U.S. Sailing certified Safety-At-Sea Seminar

Attended Safety-At-Sea Seminar with crew members at the N.Y. Yacht Club, Saturday March 24th 8:45 am to 4:15 pm in preparation for the trip to Bermuda. 
Agenda:
8:45 Introduction
9:00 Giving and receiving assistance
9:30 Boat & crew preparations for Bermuda
10:30 Safety equipment
11:15 Life raft & abandon ship
12:30 Crew health & medical assistance
1:15 Weather forecasting
2:00 Heavy weather sailing: Preparation & tactics
2:45 Storm sail & drogues
3:00 Damage control
3:30 Search & rescue
4:15 Questions, answers and concluding remarks

On the hard

My friend Capt. Bob and myself left Guilford, CT to bring the Mai Toi to Mamaroneck, N.Y. for winter storage in anticipation of beating a Nor'easter on 10/29 but the weather forecaster's mis-calculated  the start of the storm and after only an hour into our trip the winds began to pick up to 25 knots, the seas increased to 5 feet, the temperture dropped to freezing and it began to snow, visibility became zero.  We had no choice but to push on through the storm. We maintained radio contact with a barge leaving New Haven bound for N.Y.C. and the Ferry P.T. Barum leaving Bridgeport and kept an eye on them on radar. Capt. Bob's wife Marilyn and Keila met us as we arrived Norwalk Cove Marina around 3:30 pm and helped us tie-up along the fuel dock to wait out the rest of the storm. The next morning was still windy but beautiful and the rest of the trip to Mamaroneck was uneventful. We arrived around 1:30 pm and the girls were waiting there to assist us with tying up and unloading the boat .
The Mai Toi was hauled on 11/2, winterized and is on the hard at McMichaels Yacht Yard in Mamaroneck, NY.  Tartan will complete some remaining warranty work and McMichaels will attend to the work order list  and install a Reverse Osmosis System in preparation for Bermuda and the Caribbean in 2012.  

Bermuda 2012

Preparations have already begun for the 2012 Greenport, N.Y. to Bermuda Cruising Rally in June http://bermudacruisingrally.com/.  Crew selection, inventorying equipment & gear, acquiring appropriate charts and documenting procedures as well as arranging to haul and prepare the boat during the off season. Check back periodically for updates and important links.

The trip home

We arrived Treasure Cay for the last time on Thursday May 12th, Captain Mike Bancroft, my crew Bob Clark, Ed Ballard and myself. We spent Friday preparing and provisioning the boat for off shore, reviewing the weather forecast and route from Commanders and going over our watch schedule and safety procedures.  We left Treasure Cay at sunrise on Saturday morning. We made great time off shore using the front side of a low pressure cold front that was moving up the East coast. Max SOG 11.2 kts, best day distance 177 nm, totally 952 miles in 7 days. We encountered some heavy weather with 12-15 ft. seas, rain squalls, severe lightening and 30-40 mph winds but the boat and crew performed exceptionally well. Both Eddie and myself caught fish and Eddie won the "how much fuel did we use" pool with 63 gallons. The bad weather persisted up the entire East coast. We cleared U.S. Customs by telephone in route on Friday morning and we made landfall at Atlantic Highlands, N.J. on Friday afternoon around 2:30 pm. We continued up through N.Y. harbor, the East River and into the Long Island Sound Friday night and arrived Guilford, CT. safe and sound amidst dense fog early Saturday morning.
You can view our course recorded by the SPOT transponder at: http://www.spotadventures.com/trip/view/?trip_id=255169.

Easter vacation with the family

We arrived Treasure Cay around noon on Good Friday April 22nd.  Me, Keila, Jasen, Jennifer, my son-in-law James and my two granddaughters Jayden age 4 and Chloe 5 months.  We immediately changed into our bathing suites and headed to the Coco Beach Bar for lunch and enjoy the rest of the afternoon on the beach.  This is the week of the Bahamas Billfish Tournament  http://www.bahamasbillfish.com/  at Treasure Cay Marina organized by our neighbor Al Behrendt and Brenda from the "Still Uncontrollable". On Saturday morning we went to the supermarket, provisioned the boat and left for Hope Town around 10:30 am.  It was sunny and warm. but we had a head wind so we had to motor all the way.  We arrived in Hope Town around 1:30 pm and picked-up a mooring.  The kids put the motor on the dinghy and went exploring and snorkling at the beach. Saturday night we had dinner at the Harbors Inn Resturant.  We awoke Easter Sunday to a breezy but beautiful day.  We went to the Abacos Inn for lunch and to relax by their pool.  Sunday night we had dinner on the boat.  Monday was miserable, windy and rainy all day and we were stuck on the boat.  We took advantage of a weather window late in the afternoon, packed-up and left for Guana Cay.  Fishers Bay was crowded but we found a mooring and the kids went swiming and snorkling off the boat.  Grabbers was closed so we went to Nippers for dinner.  We were planning to spend Tuesday on the beach and although it didn't rain the weather wasn't much better so we dropped the mooring and headed back to Treasure Cay where it was absolutely beautiful the rest of the day. James had to leave Wednesday morning and we spent the rest of the time at the beach and the pool.  Wednesday night we were guests of our friend Elias at the Bahamas Club for Itialian night.  Thursday morning Jasen and I fueled up the boat and did some maintanence chores before going to the beach.  Thursday night was Pizza night at the marina.  Friday morning we cleaned and secured the dinghy on deck for the trip home and Friday night we had dinner onboard the boat after spending the afternoon at the beach . Saturday morning we packed and cleaned the boat and departed for the airport at 3:00 pm. The trip home was uneventful. We arrived home around 1:00 am. Jasen drove home and Jennifer and the kids spent the night.

Transmission problem

I began experiencing difficulty putting my transmission into forward gear.  Sometimes it would go and sometimes it would not.   It became progressively worse on my last trip to the Bahamas.  I checked the throttle and the linkage and there didn’t seem to be anything wrong so I called Volvo.  They acknowledged a problem with this particular S-Drive transmission model and year and agreed to replace it under warranty without an argument.  I obviously couldn’t get the boat to an authorized Volvo dealer so I had to pay for my local Volvo technician from Connecticut to go down to the boat.  Volvo paid for the transmission and labor to install it and I had to pay to have the boat brought to Marsh Harbor, hauled and for the technician’s R/T airfare and travel time.   
The Mai Toi is currently on the hard in Marsh Harbor Boat Yard. The Volvo
technician arrived at the boat on Monday 4/11 to install the new transmission.
By Tuesday afternoon the old transmission was removed, the new transmission was installed and the Sail Drive was already back on underneath the boat. Some remaining  assembly work and diagnostics tests were completed on Wednesday and the boat was back in the water and on it's way back to Treasure Cay on Thursday afternoon. The problem was evidently caused by the clutch slipping and there was a service bulletin  issued to replace the ATF on this particular transmission with motor oil.   

The Lanzilli's do the Bahamas

We arrived Treasure Cay with our friends Tom & Joyce Lanzilli on Wednesday March 23rd.  This was their first visit to the Abacos.  We spent Thursday enjoying the beach at Treasure Cay, preparing and provisioning the boat.  They were predicting the weather to be absolutely beautiful during our entire stay and it certainly was. Sunny and 80 degrees. Friday we sailed to Hope Town. I miss calculated our departure time to coincide with high tide at Hope Town by about an hour but luckily we were still able to get into the channel without hitting bottom when we arrived about 45 minutes after high tide. We went for a dinghy ride to a deserted beach outside the harbor to swim and look for Star Fish. The water was beautiful and we found several huge Star Fish.  We went to Tommy Bahamas restaurant at the Harbors Inn and had a wonderful dinner. Saturday morning we toured Hope Town and left at high tide on Saturday afternoon for Man-O-War. I had difficulity getting the transmission into forward gear leaving the mooring in Hope Town.  We disconneted and checked the linkage but the problem appeared to be inside the transmission possibly the clutch. Fortunately with a little persuassion it would eventually go into gear so we continued on our way to Man-O-War Cay.
The entrance to Man-O-War harbor is very narrow and somewhat tricky with the current. Once inside the channel is well marked to the harbor on port. We picked-up a mooring right outside Man-O-War Marina where the harbor is the deepest.  With 9-1/2 ft. at high tide and a 3-1/2 ft. tide it only leaves 6" under the keel at low tide . There is not very much to see or do in Man-O-War.  There is a very nice Canvas Sail/Bag shop and several sovereign stores. Man-O-War is famous for a particular type  boat called an Albury which strangely enough is also the last name of most everyone on the island. We went to dinner at Dock & Dine next to the marina.  Man-O-War is a dry town so it's BYOB if you want wine with your meal.  Sunday morning we had breakfast onboard and dignied to a wonderful beach where you could walk out the length of a football field in only knee deep water.  We left Man-O-War at high tide on Sunday and had a beautiful sail on a beam reach in 12-15 knot winds all the way back to Treasure Cay.
We did some further diagnosis on the transmission when we got back to the dock and decided a call into Volvo was in order. We had dinner Sunny night at the Touch of Class restaurant just outside the main gate and on Monday we did laundry, cleaned the boat and prepared to go home. 
Volvo ultimately acknowledged the problem with the transmission and agreed to replace it and pay for the labor to install it. Coincidentally we found out that there was a service bulletin issued on this particular transmission (150s Sail Drive) for the exact same problem.  There are no authorized Volvo service centers in the Bahamas and since I couldn't get the boat to the nearest one in Florida I had to arrange to fly in a technician from McDonnell Marine the authorized Volvo service center in Connecticut I use regularily and haul the boat in Marsh Harbor at my expense so they could replace the transmission.
The transmission is scheduled to be replaced the week of April 11th and we are scheduled to go back to the boat with the entire family on April 22nd for Easter.