero about 1AM.  Matt kept glancing North looking for that much anticipated cold front due to slide off the Texas coast into the Gulf of Mexico.….. In my many years and thousands of miles of sea experience I know that just before a major weather change you always go calm….  The fleet sat near motionless from 1am to 6am Friday morning.  For five hours the racers excitement slacked to a semi-alert scan… as we made 1 to 1.5 knots forward progress due only to the Gulf of Mexico currents. 

Nearly two hundred sails rocked in place along a 40 mile string of boats in the night, we slatted and rattled waiting on the wind to give us back our speed.  Each boat watched the others mast light…. wondering when the wind might restore the ancient power that propelled Columbus to the new world.  

Then just before daylight… we got our wish; the wind suddenly blew like God threw a switch and we sped off toward the finish.  Finally (while I was asleep) there were rooster tails behind both hulls.  I heard it happen from my queen sized bed, a little motion…. then the whirring of the prop shafts told the tale of speed.  My sleepy ears became vaguely aware that our ship had regained its motion…. the calm was over.  Our heavy “big wind” boat was suddenly and decidedly back in its element!

We left the Galveston Pleasure Pier along side more than a dozen boats in our class, half a hundred multihulls in the fleet…. behind a hundred and a half monohulls.  Generally a race starts the multihulls last….. supposedly because they are faster, but many of the go fast monohulls were much quicker than our big starship.  

The PHRF rating system considers boat design, sails, and possible sail combinations then assigns a handicap…. if all boats are perfectly sailed they would theoretically arrive at the same time.  Anybody that has ever handled a jib sheet knows no boat is never “perfectly” sailed due to differing personalities, sailing choices and human dynamics.  Every captain decides on a different track and sail settings.. so the race is won or lost by the skipper’s choice and helsmanship.  The fun of it is… you’re always considering the fluidity of the racing surface, changing winds and your own wit to be the best boat home. 

The first fleet of monohulls left at 2PM… our fleet was the last to be set loose.  We left Galveston at 2:50PM in 8 to 10 knots of wind in a fairly tight pinch. That means the winds were prevailing from the SE and we were heading into them at about 45 degrees….. the minimum you want on your nose in a sailboat race.  The go fast multis and 99% of the monohulls stayed along the beach pinching into the wind on the most direct path to the next mark.  Some of the catamarans and slower monohulls turned left soon after the start and headed out to sea to get a bigger bite of wind in their sails….. those guys made the wrong decision.

Our strategy was to set the sails to pull their best while skipping along in shallow water along the beach as close to the wind as possible and hope for a “lift”.  It’s risky, because you could run out of water depth while sailing the boat at less than optimum speed.  Even though it’s the most direct route to the finish line you could lose to the guy screaming along at top speed even if he had to go out of his way to achieve it.  However, if the wind changes and you can veer off the beach into the building winds without having to set your course off by tacking away offshore…. It’s a huge plus.  The guys that spent 45 minutes heading 90 degrees off shore from the finish line to make sure they had “the wind” lost big time this year… The conservative “smart” sailors squandered their advantage to us more risky rascals that counted on our own luck.

We knew 34 miles down the track AL would have to reach offshore to round a mid-race mark.  It looked impossible to make with the winds we started on….. but with good luck and weather, the risk takers won and the conservatives lost this time!!!!!! lol.  Those willing to risk his pocketbook to make the big bucks WON!  There are those that always play the game safely, then… there are those that normally win.  We opted for the second category.  I’m willing to bet on my own knowledge and skill more often than not…. or at least more than the average racer.  I put myself in a position to be blessed by the wind and thankfully I was. 

The heaviest current that carried us toward the finish line was along the shallow coast, so we stayed there….. then when we needed to go offshore to round the mark, I found the heavy outflowing current of San Luis Pass.  It spewed us out to the Rhumbline quite comfortably to round the Freeport mark.  (The rhumbline is the most direct route from finish to end of a sailboat race)

We reached away from the shore far enough to be comfortable, driven by the outbound current, then an hour after midnight we lost our moderate wind……. The current alone now moved us ever so slowly toward the finish line.  But thankfully we were all in the “same boat” at that point going nowhere.  Design or sail set didn’t matter anymore…. We all bounced along in the slow current for what seemed like an eternity in a “boat race”. 

Alternate Latitude’s crew was fully aware that after the doldrums a strong North wind would fill in from across the beach so we stayed close, others went offshore to try and find a bit of wind to sail on.  Generally the further offshore you go the higher the winds are, so there is value in the move…. but our captain made the right decision, the heavy North wind would hit us quicker if we stayed close to the beach, again time proved that we made a good choice….  We found 20 knots of wind to fill our sails 30 to 45 minutes sooner than the offshore group.  Thirty minutes of cruising at 8 knots put us 4 nautical miles further down course than the boats flopping around offshore going with “safe bet” that usually always works.  That’s a net gain of 30 to 45 minutes of “time to finish”.  We ended up winning the division by less than 30 minutes, so it was all about choices!

The 20 to 25 knot wind over our starboard hull now drove the boat like a railroad spike…. hard and fast to the finish.  While the offshore crowd stayed in place we screamed for the finish line along the rhumbline….. Our chosen route proved a double good thing….. early speed and the most direct route to Port Aransas, Texas.

Late in the race the waves built to 5 foot.  The building waves offered another advantage available for those willing to take it.  We showed the class that if you drive 10 tons of fiberglass… sitting on a fluid surface…. into a hole behind a breaking wave on a 20 degree down slope……. you can go really fast!  That’s probably the biggest oversimplification I’ve made so far… so I’ll do some explaining; Surfing waves is a delicate art. 

Initially you have to have enough waves to play on coming from the right direction and enough wind to drive the boat once you get it surfing…… couple those conditions with a zen-like understanding of how waves form and fall and you can begin to learn how to successfully surf a 4 bathroom boat at 18 knots.  It’s not in any text book… It comes from years of sitting at the helm of a boat in every condition imaginable while paying close attention to what works and what doesn’t.  I guess we can call the knowledge….. a BS from Blue Water U.

My surfing BS thesis reads like this:

• Big waves always come in sets of three; usually the first one gets you going, but the second or third is the “money wave”.
• Whenever a wave breaks at its peak… it then forms a big hole you can drive off into.
• To make a boat accelerate hard into a hole you need a loose jib.
• To make a boat stay surfing you need a tight main to hold speed once it’s achieved…. But be careful because a tight main gives you heavy weather helm so don’t let the boat round up much if the wind is high… keep her surfing down wind.
• To accelerate to surfing speed you need to scoot over behind the first breaking wave (no matter the sail angle to the wind) to set up the second and third wave.
• Once you’re positioned behind the first breaking wave, open your sails to run 10 degrees fat…. downwind off your optimal sail set by cranking the helm hard downwind as the second wave lifts you.  What that does is turn the rudders 50 degrees off the boat centerline…. the  effect provides two (on a cat) rudder surfaces semi perpendicular to the flow of the wave… so the underwater resistance lifts the stern of the boat and at the same time, allows the wave to drive the boat faster as it “pushes” you at wave speed (much faster than your own)
• Just after the wave pushes hard on your rudders…. There comes is a moment just as the wave passes your rudders when you need to crank hard upwind and here’s why…..
• Every sailor knows that if you crank the helm into a puff while setting deep.. the jib grabs at the wind and gives you a temporary lift in speed.  So……………
• There is no way to surf a wave without cranking hard on the helm.  If a wave sees a straight rudder…. You won’t surf it, it will flow under you with the greatest of ease.  Under water resistance at the right moment is paramount to climbing up on top of a wave and racing down it.
• Wave dynamics provide a trough to sail into if you can see it happening…. then crossing up the rudders provide water resistance to lift the stern and accelerate to surfing speed…. as you ascend the wave, crank in some acceleration by grabbing air in the jib… then after your surfing carefully watch your wind angle so your tight main stays the right angle to drive you at top speed for as long as the wave lasts……  oops, one caveat……
• If the wind is high… and driving you well……… drive the boat down the wave at the optimum angle to the wind (of the sail set) so the main will keep you truckin’  but if the wind isn’t there fall off downwind so the wave will carry you as far as possible before washing under you.
• Now you know everything I do about wave surfing…… !

We went from 9 knots with a cruiser steering to a max of 18.1 knots surfing the waves.  50,000 miles of steering boats on the open ocean have taught me a few things.  The cruiser often finds his best steerage “to stay comfortable” and maximize passenger comfort by avoiding conflict with the air and water when it pipes up… on the other end of the spectrum…. surfing a 4 bathroom 10 ton boat to race boat speeds requires using every wave and puff you can to propel the boat forward. 

Who said a 4 queen, 4 bath boat can’t go fast.  It’s simple physics; 10 tons on a 20 degree slope WILL speed up.  I don’t care who you are.. gravity is king.  The sail set and helm dynamics to make that happen only come with experience.  And thankfully my wife Linda has been with me for a bunch of those hours without complaint.

I often recall a time when Linda awoke after a long passage of the Gulfstream to see the water on a 40 degree angle out the side window of our little Seawind cat.  She came up from the bed holding on to the walls saying “is everything OK!!!!!!!!????  I pretended to need her help to reduce sail… but secretly I had been playing on the following 12 footers for hours in 20 knots of wind behind the boat to see how fast I could go.  I achieved my boat record on my SW 1000…. !!  When Linda showed up with big eyes…. we took the main down and finished the passage comfortably under jib alone.  I felt like a kid caught with his hand in a cookie jar…. Lol.  She’s a great wife that lets me get by with stupid stuff like that.

Anyway… during the Harvest Moon Regatta we won our class and finished fastest in the multihull division on corrected time earning the Commodores trophy for Alternate Latitude.  It was fun surfing by 45 foot boats nearing the finish line at 16 knots in a 4 bathroom condo!

My suggestion for attaining the knowledge to do what we did…… go sailing.  Sail as often and far as your budget or wife will allow.  I am blessed to have enough of both to know how to surf a 4 bathroom boat 18.1 knots…… Thanks Baby, I love you.

I just read an article by one of our favorite people, Patrick from Bumfuzzle.  The article was on “How to Write a Sailing Blog”.  I just love Patrick’s candor, wit and sometimes bluntness.  Rusty and I started this blog mainly because our families thought we had lost our mind to leave land life and go cruising.  They were convinced that either pirates or sharks would “get us”.  We purchased our Spot and started blogging.  We found we loved to blog i.e. journal.  It was fun to share our adventure and it was really fun to hear from folks back home while we were gone.  Since we have been back I have felt ambivalent about blogging.  We are in contact with our families and I keep in touch with our friends through Facebook.

I realized after reading Patrick’s article that I really miss my daily journal and it is okay for me to write just for me.  I love to hear from others and it would be awesome for others to “comment” but I do enjoy going back and looking at previous post just for my own enjoyment.

So hear goes.  This past year has been a very hard year.  We had left Sea Yawl Later!! in our home port of Brunswick, Georgia last year and rented a condo in Kemah while Rusty replenished our “cruising kitty”.  That decision turned out to be a bad financial decision for us.  Our life is too fluid to obligate ourselves to any kind of lease.  We ended up paying 7 months of rent when we actually needed the condo for about 3 1/2 months.  Then several things happened.  One good, several bad.  Our daughter, Erin, got engaged at Christmas and set a wedding date for August 2012.  She and Michael decided on a destination wedding in Destin, Florida.  Initially, I thought we could still go cruising in 2012, do most of the planning online and fly back home when necessary.  Then my step dad’s health deteriorated and it became clear we needed to be home.  In January of this year we started bringing “Sea Yawl Later!! back to Texas.  In March Daddy Joe died and six weeks later my brother, Wayne, died unexpectedly.  Daddy Joe and Wayne were in charge of my mother’s care.  Mom has Parkinson and senile dementia and requires round the clock care.  It has been a mess because both Daddy Joe and Wayne had Power of Attorney for mom but they are now both gone.  Wayne was also the executor of both mom and Daddy Joe’s will.  I was finally made Administrator of Daddy Joe’s will but still found myself hamstrung because all of their accounts are joint.  Check your wills folks and keep your Power of Attorney’s current and several people deep.

Mom was admitted to the hospital a couple of days ago with a nasty lesion that developed from deep inside the muscle.  She will need wound care for many months.  We are very fortunate in having a lady who has been her primary caregiver for several years and she is amazing.  Marie will continue taking care of Mom, what a blessing.  Mom will probably stay in the hospital getting IV antibiotics until Monday.  I have been at the hospital for the last two days but she is doing well so Rusty and I will go to Buna for his High School Reunion.

So today I will go to Mom’s house to do a few things and then come back to the SYL to pack.  Tonight we will go to Beaumont then Saturday we will go to Buna, Texas.  SYL is in desperate need of organizing.  I still haven’t figured out how to keep things organized with our current fluid land life.  Usually we are cruising or preparing to cruise.  We currently don’t know what we are going to do past February.  Rusty will be working in Texas City through February.  After that…..who knows.

Although the job I’m on isn’t ending yet, I’m moving to another.  We knew when I came to Motiva Port Arthur that I was committed to a job in Texas City that would begin in October.  I’ll take a week in between jobs to rest at the lake.

I’m training a replacement for my seat at Motiva.  The program and efforts I’m handling here are multi faceted, so handing it off to someone else is complicated.  Most schedules are built and not changed after they start, but this one is a live document that has to be managed by hand every week.  Material supply has driven every step of the project so as material dates change, we move the schedule to fit the new situation.

Linda had a nice respit at the lake, she came to Beaumont for her birthday so she’s here right now.  Saturday we will both head up to the lake again.  Not much else happening… I’m looking forward to sleeping past 5:40AM.  I haven’t had many of those mornings lately so the quiet and solitude of the lake… watching the wind on the water when I get up around 9 will be wonderful.  The weather is cool…. I’m happy about the slow upcoming week.

Anybody that has ever read our blog knows how fluid our life is.  One day we are heading South, by lunch West looks interesting then by that evening we are headed North because work sent me that direction.

If you want to, you could pick a day where we admitted a “plan” in our blog, then read what we really did and there’s a good chance it changed.  I guess my construction worker background made me pretty comfortable with change.  I do have a question for the audience though.

If I have more than one house and sail the Bahamas several months out of the year where do I live?  Good question…. Lets look at where I have been recently maybe that will help us “decide”.  The last two nights I spent at my step-daughters in Beaumont, one night this week I was on the boat, I spent several nights at my mom & dad’s in Buna, last weekend we slept on the boat because we changed marinas, this weekend we are taking the kids sailing so I’ll sleep on the boat again then it’s back to work in Port Arthur (for a while) so I’ll either be at mom’s, Erin’s or where we spent several nights in August.. at a friends house in Beaumont.  The weekend before we moved the boat we were at the lake house…. I have clothes and basic necessities in several places so do you judge where you live by where you have toothbrushes?  Where you get your mail?  I don’t know.  Last year the boat stayed in her home port of Brunswick Georgia for 6 months with nobody on it and we rented a condo to work out of.  The past 3 years I would contend I don’t “Live” any particular place…. certainly not one place.

If I didn’t have a house.. my only bed was on my boat, you could make a case that I live on that boat, but that’s not right because I have more than one other house.  A “liveaboard” is someone that sold everything and uses his boat as his primary residence right?  That’s not me.  What about the guy that buys a boat and uses it for an apartment when he wants to get away for a while… is he a live aboard?….. I don’t think so.  There are hundreds of boats in Kemah that never move.. but the owner uses it for a second home yet they aren’t liveaboards.  Because I actually use my boat.. does that mean I live on it?  If I spend more time than the average guy in the car does that mean I live in my car?  I have to move around a lot for my job.  Some guys buy a travel trailer so they don’t have to rent a place to stay on the road….  do those guys “live” in their trailer even though they have a nice house?  NO….. the fact is.. there is no ONE place you could possibly say I live… if you wanted to pin that crime on me….. “living in one place” I think the overwhelming evidence clearly shows otherwise. 

My mail comes to one of several places, our lake our or our Beaumont house.  None of those are my boat.  Personally I don’t care where somebody says I “live” but recently some jerk came on my boat and stole two major items… this same night another boat down the way was vandalized as well.  I pay for insurance for my boat, things were taken (that are covered), the police came and made a report, I made a claim… no brainer right?

I’m not going in depth at this point about what is going on or who my agent and carrier are.. we’ll see how that unfolds.  Apparently if they decide I “live aboard” (where my stuff would be much safer) they might not pay for the stolen items.   I guess it’s better if you buy a buggy load of groceries and leave them in the Wal-Mart parking lot unattended.   If you take those groceries home boy….. where you can take care of them or use them… somebody might steal them huh?  What a crock.  It’s a no brainer, I had the stuff, it was stolen I ordered replacements and showed the adjuster the reciept, it’s covered… but they are acting like I”M THE CRIMINAL.  We’ll see how this shakes out.  With all that’s going on in our life right now…… If we have to add fighting with the insurance company to the mix… just suffice it to say “it ain’t gonna be pretty”.

Linda here:  I would like to add that when I got this insurance with Progressive (I don’t mind saying who we are dealing with) I told the insurance company EXACTLY what the situation was.  I told them that we might sail the east coast next year or we might decide to go back to the Bahamas.  If we decided to go back to the Exumas we would then have to go with another insurance company because Progressive does not cover the Exumas they only cover some of the Bahamas close to the US.  Last year we didn’t think we would bring SYL back to Texas DUH…….that’s why we left her in Brunswick.  I HATE insurance companies……..I am ready to self-insure…..it simply is not worth the hassle.  Thanks for letting me vent!!  I do feel better!!

Sea Yawl Later!!

We moved the boat yesterday from Bayland to Waterford in Kemah.   It’s nice, but most of all we have some good memories here.  We are back in SYL’s first Texas slip, her first port of call when we bought her in ’08.  Waterford is a bustling community, lots of sailors that actually use their boats.  The weekenders fill the place, but there is weekday activity as well.

Yesterday’s sail was fun even with regular thunderstorms marching across the bay.  Sporatic rain events made the temperature comfortable…. and if you were in the right spot they spun off cool fast wind to play on.  I saw 8.6 knots one time on a broad reach with a tall dark cloud behind me.  Lots of fun.

One day I’m going to count boats here at Waterford.  lets see… roughly 40 boats per long dock.  Lets say there are 10 docks with 40 boats and 10 shorter docks with 30…. that’s roughly 700 total.  It’s easy to say there are 500 masts here in this particular aluminum forrest.  Watergate just across the road is probably bigger than we are…..  It’s amazing to me that with 1000 aluminum trees in one place… at least one of them ought to get hit every time a lightning storm comes thru… but they don’t.

I don’t wish for the replacement cost of all these boats, or even dream of having enough money to pay every slip fee in the marina…. I could retire on the replacement cost of the sunbrella fabric covering only the boats I can see from my seat inside SYL.

Today (Sunday) is a brighter day than yesterday.  I probably should have waited to sail today… but I couldn’t stand it….  I have  a hard time sitting still with a destination on my mind and a way to get there.

SYL !!  Rusty

The wedding was beautiful.  Our week there was fabulous though the weather tried to give us problems.  

I’m back on the job…..  I’m telling you, getting a wedding behind you brings a great sense of accomplishment.  Part of it is relief… but most of it is joy.  We are so happy for E & M as they begin their life together, and proud knowing we gave Erin a great wedding that many will remember for a long time.

Destination weddings normally don’t draw a huge crowd but we probably had 80 people at the ceremony.  I was very impressed with the turn out.

The pile of papers on my desk are almost taken care of.  I remoted in from Destin every day, but some of the work I’m doing could wait until I returned….. I’ve almost cleared that off my slate.

Linda is working like a turk getting the Taft house cleared of Berry Road stuff.  When we sold the big place in Beaumont and moved to the lake we left a lot of our stuff at Taft.  The lakehouse was already furnished so we didn’t need it there.  Our wedding gift is to give the kids use of the Taft house for their first year of marriage.  Erin and Michael have’nt broken out any of their wedding gifts so when they get home they want furnish with their plates, glasses, pots… etc, so Linda is packing our stuff up.

Anyway, it’s all done except the packing.  The kids come back tomorrow so Linda has a massive amount of stuff to clear out.  It will initally go to storage, then be sorted out to the lake or passed down.

It’s good to see the office desk getting cleared in front of me…. I’m definitely multi-tasking these days.  Handling multiple jobs at one time.  Ahhh for the good old days of just being a scheduler.

The new password at our house is “austerity”.  It sounds really cool and everything but so far in our life the word has only been used as a mental bluff spoken only to make ourselves feel better… lol.  Neither Linda nor I am good at “frugal”.  Hmmmm.. lessseee.  when I have her on the boat in the Bahamas, it’s hard to spend a lot of money….

Sea Yawl Later!

Rusty

Wow, we leave in 4 days for Destin Florida.  Everything is arranged here, we have house and dog and boatsitters….  Linda kept my car today to get the oil changed for me, it’s all coming together!

Linda has the itenerary and food pretty much taken care of at the beach house for the week of the wedding.  It can and will be a bit of a vacation for us.  I’ll certainly have my duties but mostly I’ll have time to hang out at the beach, on the balcony and in the pool. 

I’ll make some of my favorite BBQ dishes and throw down some good food, but mostly I think I’ll just have fun and entertain.

I’m sure the site will see some great pictures when we get back… Hasta Lavista.

Its getting close……..    We will leave for Destin looking like the Beverly Hillbillies on their way to Caalifornee.  I plan on tying the top of the arbor to my station wagon roof rack.  The trailer I’ll be pulling will hold more stuff without the top section of the arbor inside.  The legs of the arbor fit nicely, but the top is more 3 dimensional so its better riding outside.  Boxes and stuff that can’t get wet need to ride on the inside.  The arbor came out nice… it’s made of PVC, no wood to rot and no paint!  Pretty sweet if you ask me.

The legs are long because they will be buried deep in the sand to hold it up for the ceremony.

I’m toying with the idea of doing a sand sculpture at the feet.  I may do some testing to see how that might look once we get to Florida.. but I’m not going to stress over it.  I would have plenty help carrying sand with all the groomsmen there for the week preceeding the wedding… lol.  I’m thinking about a single base for each leg with an initial in it.  I may build up a step for the preacher so he can see and be seen over our rather tall bride and groom.

I like the idea of elevating the preacher and even the bride and groom to an extent.  It will make nicer pictures and help the crowd see the event.  I think we had 92 RSVP’s at last count.

I’m sure the event will be a success.  Planning has been meticulous so maybe we didn’t forget much.

And He’s a big one……  I did go to Motiva Port Arthur.  The midstream change of mounts was done almost flawlessly.. I did hang a spur there for a second when I was almost off the last horse… but got it shook loose pretty quick.

There is a LOT of work here, I probably won’t see it all because I have a prior commitment in October, but this place is like a 3 ring circus with all that’s going on.   I suspect 90% of the craftsmen within a 200 mile radius will be here at Motiva for quite some time.  They find new problems every day so the already huge scope is expanding rapidly.

The schedule has been fun so far, its unlike any other I have made because it’s based on when we get material for each piece of the puzzle.  It’s probably one of the most complicated I’ve built in a while.. that makes it fun.  The people I am with make it good too.  I worked with the major players years ago so it’s a reunion of sorts… good people.

Linda is still on the boat, we will be back and fourth I’m sure… during my stint here at Motiva, then back to SYL full time when we go to Tx. City. 

The horse I roped is bigger and stronger than I thought….. got on him in full stride too..  Heck I would even say I got on in a turn rather than the easy straights.  Better get back to the grind…. 30 minutes until quitting time.