Boating with Sunset Delight: 2021: Art Classes and Electricity

24 Feb 2021

Maintenance Run on Boat

For some exercise, I decided to take a walk out to the 7 Mile Bridge. For a slight change of pace, I decided to cross over Route 1 when I got as far as Isla Bella Resort and explore the streets near the Sunset Grille Restaurant. I walked down Knights Key Blvd and then followed Kyle Way around the block.

The view from a vacant lot just after Sunset Grille was breath-taking!

Having stayed in Marathon a number of times, I have often seen signs for Captain Pip's, but this is the first time I walked past their location.

I should have brought water with me for the walk. The sun was baking hot. I decided to stop into the market at Isla Bella for water. I knew it would be expensive but argued with myself that keeping hydrated was important. $4 later, I walked out with a small bottle of Fiji Artesian Water. It did the job!

Walking back to our marina, I passed the grounded sailboats I saw on my last walk this way. They looked worse for wear from last time.

S/V aground

Zoomed in view of S/V

One of them had clearly been pushed closer to shore than my last view of the wreck.

Grounded S/V almost on shore!

Nice solar panels - Looked like it was a decent boat!

On my last walk, workers were out replacing the hotel sign in front of the marina. New owners decided that the hotel should be renamed appropriately.

Hyatt no more!

We did our weekly boat maintenance run late in the afternoon. It was the out-and-back-in-an-hour rendition.

25 February 2021

No boat travel.

Today was mostly a work day. When we had the weekly pumpout, we were told that we had the honor of being the first ones to use the new pump-out equipment. Several jokes were made about it blowing up in Clark's face, etc. Fortunately, we had no mishaps, and I was glad I did not need to dispose of his clothes!

Besides pumpout, I did laundry and Clark worked on varnishing the boat trim. He is looking for a better solution for the teak trim wear and tear than semi-annual varnishing. It is a tedious and hot job!

After a busy work day, we strolled over to see who was at Thursday-night docktails, found a few folks to talk to, and saw a lovely sunset! As part of the enhancements to the marina, two firepit stations are set up near the pool for ambiance. One can be seen in the foreground of the picture below.

Sunset behind the marina pool area

Thursday nights we typically watch "Young Sheldon" as we both get a kick out of the family interactions. Halfway through the show, we hear "boom boom boom" as someone knocks on the side of the boat. Since absolutely no one comes to visit at 8:15 at night, we wondered what was up. Mel was knocking - his boat had no power! Clark to the rescue!

A poor connection in the electric pedestal had caused the power outage and damaged Mel's connector. A burning smell came from the pedestal. The plastic in the receptacle had melted from the heat of the bad connection onto one of the contacts and welded the plug to the receptacle.

Clark managed to break the weld and separate the two parts. Then, he cleaned the melted plastic off the prongs of the plug and inserted it into an unused receptacle on our side of the pedestal. With that, Morning Star was good for the night.

26 February 2021

No boat travel.

Low Country Boil Night

The fix to Mel's electric last night was only temporary. This morning, Mel went to West Marine and bought a new 50 amp twist-lock plug. Mel removed the old plug, and with Clark's help, reassembled the new plug. The original receptacle on Mel's side of the pedestal was totally out of commission, sot they tried to plug it into the alternate receptacle on his side. (We are billed for electric so his vs our side matters.) Unfortunately, the receptacle on his side was stiff. Aaron, who works at the marina, came by and used brute force to twist lock it into place. That worked, and now all is well with Mel's connection.

As Clark and Mel worked on the electric issue, they drew a crowd.

Repair in progress

Became a spectator sport!

All done! Yay!

At 5:00 we had a special group dinner planned for Staff Appreciation. Mel and Ann of Morning Star II orchestrated a Low Country Boil for tonight's event. We had a moderate but friendly crowd, and the staff really appreciated the food and gratuities offered up.

Chocolate and Vanilla Layer Cake
hand-decorated from Publix

Ev and Clark

Wendy and Ev

Mel "Thank you Staff!" presentation

Shrimp on Boil

End result - they even threw in crabs!

27 February 2021

No boat travel.

Anna May Wilson, a delightful teenager residing on a boat here in the marina, is interested in engineering type discussions with Clark. He invited her over today to talk about and work with volt meters. They sat out in the cockpit, and I tucked myself over in a corner to enjoy fresh air and observe. Using a shiny penny and a piece of zinc with salt water, they made a battery and measured the current.

While I listened to their discussion, I pulled out my colored pencils to work on a picture. Ella, Anna May's sister, let me know before we even arrived at the marina in December that she wanted to do some art with me like we did last year. She even told me what type of picture she wanted. It had to have a beach, palm trees, shells and a sunset.

My demo picture for Ella to work on

All through January and February, I had tried to figure out a day when I could address Ella's request that we do art work. Due to pandemic, I wanted to be able to have an open air situation. January's continuous north winds made it too cold and windy to even have the salon doors open for air let alone sit out in the cockpit to do art work. On the few occasions the weather cooperated, we found that one or the other of us had scheduling conflicts.

Finally, today, we managed to get together. Just as Anna May finished her session with Clark and was ready to go back to her boat, Ella arrived. Once Anna May saw our plans, she sat down to join us.

Art Class - Ella and Anna May
Colored Pencils

Anna May almost done

Anna May's final work

Ella - all smiles

Ella's finished work

28 February 2021

No boat travel.

Ella enjoyed her time so much yesterday, she asked if she could come back today. We planned on her doing a colored-pencil dolphin picture. She finished that one so fast, she wanted to do something else. I came up with a flamingo for her to work on.

Ella busy at work.
Dolphin finished. Time for a Flamingo.

Ella's flamingo
She wanted a butterfly as well.

Proud artist!

1 March 2021

No boat travel.

When Ella left yesterday, we agreed that we would get together again today and pull out the acrylic paints. She had seen a picture on my wall of a dolphin in a sunset and wanted to do a similar picture. I sketched an outline for her, and she took it from there.