2014's accomplishments for the Oceanus crew

Hauling out Oceanus was only one of a list of accomplishments in 2014.

2014 was a seminal year for Virginia and me. We made several major steps toward our goal of cruising full time. Last year left us exhausted, but elated. Here's a list to buoy us up and to inform our readers.

Sold our house

Our house was a very very very fine house. We don't miss it.

Leaving the house we lived in for 11 years and getting rid of a lifetime of stuff was the hardest thing we did last year. Maybe in the last 10 years. We were pretty excited when we got a near full-price offer less than a week after we put it on the market in early summer. The excitement faded quickly when the buyer's agent fired off the first of nine adversarial revisions to the offer. The deal almost collapsed several times until finally closing more than four months after we put the house on the market.

Even though we loved our 1400-square-foot house, it was clearly too big. "The only thing I miss is my bathtub and washer and dryer," Virginia said.

Getting rid of our stuff

We are not hoarders by anyone's definition. But still we accumulated a small mountain of stuff. Paring it down to what fits in our Columbia 43 was just plain hard work. We sold tools, wood and excess boat stuff on Craig's List and on Ebay. Our kids rented a large truck and hauled away tables, chairs, beds, pots and pans.

With each trip to the dump or truckload of donations to the thrift store we felt lighter and more free. In the months since we haven't missed any of it.

Hauling out

Sanding down to the original gelcoat.

I hoped the haulout would take only two weeks. Boy, was I naive! It took almost seven. But the haulout was worth the effort, we:

• sandblasted the bottom and the keel taking off about six layers of old bottom paint;
• sanded, faired with epoxy the keel and bottom;
• painted three coats of epoxy barrier coats on the bottom and keel;
• painted two coats of Trinidad hard bottom paint;
• removed four through hulls and repaired the hull with epoxy and lots of fiberglass;
• installed three new through hulls;
• replaced two old through hulls;
• unstepped the mast and rewired it as well as taking apart all the rigging and inspecting it;
• removed an old transducer and replaced with a new one;
• removed rust and painted the mast step;
• made rigging improvements to the mast;
• sealed deck with epoxy around mast partners;
• removed and replaced the cutlass bearing;
• more than doubled the capacity of the cockpit drains
• and the most noticeable improvement -- we spent days and days sanding fairing and sanding some more before having the topsides professionally painted with the AwlCraft 2000.

It was the most physically demanding work we've done in a long time. We literally worked our butts off: we lost weight even eating almost exclusively fast foot for the entire haulout. We called it the boatyard workout. And it was every day, all day for both of us.

Toward the end of the haulout it was tough to haul our tired selves out of bed. "This is like the movie Groundhog Day," Virginia complained, "the same hell every day. Sanding and fairing and sanding some more."

It was dangerous too. Oceanus's deck was 12 feet off the ground and we made dozens of trips up and down the ladder each day. We also worked on scaffolding and with power tools. To make things even more scary we had no health insurance because we both ...

Quit our jobs

It was hard leaving a job I enjoyed and which provided a regular paycheck. It felt like stepping off into the abyss. I miss many things about the job, especially seeing my many friends.

Virginia resigned as a full-time nurse, but still works per-diem at the hospital, picking up about three 12-hour shifts a month. She is something of a minor celebrity when she returns. Her co-workers introduce her to patients as the nurse who lives on a sailboat and is about to sail away.

Oceanus leaves the dock under her own power

Oceanus heads down the river after her haulout. For 12 years she didn't leave her slip.

For most boats this wouldn't be a big deal, but Oceanus hadn't left her slip, except with the help of a tugboat, for more than 12 years. When a previous owner trucked her to Oregon from California he launched her at the Toledo Boatyard and found the engine didn't work. So he hired a tug to tow her down the river to Newport where she stayed in her slip for 12 years.

One of the things Jason, the owner we bought her from, did was rebuild her Perkins 4-108. But several engine issues remained when we bought her, including a leaking raw water pump and a prop that was the wrong size. Jason helped me replace the water pump and, after two trips to Astoria and three attempts by a professional diver, we installed the proper propeller.

Selling Ravn

I sold my beloved faering in 2014.

I suppose I should have included this in our second section, but Ravn deserves special mention. I wanted to build a faering for more than a decade and in 2010 finally finished a 19-foot version designed by Atkin. Before our lives changed, it was to be my last boat. I even joked that my family could use it to give me a Viking funeral when I died.

I loved that boat and poured three years of hard work and the finest wood I could find into building her. She was and is a head turner and won the People's Choice Award at the 2011 Toledo Wooden Boat Show. So selling her was a big deal to me. Luckily I found great new owners for her in Paul and Maryann. It helps that they are good friends and love the boat almost as much as me.

Finishing the head

Virginia gives a final coat of paint to the head.

The most unfinished space in the boat when we purchased her was the head. It was wonderful to build it just the way we wanted it, but it was a lot of work too. It turned out great with an AirHead composting head and a real bathtub.

Bimini and two enclosures

Virginia used the first enclosure, made from Sunbrella View, as a pattern for one made from clear vinyl. 

Virginia's skillfulness and ingenuity never ceases to amaze me. With the help of a local canvas guy, she designed and then he fabricated a stainless steel tubing frame for the bimini. Then she sewed the canvas for it, including a small window so you can see the masthead fly from the helm.

During the haulout (while the boat was in the paint tent and out of the wind) she patterned an enclosure. Once the boat was back in the slip, she sewed a warm-weather enclosure out of Sunbrella View fabric. Then she used that as a final pattern to sew an enclosure with clear vinyl windows for rainy, cold Northwest winters. Since we moved aboard, we are thankful for it every day for the enclosure.

Cabin sole

Varnished teak on the saloon sole gives way to paint with non-skid beads in the rest of the boat.

The plywood cabin sole of the boat was strong, but ugly. We considered several options, but in the end we replaced the ugly plywood in the main saloon with beautiful marine-grade teak plywood and varnished it. In the rest of the boat we cut access hatches to every section of the bilge, then faired, sanded and Virginia painted it. It looks good and is easy to care for.

Painted deck and non-skid

Virginia primes the deck for the first coat of non-skid.

Another huge project Virginia did almost singlehanded was stripping the old paint from the decks of Oceanus and repainting. The decks were repainted several times over the years filling the weave of the original non-skid pattern and making it unsafe. The decks also just looked ugly!

Virginia spent countless hours on her knees using Citrus Strip and a wire brush to prep the decks for painting. Then she did most the painting herself. I only helped with the tipping of the polyurethane paint in the water channels that border the non-skid sections.

Other projects

Oceanus never had curtains until Virginia sewed them using Sunbrella and a track from Sailrite.

We finished several other projects including more wiring, a real AC panel, plumbing projects, a 600-amp house battery bank and a 60-amp Sterling smart charger for the house battery bank and engine battery. I also rebuilt three more hatches and installed a freezer. Virginia sewed curtains for the main cabin. I will highlight several other projects in future posts.

Oceanus received notice in the media being featured in Three Sheets Northwest and named an honorary Columbia 50.

Adjusting our plans

As the haulout stretched into late October it became painfully clear to us that we were not going to sail south in 2014. The weather window slammed shut just days after we relaunched the boat. We also have several projects that need finishing before Oceanus is ready for blue water.

While we really wanted to celebrate last Christmas in the Sea of Cortez, moving our departure date forward has its advantages. One is that we will be around when our eighth grandchild is born in early May.

Another is the relief we felt when the deadline pressure was off. We now will have time to sail north and do our shakedown cruise in the familiar waters of San Juan Islands and Puget Sound. We will then sail south and take our time exploring the Channel Islands and other places in California before going to Mexico in the late fall.

New frig/freezer looks like a winner

Our new Engel Fridge/Freezer and all my fancy blocking to get it securely hung by the corners.

Son-in-law Tony got a long list of wiring projects completed over the Memorial Day weekend and a couple of good starts on others. In between playing electrician's assistant, I checked off a couple projects of my own, the most exciting was installing our new Engel MB40V Fridge/Freezer.

Engel has been popular for years with truckers, RVers and boaters for their excellent line of 12-volt portable frig/freezers. Many blue-water cruisers count them as one of their top-10 favorite pieces of kit. The Totem crew among them. Finding a spot for a portable frig/freezer on a sailboat is a problem, but most crews figure something out.

A few months ago, while perusing Engel's web site, I noticed a new offering in their line: the MB40V, a 40-quart capacity, top loading model made to be permanently installed in cabinetry. This would fit perfectly in an otherwise underutilized space in Oceanus's galley. The inside measurements are 15-inches deep by 17 by 10.5, or about a 40-quart capacity.

West Marine carries several portable Engel frig/freezers in their catalog, but not the MB40v. I could have just ordered it from the Engel site, but where's the fun in that? So a couple of weeks ago, when we were in the Portland West Marine, store I ask a helpful associate if he could special order one for me. He checked the computer and said he could, so we told him to go for it.

I got a call from the Portland West Marine store about 10 days later saying it was in. Virginia picked it up on Friday while Tony and I worked on the boat.

I've got to hand it to West Marine, they made the whole transaction easy. I also paid no shipping, used a $15-off coupon I had and will get cash back for my purchase because I'm a Gold Card member.

I wish the installation was as easy. The tricky part was that the MB40V is designed to hang from four little tabs at the outside corners of the top. So I had to devise a system of corner braces and a partial bulkhead to suspend the unit under the countertop, which I, of course, had to remove. It also had to be mounted below the underside of the countertop by exactly the thickness of the insulated top. All this was complicated by having to hold the 45-pound unit in place with one hand, while measuring with the other.

I devised several complex methods of installing the unit in my head, but in the end I started at one corner, got it right, then fitted the next corner and finally made up the partial bulkhead with one corner block already attached, glued and screwed it in place. Finally, I glued and screwed the last corner block in with the unit in place. There is a hole in each corner for screws to hold it in place, but they are largely redundant in my installation: that baby ain't going nowhere.

Now I just need to cut out the section of countertop over the lid of the frige/freezer, install some hinges and a pull ring. That's one of this weekend's projects.

Before installing the frig/freezer, Tony temporarily hooked it up. It got cold almost instantly and was nearly silent. He was also impressed with how little amps it drew. It has three temperature settings: +5 degrees C, -10 degrees C and -15 degrees C. Pretty impressive. It will be the perfect complement to our Isotherm 4.6 cubic foot refrigerator.

Our trusty Isotherm refrigerator has been working like a champ for about a year.

Tony finalized some wiring in the head and installed three 12-volt sockets: one in the forepeak, one in the master stateroom and one in the saloon. They will be useful for 12-volt fans as well as charging electronics so as to bypass the inverter. A recent article I read said you lose about 40 percent of the juice from your battery converting it from 12-volt DC to 120-volt AC and then back to 12-volts, which is what most cell phones, laptops and tablets chargers use anyway.

Tony ran wires directly from the battery to the Air Head fan. Since it should run continuously, there's no need to run it to the panel and have it switched. We protected the little fan with an in-line fuse, which I can easily disconnect if I need to swap out the fan.

The new ship's bell finds a place on a repurposed BBQ bracket.

While Tony wired up the VHF, I installed the antenna in a temporary location on the bimini. At Englund Marine, I spotted an aluminum BBQ mounting bracket for one-inch tubing. The VHF antenna will eventually get mounted at the top of the mast. The bracket will stay put, however, because it is the perfect place to mount the ship's bell.

I looked long and hard for the ship's bell. I rang dozens of bells in Portland and Newport to find one that sounded good to me. I finally found one in a little brass shop in Depoe Bay. It was the last one of its kind in the shop, so the old guy who helped me unscrewed it from the wall. Besides the tone, I really like the wonderful shape and that it's chromed. I'm hoping the chrome will make it easier to keep shiny. The U.S. Coast Guard requires a bell on a vessel the size of Oceanus.

The VHF seems to be working fine, but the West Marine stereo wouldn't turn on, even though it was getting power. Virginia gave me this for Christmas, but I'm sure West Marine will replace it. Still, I was hoping to crank some tunes this weekend.

Getting ahead on Oceanus

Virginia plugs screw holes in the head.

Last night Virginia and I watched the video I made of the inside of Oceanus before we bought her. We hadn't watched it for more than a year. We were silent. The video showed the raw, unfinished interior. Random-sized scraps of plywood leaned against bulkheads. A five-gallon tin of polyester resin squatted where the head would eventually go.

We watched in silence. I thought seeing the video would energize us: we'd give each other high fives and bask in the warmth of how far we've come. That didn't happen. It was more like a dash of cold water in the face.

"I can't believe we bought her," my wife said as the video finished.

"I knew it would be a lot of work, but I didn't realize how much work," I said. "I knew we could do it - it's all stuff I know how to do - but still..."

"How did we ever see her potential?" she asked.

Plugs sanded flush,  the first coat of oil goes on the African mahogany fiddles. Our friend, Bob Diefenbach, glued the laminate to the countertop. I will build a medicine cabinet with a mirror to go above the sink.

Are we glad we bought Oceanus? Yes. Knowing what we know now, would we do it again? Yes.

We looked at a lot of boats before we stepped inside Oceanus. Most were beautifully finished. Some were even ready to sail south. But when we walked through Oceanus we knew she was supposed to be ours. Still, watching the video was sobering.

Virginia's soaking tub. 

The darkest, most unfinished part of the boat in the video was the head. Now it is bright with white enamel paint, finished surfaces, new fixtures, and a hatch that lets in light and air. The most important part: it's functional. It's not finished - it still needs cabinet doors and a finished floor - but the dim vision we had nearly two years ago is finally realized.

Our new Air Head on its pedestal. Every throne needs a pedestal. Also, raising the sole a few inches allowed me to position the head in the center of the space. You can see the hatch under the head for access to storage. 

In fact, we did the dream one better: instead of just a shower, we have a soaking tub and instead of a regular head we have a composting head. We also spent extra time insulating the inside of the hull, including inside the lockers. The tub itself is now insulated better than most iceboxes.

The Straight Poop on Composting Heads

When we purchased Oceanus all the plumbing had been removed, including the head. The through hulls were capped. Among the three pickup loads of gear that came with the boat was a new LaVac Head still in the box and a 15-gallon holding tank.

Our new Air Head in its place on Oceanus. The gear on the countertop is for installation and use of the composting head.

On Lobo, the Pearson Renegade we owned for 12 years when the kids were in grade school and junior high, we had a marine head with a holding tank. I know marine heads inside and out. I can recognize their smell, sometimes from across the dock.

The LaVac is top-of-the line, still I wasn't looking forward to installing it or dealing with a holding tank. After months of discussion, my wife and I decided to go with a composting head; but which one? There are three manufactured for marine use that I know of: the Nature's Head, Air Head and C Head. They all work on the same principle: the seat is designed so the pee goes into a jug and the poop goes into a bucket filled part of the way with peat moss or ground coconut shells. The pee jug you empty as needed. The poop bucket is stirred after each use using a hand crank attached to an agitator in the bucket part. A small 12-volt fan draws air through the bucket and out a vent in the deck or topsides.

Of the three, the Air Head is the most expensive at about $1,000. The Nature's Head is next at about $850. And the C Head is least expensive at under $600. We seriously considered all three over the past year. Each have their adherents and good qualities. The appealing part of the C Head - besides the price - is its parts are cheap and commonly available: the pee jug is just a one-gallon milk jug and the poop bucket is just a five-gallon bucket. It's not bad looking either. At one point we almost ordered one, but decided to wait.

We saw both the Nature's Head and the Air Head at the Seattle Boat Show in January. Before seeing them in all their rotomolded plastic glory, we were leaning toward the Nature's Head, primarily because of the lower price. At the show, however, we both changed our minds immediately when we saw them. The Air Head build quality looks clearly superior as does the design. Shortly after the show, we ordered an Air Head.

It came this week, after about a two-week wait. I took it to the boat yesterday and it fits well in the space we have for it in the head. We're under no illusions that this is a perfect solution because there is no perfect solution. We also suspect the picture painted by literature from each of the three makers is rosier than the reality.

It was great, then, to hear from a couple who have used a composting head for the last three years while cruising full time. Kirsten Rohrbach and Patrick Dayshaw left Seattle on October 2011 on their Cabo Rico 38 cutter Sihouette. They are currently in the Hawaiian Islands after cruising the Pacific side of Mexico, Galapagos, French Polynesia, Tonga and New Zealand. You can read about their adventures on their excellent blog. They were kind enough to respond to some of my questions about cruising Hawaii. As a bonus, they sent me the straight poop on their experience with their composting head. It was too good not to share.

Kristen writes: "I will give you a few tips on using a composting head. We have used one for the duration of our entire cruise.

"First of all, if you can install the head amidships, rather than on one side of the boat or another, you may have a better result. We have found that with our head (installed on the starboard side of the vessel, the only option available), the liquid side of the head doesn't drain well on a port tack, which is the tack you'll be on most of the way to French Polynesia and beyond. Inevitably, some of the liquid gets into the solid side, which can both engender a fly problem and be messy when emptying the solid side.

"Second, the composting head can't really keep up with full-time use with two persons on board. Although the composting action is faster in a warm climate, the composting head only really works on a boat with weekend or occasional use. That doesn't mean you can't use one, and it doesn't mean another system of waste management is necessarily any more desirable. (There are no pump-outs available after you leave the States and traditional holding tanks and their pumps are problematic.) Frankly, there is no ideal system of waste management on a cruising boat. Just realize that you will have to empty the solid side of the head about once a week (you will know when, because the handle used to turn and aerate the solids will get hard to turn) and the liquid side once a day."

Now Patrick comments: "For full-time liveaboard use, the composting head should be viewed as a 'two-part holding tank' rather than a composting unit. Sure, some level of composting occurs in the warm tropical climates, but it can never, ever, no matter which unit you buy, compost fast enough. Further, even if it does compost completely, the volume is only slightly reduced and you still need to empty it as noted above. If you read the advertising pitch from the top two vendors they never really address the full-time use issue. "These are my thoughts after using a composting head for the past five years on two different boats. I'm not trying to discourage you, just making sure you understand the realities of the situation. Happy to provide more details if you want them."

Kirsten pick up again: "So what does that mean for the cruising sailor? It means, just as with electrical, engine, and plumbing spares, you have to carry enough supplies for the head on your cruise. We normally use coconut fiber bricks (coir) for our head media, because they are a more environmentally friendly choice than peat moss (which is harvested from wetlands, i.e., bogs.) You can purchase the coir bricks from PETCO in the reptile section, but we found they were cheaper at Home Depot in the garden section. Buy enough for your South Pacific crossing. Make sure you get the finely ground material rather than the coarse material labeled as mulch. We were unable to buy any coconut fiber bricks between Mexico and New Zealand. We were able to purchase some peat moss in Tahiti, and found the coconut fiber bricks again in New Zealand at their Home Depot equivalent at a reasonable price.

"We also keep a large supply of newspaper on hand, so that when it comes time to empty the solid side of the head, we can line a bucket with newspaper, dig out the solid waste and media with a narrow potting trowel, and dump it overboard. We try to always empty the solid side of the head when we are underway in deep water; but if we stay in an anchorage more than two weeks (we have occasionally let the head go for 10 days to two weeks while in an anchorage), we have to do something. We always double or triple-bag it and put it in a garbage bin, rather than empty it directly into a pristine anchorage.

"Another tip is to have a separate receptacle for pee-only paper. Toilet paper clogs up the solid side of the composting head more than the solid waste itself, so - just like with most marine heads - put the paper in the trash can if you're only peeing. "Patrick brought three spares for the head fan, and he just installed our third. That works out to about one fan per year."

We appreciate the frank assessment from a couple with so much experience. We searched the web for months and never found information this detailed and frank. Getting the straight poop on composting heads is difficult. If you have actual experience using a composting toilet, especially on a sailboat, please share and comment to this post.

Making Big Decisions at the Big Seattle Boatshow

Boat show booty!

Virginia and I made major steps toward getting Oceanus ready for blue-water cruising last Friday and we didn't even set foot on the boat. We attended the Seattle Boat Show and finalized several gear choices.

One nice thing about going to the show is that our tickets were free because I wrote an article about our Columbia 43 for Three Sheets Northwest and they gave us a pair of tickets. When Oceanus is featured in the on-line magazine I'll provide a link on the blog.

Here is our report.

Oceanus has no electronics at all so everything will be new. Like all electronics, marine radios, chartplotters, and electronic navigation equipment changes rapidly. All of it seems expensive. My big fear was to spend a ton of money on electronics and have it be outdated or even obsolete soon after we leave the dock. So I've put off making any decisions about which equipment to buy hoping something would come along that would make sense and not break the bank. I think I've found it.

We bought a DMK 11A, a wireless gateway with GPS to be the heart of our electronic instrument setup. It creates an wireless network that streams data from your boat instruments and a GPS signal to up to three devices (like an iPad or iPhone) simultaneously.

The simplicity of the DMK booth attracted me immediately. On a small table a wind instrument, a depth sounder and a speed log were hooked up to a box about the size of a deck of cards. Next to it was an iPad displaying the data. Behind that was Kevin Dolan eating a banana. Since there's nothing I enjoy more than interrupting someone who's eating, I went up and started asking him questions. I liked his answers and we bought an 11A with GPS, at a special boat-show price, of course. You can tell that he's tuned-in to cheap sailboaters; he bought the iPad he was using at the show on Craigslist for $200.

On his recommendation, we went to the J&G Marine Supply booth across from him and bought a Standard Horizon VHF Marine Transceiver with AIS (GX2150). It was also a screamin' boat-show deal. I found this video about it.

Now I just need to buy a smart depth transducer and a wifi-enabled iPad, add iNavX software and we're set. A single sideband shortwave radio is also a must have. It would be nice to have wind instruments and radar too, but we'll see.

Virginia is in charge of deciding on a watermaker. After much research, she chose the Cruise RO Water watermaker. It was the first booth we visited. Visiting with Tom Brown of La Paz Cruisers Supply and Richard Boren, cruiser and president of Cruise RO Water, was a highlight of the show. Not only did they answer all of our questions about the water maker, but Tom also regaled us with great stories about cruising the Sea of Cortez. Tom painted vivid pictures of days spent snorkeling, spear fishing and dolphin watching while anchored in sheltered bays. He even got out the Sea of Cortez Cruising Guide and pointed out several not-to-be-missed anchorages with great snorkeling and diving.

We went to two seminars while at the show:

• The first was Preparations for Extended Coastal and Offshore Cruising given by Liza Copeland. A lot of information given as fast as possible in one hour. (She said she usually takes three hours to give the presentation.) We were able to glean some good tips. We were so impressed with Liza Copeland that we found her later and bought two of her books, Cruising for Cowards and Just Cruising.
• The other seminar was Sail Trim for Cruisers by Carol Hasse of Port Townsend Sails. Carol is a delightful person and one of the most knowledgeable sailmakers around. She learned her craft from the venerable Franz Schattauer, who was a Seattle institution for many years. Both of my previous big sailboats -- Lobo, a 27-foot Pearson Renegade, and Freyja, a 22-foot Alden-designed sloop -- had Schattauer sails. They were excellent sails.

We visited Carol Hasse at the Port Townsend Rigging booth later that evening. Lisa Vizzini of Port Townsend Riggers showed us how to rig lazy jacks so they are functional and yet can be easily stowed against the mast and not interfere with putting on a sail cover. I also liked her suggestions for rigging a preventer on the boom.

One of our goals at the show was to make a decision on which composting head to buy. We looked at both the Nature's Head and Air Head to compare the two. Before the show we were leaning toward the Nature's Head, but after seeing the Air Head we changed our mind. The build quality of the Air Head looks superior to us as does the design. It's a little more money but I think it's worth it.

We think the Air Head is a winner. 

More must-have items are:

• Hydrovane self-steering wind vane.
• The Wallas 40 Dt Diesel Heater. I talked to the representative about the installation details and I'm actually looking forward to installing it.
• The Lehr 2.5 hp outboard that runs on propane;
• a scuba compressor. 

A Hydrovane on the stern of Distant Dreamer, a Columbia 43. Formerly known as Encore, she won the Trans-Pac Class B in 1973. 

We bought each other presents for our 37th wedding anniversary: a monocular with a built-in compass for me and more plastic storage containers for Virginia.

If you have comments about our choices please let us know. Aside from the items we've already purchased, we reserve the right to change our mind.