Pelicans and Cormorants are diving for fish, dolphins are here playing in the harbor, and its finally clear and sunny skies here in Port Aransas, TX. I watched as two boats, one motor and one catamaran, took off yesterday heading South to Isla de Mujeres. You could feel the excitement that everyone here at the docks had for the crew of these boats as the were finally ready to head out. It will be real nice when all that excitement is for us!
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This proved to be a pretty productive week with maintenance on the Odyssey. I should say it was as productive in finishing projects as it was in finding new projects needing attention. So there is no worries that we will get bored waiting for parts in the mail (whisker pole, new genoa, and autohelm replacement belt), because we have plenty to work on. The biggest new project was found after pulling out the dinghy engine because it wouldn't stay running. It seems three months of caked on barnacles and friends will do that to a motor. But after a thorough cleaning I began wondering what the bottom of the dinghy...and then the bottom of the Odyssey must look like! Oyevey! Optimistic thought of the day: I swam a mile today!
Outfitting the Odyssey
Well, I made it to Texas and to the Odyssey. Kirk met me at the tiny Corpus Christi airport and after a quick tour of Corpus and Port Aransas we headed to the marina to see my new home. The 35.5ft Hunter sailboat, aptly named Odyssey , that we are going to sail all the way to Borneo. But first a few things need to be done to get her ready for the big voyage. Some of the projects me and Kirk are tackling include ordering a new/backup 130% genoa, buying and mounting a fiberglass deckbox in which we can secure the scuba air compressor, fixing the autohelm (hopefully a new belt will do the trick), installing a manual freshwater pump on the sink to allow us to have access to drinking water if electics fail, ordering and setting up a track for a whisker pole, building a secure place for scuba tanks, and fixing the sail cover for the new mainsail. These, along with the somewhat overwhelming project of inventorying, cleaning, and restockin...
The Odyssey is a 35.5ft Hunter sailboat that I and Kirk Daughtry are planning on sailing halfway around the world during 2010 -2011. Starting in Corpus Christi, TX and hopefully ending in Borneo, our route takes us past the Yucatan, diving in the meso-American reef (the second largest in the world), through the Panama Canal, off the coast of Ecuador to the magical islands of the Galapagos, and then island hopping across the South Pacific. We are both scuba divers and we plan to document the trip with alot of underwater video filming. We will get stock footage as well as document different stories that we come across along the way. Hopefully we can find some secret surf spots as well. The Odyssey needs a little more work to be outfitted for our big trip so we will spend January and Febuary fitting her up with a dive compressor, a new storm sail and some water works. We have room for 2 passenger/crew members to do ride-alongs on different legs of our journey. Chipping i...