I guess it’s Microsoft that gives me another reminder of yesteryear. This time from 11 years ago. Hard to believe – those were fun days. I think this is from a tourney in Mississauga.

I don’t sleep terribly well, it’s still quite warm and I can’t help thinking about the windlass.

But that’s OK, we have a coffee maker!!! I get up, dig it out of the many boxes that are lying around everywhere and plug it in. Works great, very fast but not very hot. Not sure what the deal is there, but it’s coffee.

Once Christy is up, I want to check on the windlass. Need to start the engine first. It doesn’t start. The ignition beeps a bit but that’s it. The start battery is near-dead. So now we have a boat at anchor with no motor. Niiiice. Now if only I had jumper cables I could hot start the engine.

If only I had ham and cheese we could have a picnic.

But what’s this? Fabien left his battery charger! We’re saved. I plug it in and sure enough it shows the battery is near dead. No problem, charge it up baby – we’ve got lots of power with solar now to charge it.

Christy and I prepare a list of tasks that need to be done, it’s extraordinarily long so let’s get started. The place looks like the hurricane just blew through here since all we had time to do last night was unload the barrel contents into the hold. So Christy starts on organization while I look at Job #1.

Got some time so before 9 am so I take a look at the bilge pump since we have water in the, um, bilge. But when I run the bilge it just seems to pump water BACK INTO the bilge. Sure enough when the bilge is running it pumps water through the exit pipe which is connected to a bunch of exit pipes, including the freezer pump pipe which is currently disconnected. So if I install the missing freezer pump, I fix 2 problems? 20 minutes later I’ve got my two problem solved.

At 9 am I have my cutover call with Fidelity. It goes really smoothly and my job is done at 10 am. The charger says the battery is almost fully charged so I try the engine.

Nuttin.

OK, no time to worry about that now, we need to go to town for groceries. So we do. Stop at Island Water World for a dinghy cable lock and a couple other things. We’d like a bbq but they are extraordinarily expensive. Fill our backpack, cooler bag and a few other bags full of groceries – including frozen fruit so we can try our Bullet Blender Clone.

Dinghy back, unload the groceries then we take the barrel over to Bob’s (we’re giving it to him as a thank you). The dinghy coughs, sputters and dies on the way. That’s odd. Give it a minute or two, it starts back up no problem. Oh well.

Dinghy over to Whisper Cove to book a laundry spot – dinghy dies again on the way. Whisper Cove looks like fun, we’ll have to come back. Now we’re going back to Bob’s, haul the barrel up to his house, then treat ourselves to a swim off his dock for the effort.

Dinghy dies again, this time won’t restart. I start rowing, but to Milu, not Bob’s – the barrel can wait. I’ve hardly begun when a lovely couple shows up on their way to pick up their kids somewhere. Chrissy and John graciously tow us back to Milu.

So now we’re at anchor in Woburn Bay WITH TWO BOATS THAT WON’T START.

Not sure how this is going to play out. If we don’t get the dinghy at least working, then we’re rowing or swimming.