Sunday 21st June 2015

Distance sailed 5 miles

Monday 15 June Anne and I took the bus from Woods Hole to Falmouth bus station where we were collected by Hertz to hire a car. Anne drove 60 miles to Taunton where I bought 6x10 litre containers of methanol for the fuel cell, enough to get us across the Atlantic again. Next day Shelduck was due to be lifted out at MacDougalls boatyard in Falmouth. Doug Handy, Dockmaster at Woods Hole appointed Ben with a fast skiff to monitor our short passage. Ben arrived at 0800 and we agreed to communicate on channel 09. Before Shelduck left the berth at 08.45 I checked the VHF with Ben who was staying,at the ready, at Woods Hole, The five mile passage to Falmouth was uneventful. I was very careful to keep well clear of buoys. Soon after Shelduck arrived at MacDougalls, she was lifted out and we found the rudder was not in too bad shape but it was split and had dropped 50mm. Shelduck was able to steer fully to starboard but only about 25% to port> The boat yard staff dismantled the steering and dropped the rudder to the ground but it could not be removed until Shelduck was lifted again.

The next day, Wednesday was spent preparing estimates, which I then forwarded to my insurance broker. Work here in the boatyard starts at 07.00 and next day Shelduck was the first to be lifted to remove the rudder for repair. Upon further inspection it was discovered that the bottom bearing was cracked and research commenced to find out whether a replacement was available. I spent the rest of the day cleaning the brown staining off the hull, which all boats get here from some kind of fungus in the water. The yard provided me with a cleaning compound diluted in water.

On Friday the bearing replacement was found in France and put on order and they then removed the cracked one. The manufacturers website was a great help in this. I continued to work on the hull for the day climbing the ladder many times.

On Saturday Anne and I took the bus at 12.15 to Logan airport and arrived at 14.00 to collect my daughter Patricia. Patricia’s plane arrived on time at 14.40 but she did not emerge until 16.40. It took two hours to clear Immigration. We then took a bus back to Falmouth arriving at 19.40. but found there there was no taxi available for 30 minutes to bring us back to the boat. While sitting in the bus station waiting on the taxi a trolley bus pulled in so we went aboard to see what route it took. It had a stop about three quarters of a mile from Shelduck. Having passed his last stop and with only us aboard, the trolley bus driver told me that as it was his last run of the day he would drive us to the boat yard. Surely the first Trolley bus seen at MacDougalls.  Patricia’s total travelling time from Paris to Shelduck was over 24 hours.

We have met so much personal kindness here in the U.S.