What a difference two days makes, eh? Normally I would expect a statement like that to allude to a weekend, but nope, not today. I posted just recently how they were starting to get things moving on the boat side of the marina. This was because I saw them launching a sailboat off a trailer, stepping the mast, and then it vanished to parts unknown. Yesterday was spent mostly putting the last dock sections in, save one or two, which they got around to this morning. And then the rains came on the lake. According to the weather channel, it was a band that looked like it would last a few hours, so I had stopped watching the camera during work for a while. Imagine my surprise when I checked back at 6 PM (they would've long gone home by then), and saw this.

    There's no mistaking the silly blue hatch. Yessir, that would be my boat in the slings, floating merrily in the loading slip and awaiting it's departure. Granted, they had all ended their day after getting it this far, but it'll be interesting to watch tomorrow and see the mast go up. More interesting than that however, will be where it ends up, and how. 

    Last season was the start of the marina launching boats without owners present. It saves time, and in the Covid clutches, was safer for the staff to not have lots of people clamoring over each other on the deck. Unfortunately, this did lead to a couple hiccups that I had posted about. To recap - the halyards were run through the spreaders, which left them unusable until I was able to get them to go up and straighten them out when I was gone the next weekend. And I had run them on the wrong side of the forestay tang on the masthead. Now, both of these were my fault, though had I been able to attend the launch, I would've caught them immediately and fixed them within five, maybe ten minutes. More concerning was where and how the boat was slipped. 

    You can make out a white fishing boat on the opposite side of the dock just behind the travel lift in the picture. My boat was slipped on this side of the dock, directly opposite. That already was a little strange, as the depth there isn't really ideal for a 5' draft, but ok, it managed. However, they parked it stern in, likely due to not being able to start the outboard. Fair enough, except they pulled it so far inward that the outboard was quite literally getting banged off the dock for a couple days until a neighboring owner noticed and did me a favor by pulling the boat forward a little bit. Don't get me wrong, stern in was fine, and it made it easier to mount the solar panel. But the outboard getting thrashed was a little upsetting. And that was the old Mercury outboard, not this newer Tohatsu that I really hope isn't subjected to the same fate. This one does have electric start, with a dead battery, but should also start just fine once the gas line is hooked up, with a few good pulls on the cord. On a related note, I've already started ordering replacement cables to run from the outboard to replace the one I tried splicing in, in the event that it doesn't hold the amperage correctly once I've got the battery topped off. We'll see as the season goes, but at least this one does start more reliably than the Merc did, even with the pull start. The only downfall is that it takes more effort to yank this cord, even though it takes less pulls. Tradeoffs, I guess.

    I'm not sure if I'll be able to get up there for the weekend, or just waiting until Monday or so, but that might also just depend on the speed of UPS this week. I had to order a new spring for my riding mower so I can chop down the budding forest that is my lawn, and also ordered a new deck gland for the battery cables when I get to that. I also ordered some long overdue new clevis pins for my shrouds. I've been using generic 3/8" pins from the hardware bins of Lowes - I'm in fresh water so being high grade stainless wasn't a priority, but I've been meaning to replace them ever since I got the boat. So I've ordered the shroud pins to take up with me and swap out, and then after I get to double check the forestay and backstay sizes, I can order those too for the next trip up, probably in two weeks.

    My plan so far, is to stay up for the better part of my first week off, then come back home for a few days in the middle of my vacation, and then follow it up with the last week up enjoying the floating fun. Granted, I haven't looked at the weather upcoming, but then again it changes so quickly on the Great Lakes as it is, I don't think it would help much. As long as I have a cooler full of water and some munchies, I'm good.