Can we drive this thing? Baby’s first drive

Lower helm

Getting a new-to-you boat is always an adventure. We were so used to the old Good Karma. This boat is completely different. Not only is it bigger at 53’, it is a completely different style. It is heavier for one thing, and laid out totally differently.  It is like a little house. In fact, it is not that much smaller than our current house.

There are two stations to drive the boat, one in the salon and one up a ladder on the fly bridge. You start the engine in the salon at the lower station then if you want to drive upstairs, you just go upstairs and start driving. Nothing special has to happen to make that happen. That is nice.  

3rd door to salon with stairs to upper helm

The salon has three doors. One door on each side of the helm opens on to the walkways around the boat (called gunnels). We have heard that these are called Portuguese doors. 

The back door from sunroom -
both doors are open

The door at the back of the salon leads to the sun room. The sun room has three access doors. The one at the back has a ladder that leads to the swim platform. It is in a Dutch-style with two parts. The lower part stays closed for the most part and the upper part is a window that swings open handle lines. There are doors on either side of the sun room that lead to the walkways along the sides.

Notice the wide walkways? 

This boat has wide gunnels, the walkways that lead from the back to the front on the boat. These gunnels are probably 18 inches wide. I do not have to turn sideways to walk along the gunnel like I did on Good Karma. The railings along each side are at least 3’ high so there is always something to hang on to with a strong feeling of protection. On each side of the gunnel at the site of the salon side doors is an opening in the railing. A folding stairway can be attached to pins located below the deck level. This is how you get on the boat!

I tell you this to lay the groundwork for what we do to drive this tank.

First we start the engines and generator at the lower station. Keep those doors and windows shut because this is a diesel and we know what that means – smoke billows out when the engines start. It is not a big deal but it is stinky.

Then we unplug the electric and water and pull those hoses on to the boat. Then we pull up the stairs. This is an adventure in itself.

The stairs are pretty heavy aluminum with wheels on one end and a latching mechanism on the other end. It has a handle that fits into two holes, one on the top and one on the bottom of the steps. Ideally the railing handle pulls out and is stowed then the stairs are hoisted on to the gunnel to be stowed. Both are supposed to be stowed on the side next to the wall of the boat. Unfortunately someone really jammed one side of the railing into the hole. It won’t budge. That means we lift the entire stairway with handle attached onto the boat – an awkward exercise!! At some point Kermit will loosen that handle to lighten our load but until then if that is the worst thing that happens then fine.

When the engines are warmed up, we pull up lines and we are off! We had our first practice on Tuesday. We did all that then very, very carefully inched our way out of the marina. It was exhilarating! We went out of the marina, turned east and went all the way down the canal to Lake Michigan. It was not a nice day so we did not edge out into the lake. Instead we turned around and headed back.

On the way back we got a pump out. Not sure when that had been done but we are all clean now. Kermit docked her just fine.

On Wednesday we tried again. Again an uneventful excursion. This time we topped off the fuel.  The two tanks took on an additional 70 gallons of diesel fuel before spurting through the five vents at the dock line. Note to self: Must have absorbent pads at the vent lines when we fuel up. Two tanks are full so now we hold 700 gallons of fuel. We are not sure how to check the fuel levels or how quickly this thing burns fuel. We will learn that on the road.

We plan to leave on Thursday Sept 13, 2018 because the weather is beautiful. More later.