Yes, we’re back on the water! We are now Fire Engine Red with a new bright red-and-white headsail to boot! It’s been a warm spring and we are taking advantage of it.
The excitement started the last week in April, right after we got Amicus II in the water and a TV crew from WDIO came out and filmed us on the water. They came up with an awesome clip for MN TV (watch it yourself by looking up our Facebook page or linking in at http://www.wdio.com/article/stories/S2614836.shtml?cat=10335) which we missed because 1. we have no TV and 2. we were on the boat. We’ve also had two newspaper interviews, numerous library/bookstore signings, and lots of interest in our book which has blossomed into great free advertising for us, our charter sailing, and our lifestyle in general.
But, back to the trip. Right after a marathon weekend in Minneapolis at the Midwest Mountaineering Expo, where we kept up a booth for 3 days and talked to thousands of people about sailing, Mark waited for the first day with a W in the forecast and headed straight to Bayfield in the Apostle Islands for a long date with Walkie, our favorite diesel mechanic who has been rebuilding a Perkins Engine for us. And thus began our education into what-it-means-to-actually-get-a-new engine 101.
On the first day Mark and Walkie, through some ingenius trick of ropes and pulleys, removed the old engine (an old engine made in Europe with no manual and no spare parts to be found anywhere, including on the internet) and started working on the mounts for a new engine. “I think it’s going to be a few days,” Mark said to me on the phone, but the girls and I were packed and ready for a vacation. Besides, we had lots of friends in the area. “We’re coming,” I replied. “If we’re not allowed in the boat we’ll stay with friends.”
As it turned out, Walkie was busy with the engine in his own shop all weekend, so we had a weekend on the boat sans engine. It was chilly and foggy. I had made a brilliant discovery the fall before, which was if I brought my yoga mat with me, I was much more likely to keep up my feel-happy-and-healthy yoga routine on docks, cabintops, and other nearby surfaces. So I did my yoga and the girls fought over the primo spot on the boom to watch the boatyard, and Mark continued to do projects on the boat which appeared endless, even then. It was nice to be living aboard though a little strange to stay put no matter what the weather. I discovered I was exhausted and slept like a drugged woman every night. We walked the streets of Bayfield and peddled our new book (Big Waves, Small Boat, Two Kids—see our website for more info.) everywhere we could. We played at the playground and looked at boats.
Monday morning the girls and I left for a homeschoolers’ gathering in Cornucopia, WI. We knew about it from our friends the Sauter-Sargents, a homeschooling family that lives in a made-over barn, manages a small farm and a chicken CSA, and sells fermented products all over the Midwest. And, they are sailors! Needless to say we enjoyed spending the time with them; their daughters are our daughters’ ages. In fact the girls were bent on spending the night there (WITHOUT parents).
The homeschooling gathering was a blast. The girls made some instant friends; everyone made tortillas and ate them, and then we all went exploring on the beach. It was a gorgeous day, even a little warm, and of course once one small child headed into the water there was no stopping any of them. Soon all kids, big and small, (and one dad—Andrew Sauter-Sargent--the dad who headed up the tortilla-making, in fact) went in just like the rest. Clearly he has not lost his small child within. Luckily there were backup blankets for afterwards.
The girls then stayed at the Sauter-Sargents while I drove down to Ashland to peddle the book and buy groceries. Mark and I spent a pleasant evening alone (no engine yet) and I finished sewing the cushion-covers. The next morning I said good-bye to Mark (the arrival of the engine appeared imminent) and picked up the girls. We said good-bye to the Sauter-Sargents and hello to the Holdens, old and dear homeschooling friends of ours who lived another hour away in Port Wing. And there, at the Holdens, we stayed for almost four days. Twice a day Mark and I reviewed the situation over the phone. It was becoming apparent that getting a new engine is like getting a new organ—a lot of things have to work together and the engine has to agree with its new owner. And all this takes close monitoring, frequent adjusting, and lots of time. Walkie worked late into the night with Mark, who watched, learned, helped, and ran errands. There was a hardware store just a block away, which was handy because, Mark told me, he went there several times a day. “They must have wondered what was going on,” he remarked. He was filthy the entire time and his fingers were usually covered with grease, dirt, and blood. “But they never asked,” he finished, “so I never told them.”
Meanwhile we were having a lovely time. We adore the Holdens and they adore us. Luckily. I tried to be helpful, which basically meant I did a lot of dishes. Coulter and Cedar Wind (Holden), the two older boys (who with our girls formed what we call “the posse,”) became a formidable force that spent the majority of the day climbing trees, playing games, chasing chickens, dipping in the lake, and occasionally getting roped into chores or a little schooling. They appeared only at mealtimes. I could tell the girls were exhausted with this pace of life, but thanks to the extreme vitality that emanates from the Holdens and everything about them, including a gluten-free dairy-free diet, no one got sick even when they spent the night in a slumber party on the deck, under the stars and not too far from a bunch of howling coyotes and the dawn calls of both roosters and peacocks. Meanwhile, Stacy and her little girls (4 and under 1) and I spent the days gardening, cooking, and chatting. Late in the evening Dustin (dad) came home and we chatted long past my bedtime. The next day Dustin accomplished in about an hour what it would have taken Mark or I a full day to do to spruce up our website. How indebted we are to the Holdens! We were blessed with warm—even hot—windy weather and a few extended trips to the sandy beach made the days long and full.
On Friday Mark finally gave us the go-ahead to come back to the boat (though he warned us, “It’s not done yet”) and we arrived precisely at suppertime with a pre-cooked chicken. There, in a slight drizzle, Stacy said good-bye to her two boys who were coming sailing with us! Her two little girls clinging to her, she held a little conference behind the minivan to remind them to take their supplements, wear enough clothes, be good to each other, and who knows what else—how does a mother say good-bye to her two big boys, their blond pony-tails flowing out from underneath the woolen hats she made them that they never take off--right before they go out on their own for the first time ever? All I know is that she was teary when she got back. The boys were calm, excited, and ready to go.
However, we couldn’t actually GO anywhere yet. I let everyone enter the cabin from the front hatch (the v-berth, where Mark and I sleep) because Mark and Walkie and the engine and all its parts took up the entire hatch area, including the girls’ bunks. The posse became instant experts at bringing large amounts of gear in and out the front hatch. We ate a late supper and prepared for bed. I jammed big cushions between the front half and the back half of the cabin so that we could read in peace, as the mechanics had advanced to the point of turning on the engine and it was LOUD. I put the girls to sleep in the v-berth and the boys sacked out on their double berth over the saloon. The engine went off, Walkie disappeared for the night, and Mark and I cleaned up as best we could and returned the sleeping girls to their bunks.
Saturday we woke up raring to go. Mark had a bunch of tweaking still to do but he was on his own since Walkie was in great demand and was in fact launching boats at another marina all weekend. By Saturday afternoon he declared us ready for a spin around the islands, and with great excitement we headed out. After a ½ hour of running the engine without mishap we headed up towards Raspberry Bay. The sailing was mild and Cedar Wind (not to be confused with Cedar Dance Gordon) learned to manage the wheel while Coulter raised the sails. The girls realized how interesting it all was and took renewed interest. All went well until the wind died out and Mark turned on the motor. He sat in the cockpit. “I feel like I should be really worried,” he commented. I laughed.
Twenty minutes later he went to check the engine, again, and popped his head up almost instantly."Throttle down!” he ordered. I did.
30 seconds later—“Turn it off!” I did.
All was silent.
The posse showed up. “What happened?” My eyes were questioning Mark as well. He turned to me, chagrined. “You know that hose that Walkie was going to bring over on Monday? Well, the jury-rigged one is leaking oil badly.” I looked down in horror; sure enough, pools of oil lay in the shiny painted engine floor. “Dang.” I gulped.
We looked around. It was essentially calm. Mark left a message with Walkie, then called the Coast Guard. “We’re becalmed without an engine off Red Cliff point,” he told them. As usual, as soon as he told about the kids on the boat, the ante was raised. He was told everyone should immediately don lifejackets, even in the cabin. (This, he told me later, is actually not protocol.) The kids were already lifejacketed and this was a great adventure for them. They watched as the Coast Guard boat, which was nearby anyway, came over to us. A slight breeze had sprung up from the direction we were headed, and we put up the sails. The breeze picked up in seconds. We set sails and started to head back. The Coast Guard, courteous and friendly, was nevertheless somewhat distracting as they called us, made plans, heard our plans, agreed to follow us, and sent out a call all over the radio regarding our plight. The breeze turned hard and gusty and the posse came and sat in the cockpit, which felt safest. We heeled over hard in the gusts and Coulter looked at me with wide eyes. They were getting their first real sailing! Soon they learned how to have fun with it. They watched the clinemeter that measures the degree of heel and shouted out in the gusts—“We are 20 degrees over! 34 degrees over!”
Mark and I were busy. One of us steered, getting the most out of the gusts, and the other tied things down below, answered Coast Guard calls, and trimmed sails. I started supper—a hefty roast, pressure cooking on a rocking gimbaled stove. We tacked three or four times and were near the marina by suppertime. “When’s supper?” Cedar asked. I put all supper preparations in the deep, safe sink, hoped it would keep cooking in the pressure cooker and told her, “Once we get in.” “But I’m starving!” she protested, unimpressed as usual by crisis.
Finally we turned in towards the marina. The breeze was dying already, and more so by the shore, creating ideal conditions for slowly ghosting in under sail. Which is exactly what we did. Coast Guard officials waited for us on the dock with extra ropes. They were young and military, snapping “ma’ams” to me even across the water. We pulled in and Mark cracked a smile. Not even a bump to the hull.
Of course, the Coast Guard then had to board us to make sure everything was in order. One of the Guards stood outside while I fed the posse in the cockpit. The roast was incredibly tender and so were the potatoes and gravy. “Come join us!” I called to the coasty guard official, and he did. Meanwhile, mark (who never gets impatient at any of this) graciously allowed the boat to be inspected. The guys admired his sailing skills and told him so. “This is the first time I’ve ever seen a sailboat rescue itself,” one said. “Did any oil get into the lake?” the other checked. “No—that’s all waiting for me in the bilge,” Mark answered. They laughed, waved, and left.
The next day was Sunday. Walkie was still occupied and the essential hoses had not yet arrived so we spent the day having fun. Not sure what the posse did all day but the four of them could be seen together at any time. They took the boatyard by storm. They had built a marvelous miniature sailboat back in Port Wing—including a fin-shaped slate keel, nail stanchions, and a wooden dodger—and when a wooden boat builder took them on a tour of his shop, they showed him their boat and asked for advice. (It wouldn’t float.) “More ballast?” They guessed, and he nodded. “That’s what you really need.” They sighed—they had not found a solution to this problem thus far.
When not working on their boat, they pulled stuff out of the water—hooks, bumpers, even a chair. That one took hours. Finally, setting their sights on a huge hook 6 feet under, they spent hours leaning over the lifelines with the boathook. Eventually they got out the kayak. Somewhere in there Cedar Dance leaned out too far and fell in the water, over the kayak. Then the boathook was gone, then the kayak was let loose….they could not stop talking about it later. I’m still not sure what happened, but it was definitely the highlight of the trip so far. Cedar beamed with accomplishment the rest of the day.
Monday was another waiting day, and it would have been hard except that the weather continued hot and glorious and the posse was a pleasure to watch. Coulter and Cedar Wind are two very special boys. There was never any conflict—only minor irritations between siblings—and no fixed hierarchy. Coulter, as the oldest, was always surrounded, but CedarWind had his own antics and works the hardest. Often he had his own following. Lamar adores Coulter with all her heart because he is old but also kind and inclusive and understands things like “Deery,” her pet deer. Cedar and Cedar were the wrestlers, the crazy ones, the spastic ones. The four of them were assigned dishes to do each day, and a little bit of work, but other than that they were on their own.
In the morning Mark did some map-reading and navigating with the kids. Then we made maps and I even prevailed upon them to play a math game. Late Monday afternoon I was at the beach with the posse (who were pointedly playing far from me) when we looked up and saw our beautiful, unmistakable fire-engine red hull nosing out from the marina into the lake. Hurray! It took a spin and eventually came back, Walkie and Mark mostly triumphant with the results. Apparently the engine had made one last protest that afternoon when somewhere water mixed with oil and made a milky mess. “She just doesn’t want to leave me,” Walkie told me. I gave him a copy of our book and a big hug and he left us that night for the last time. Mark talked to him several times over the phone the next day, but by noon on Tuesday Mark declared it ready to go once again.
Only problem was, it was gusting up to 30 knots out there. After lunch we sat around and read aloud and waited for the wind to drop, which it did by mid-afternoon. We said good-bye to Kenny, the marina guy, who was incredibly generous with the dock space we’d been at for nearly two weeks and hardly charged us a thing. “I’ll miss you guys,” he said. “Why not leave tomorrow?” But we were ready to go, and we motored up to Oak Island. Mark barely stopped watching the engine the whole time. We anchored and it was peaceful and lovely and a little bit bouncy. After supper everyone was ready for bed.
Wednesday Mark and I woke early with no way to escape the cabin quietly, as we usually did while the kids slept in. So we put the dinghy and the kayaks in the water and that woke them up. All four kids are avid kayakers. In minutes Cedar Dance and Coulter were in the kayaks, heading for shore. The others followed while I made breakfast. It was bittersweet, watching them. Kayaking, sailing, anchoring…this was the plan for the whole trip! Ah well…another time. We were scheduled to leave for Isle Royale in two weeks, and between now and then we had umpteen jobs to do, food to order, book signings to attend, interns to house, calls to make, books to mail…so by 9:00 we were motoring out of the islands. The winds had turned to NE, of all good fortune, and we sailed downwind for an hour in lovely but chilly conditions. We had a half-a-book to read aloud before the trip ended, and we got to it. But then the wind died, which disappointed the crew but Mark considered a special gift from Mother Nature Herself, as it gave him 5 solid hours to run the engine at every RPM and check it and check it until he began to feel confident that it was going to run properly. I went with the posse to the bow of the boat—away from the rumble—and we did a marathon read, learning all about Gary Paulsen’s foray into Iditarod dogsledding. They wouldn’t let me stop until it was all over, and we were thoroughly chilled and also starving, and only an hour from Knife River.
And that’s the story! We came in without incident and met Stacy and the two little girls. Sadly, Dustin had to work and couldn’t be there to see his boys, surely looking a little different, treating the boat like their own home but eager to hear how their ducks and chicks were growing.
This was a very special trip. We ran out of camera battery early on and can’t do it justice in pictures anyway, but there will soon be a few taken from our cell phone in an album. Stay tuned; in just two weeks we head to Isle Royale with four young adults!
