We're Yard Rats in Gloucester, Mass

Yep, yard rats, but you have to say it with a Boston accent. We are still out of the water, walking around the shipyard like we live here (since we do); looking like we work here since we are always carrying tools and boat parts around. We can give you our coordinates (N42 36.715 W70 38.99) since we have a working GPS (it’s a good shot in GoogleEarth).

We rented a car last week to drive across the border into New Hampshire (no sales tax) and purchase some of the items we needed; we later found out from our friends in NH that makes us massholes. Reinhart is busy as a bee installing all of the new electronics which arrive daily…in boxes…with lots of Styrofoam peanuts. When things first started arriving we were buried in boxes (and peanuts), the cockpit and saloon were full of parts and tools (and boxes, and peanuts). That is almost all taken care of now, the boxes are put away in the aft cabin, and there isn’t a piece of Styrofoam in sight. I’m not much help to Reinhart, but at least I can pull new wires through the boat when necessary. On Monday we had to take apart the boat to pull a few wires, and when it started to become clear that we weren’t going to get it all put together before dark, we started calling hotels. We lucked out getting a special deal at an ocean front inn nearby we could ride our bikes to. We had a great night ordering in pizza and watching cable TV. The wifi was even good enough for a long skype call home on Tuesday morning.

Almost everything imaginable has been installed now, instruments, transducers, navigation lights, antennas, the refrigerator compressor, the AC/Heat compressor, a TV, a stereo, etc. We are just waiting on a few specialized parts to arrive next week: the alternator and the electrical panel. Reinhart is finishing up the roller furling today and then Kevin and Karen will be coming down to pick us up and take us to New Hampshire for the weekend. We hope to get the boat back in the water on Tuesday and then we can start to turn on the water cooled systems to see if they are really working! We’ll let you know how it is going and how our weekend in New Hampshire turned out once we are floating again next week!