Welcome to the family, SeaBright!

8.16.2009

This morning, John and Jeanie Coyle’s boat, SeaBright, was officially welcomed into the Outer Reef family.


Here's a bunch of us waiting for the christening to start:


Since we were all so smished in next to each other, we had to be flexible and christen the stern so that the Smalls’ boat, Illusion IV, didn’t end up covered in champagne. Jeanie hit the bottle against a stern cleat instead of the anchor.




After the christening, it took a while, but we all made it out of the gridlock.


Now we’re in Stonington, CT.

We saw North Block Island lighthouse:


We saw Watch Hill lighthouse:


And we saw Point Judith:
that one turned out pretty cool.

Here's our sunset:


We had a chill day after a big weekend. Tomorrow is a maintenance/layover day, then Tuesday we're headed to Mystic.

Thanks for reading! love! :D

Pirates, AARG!

8.15.09

Today is Halloween on Block Island.

This morning, the guys from Concord Electronics came to the boat and fixed everything. AND brought internet. AND made it so that it’ll be easier to find wireless from now on! Woohoo! So, until something else breaks, we think they’re wonderful.

Once they left, we made sure the boat looked presentable enough for the yacht hop scheduled for after lunch. Speaking of, here are a couple more pictures of the boats all together:

After the yacht hop, we flew kites!!! Turns out, I’m not a great kite flyer. My kite had a tendency to bomb others. Oh well. They were really pretty!
Here's mine, during a rare moment that it was actually flying:
And here's me attempting to keep it in the air:
Story time: one kite (that I was NOT manning) bombed another one and somehow cut the string off. The victim kite went flying up and over the pool, made a quick turn down the left side of the dock, dipped way low almost to the water, and then shot up in the sky, its string caught on (we speculate) the radar on the flybridge of an innocent boat. So funny. And here’s the picture:

At 4pm, there was a wine tasting- yum-oh!
And later, there was dinner, awards (Who Traveled the Farthest? Andrew and Jo from Australia. Who has the Biggest Engines? Barry Allred. Stuff like that…), and dancing. The whole night was pirate themed- there were quite a few Outer Reef-ers who definitely made the effort. There was a DJ there, doing a wonderful job of singing fun music, and the food- surprise, surprise- was wonderful.

After dinner, some of us went down to the end of the dock to check out the Halloween costumes. Boy, were there some costumes: entirely too many men dressed as slutty women, and 2 too many boys dressed as babies, diapers and all. Gross.

Tomorrow, we have to leave. Everyone is already really excited about the next rendezvous. In the Keys, perhaps? Outer Reef (Jeff and Colleen, in particular) did a wonderful job. I doubt the location would make much of a difference.

Have a great day! Carlson out.

WILL PADDLE FOR FOOD

8.14.09

Happy Anniversary, John and Jeanie!


This morning, Barry and I went kayaking! It was way fun. There was a group of 10 of us early risers and 1 guide. Luckily, they’re not the kind of kayaks we’re used to at home, otherwise we would have been rather chilly. The water is barely 70 degrees (that’s colder than the water at the Springs, thereby making it intolerable.) While a few of us were waiting on the rest of the group, we heard a man yelling from his boat- no idea what he was saying, but turns out his name is Aldo. He runs a bakery on Block Island and was keen enough to figure out that anyone anchored out in the water has a tough time getting to the bakery in the mornings, so he just brings his bakery to them! Needless to say, the group of us high-tailed it across the water for sticky buns!!! I wasn’t as brave as some others who got a cup of coffee as well (no cupholders.) …but dang, if that wasn’t the best sticky bun ever! Once we rejoined the rest of the group, we all leisurely paddled along the shore line, saw egrets, and I think a heron, and a crab walking across the bottom (didn’t think the water would be that clear), and a sailboat that we’d already seen in New London: Breakin’ Wind. Oh, and they have a ton of jellyfish here too, but they’re tiny- no bigger than a golf ball, and more see-through, harder to see.

After kayaking, Barry went to 2 different seminars… stuff about boat technology and whatnot… very helpful, apparently.

After lunch, we went on a tour of the SouthEast Block lighthouse.
And we got to go up to the top! Here I am, waving!See me?

From there, we went to the Mohegan Bluffs. This is the view from the top:
What are not shown in this picture are approximately 200 steps. Then rocks to climb down from the 200 steps to the beach. My legs are killing me! But it was totally worth going all the way down those steps. The water was gorgeous and the view from the beach up to the bluffs was amazing!!

When the guide drove us back to the marina, he took us around the other side of the island just to show us the beautiful scenery. They have what you can call terrain here, haha… cliffs, hills and valleys, ponds everywhere… really pretty. And a cemetery. Here are 2 strategically placed headstones.Ha!

For dinner, we had a clam bake! And the best clam chowder ever ever.

After dinner, we all went to the beach for a bonfire! It was so fun! A little chilly- the perfect night for it! I had a s'more! sooo good! and there was so little light you could see the stars perfectly! I even saw a shooting star!!!

Can’t wait for tomorrow! Life is good!

Rubix Cube

8.13.09

This morning, we left Newport in the rain. Less than fun. The temperature was nice though- 70ish? The ride over to Block Island wasn’t long, but the water was rough. I was nauseous. I hate nausea. Once we got closer to the marina, the water settled, and the dockmaster let us know it would be just a little while til we could get it- there are a TON of boats here this weekend (and apparently every weekend in season) and they had to do some rearranging to accommodate. A few Outer Reefs were already settled at the marina before we arrived, some were still on the way. Some fellow Outer Reef-er’s, Walter and John, joined us on the boat to help guide us in.It was tight.
And boy, did we have an audience, not to mention all the help we could ever have needed.
There are now 8 Outer Reefs all right next to each other.
Six 65’s (Risky Business, Copeing, SeaBright, Tomahawk, Freedom, and one unnamed)
One 63 (unnamed)
One 80 (Illusion IV).
Here's a picture of some of us:
Not only is this a rendezvous, it’s also a sort of boat show? They have flags set up outside all of our boats announcing our presence- the boat is getting more looks than usual.

At 7, there were cocktails on a boat named ShowTime- not an Outer Reef, but sooo pretty! …as was the sunset.
Everybody here is really great- and everybody came, it seems like!
The president of Outer Reef…
A man named Nansun (that’s probably not spelled right) is the guy who actually made the boats- he and his wife came all the way from Taiwan!
The guys who put the electronics/ Audio/Visual stuff on the boats came up…
And there are also people here from Yachting Magazine.

Then, at 8ish, we had dinner under a tent just up the hill from the docks- Italian, and sooo good! Somehow, I was talked into a kayak tour at 6:45 in the morning- I'm sure I'll have stories for you tomorrow!

Thanks for readin! Lovelove! :D