Not a banner week

We are ensconced in our new apartment.  It is roomy and I have managed to frame a few of our pictures from around the world so it feels like our space.

The furniture from Mark and Jen's cabin fits in well and will be great for the time we are here.  We are using their dishes as well so we would be able to go sailing in the spring without transfering a bunch of housewares. We had a few hitches hooking up our internet, but it finally has happened, yeah!!  

At the dock almost ready to be lifted out, no dodger, no sails, very few lines, boom waiting to be tied down.

The other problem is the boat.  We had a lift out scheduled for last Tuesday and we were all prepared. When the travel lift hoisted the boat out of the water it was not level, the operator thought it would straighten out when he put it down, but no such luck.  

Look at how crooked the boat is VERY SCARY!!!

We tried everything, putting the jackstands high on one side and low on the other but the boat just kept looking more and more crooked. IT WAS UGLY. At one point it bent one of our brand new jackstands. Then the lift started malfunctioning, the brake didn't work and the cables kept slipping and the boat would suddenly lurch, NOT GOOD to have a 26,000 lbs.of anything jerking about in the air.  I was almost sick to my stomach.  We finally decided that the best thing to do was put it back in the water and try to lift it straighter. We had to wait four hours for the tide to come up and then tried again, it wasn't completely straight when he lifted it and the operator put it down and said that he didn't know why it wasn't coming out straight and he wouldn't do it again. SO, we took the boat back to the slip. 

It was so disappointing not to get her out, we have had her lifted seven times before and we have never had a problem before.   We put a level on the boat and discovered that it did not sit level in the water so we moved our extra chain around inside the boat and we took 100 litres of fuel out of the bow and put it in jerry cans so it won't be on the boat the next time we go to lift it.  We also took off our wind generator and our wind vane hoping we could be lifted out backwards but after doing that work we looked at the travel lift again and once we measured we could only be lifted out bow first.  I guess we should have measured before we did all the work, when will we learn. 

We went to see a different lift operator on Thursday morning at the club, thinking he would give us a time for our haul out and he informed us that the cables on the lift  were fraying and needed to be replaced so probably the soonest we could be lifted out was next Wed.  In the afternoon I convinced Barry we needed a change of pace and we went to a local 9 hole golf course and shot a round of golf. I quickly pulled out in the lead with a couple of lovely fairway shots and then my game fell apart and Barry pulled ahead.  Going into the 9th hole Barry was 2 strokes ahead but he choked on the green  and we finished the round all even.  It was a beautiful day, the sun gleamed down on the trees lining the course that were all shades yellow, red and orange, gorgeous.