Sunday 12/3/2017  Vero Beach Layover

Since I'm usually asleep by 9pm, I'm usually up by 5.  And that means I'm working on getting the dinghy in the water and the motor as soon as daylight arrives.  I devised a sling and a block and tackle that I hang from my spare halyard.  It works pretty well but I'm sure I'll get better at it.  I would not have wanted an audience for today's performance.  The motor was another challenge.  I had a combination lock on the motor, mounted on the stern rail.  I had a piece of tape on the back of the lock with the numbers 6 24 22.  I spent almost an hour trying to get that lock off before I realized I had written it backwards.  Why do I do things like that?  At least I didn't have to cut it off with a hack saw.   Getting the gas into the tank on the motor was the next major feat.  I do love the new "spill proof" gas cans.  Between the gas leaking out of the spout fitting and the nozzle plugging the motor fill hole, I only lost about a pint of gas. 

My other task for the morning was to get the my two 50 watt solar panels set up and connected.  These are flexible panels and they lay on top of the bimini.  I have an older 65 watt panel that sits on the cabin top aft of the mast.  Getting the two 50s set up and running the cabling only took a short time.  However, I wanted to do some testing of the new controller and that took another couple hours. 

So, at around 11am, I took the dinghy to shore.  The engine started right up and ran great both going and coming back.  I spent about an hour at the marina but they make it hard for non paying cruisers to use any of the facilities so there wasn't much to do.  Tomorrow, I'll pay for a mooring (but stay at anchor) just so I can use the facilities (dinghy dock, lounge/wifi).