Toward the end of May the whole gang was finally back at the Marina and the season was shaping up to be a great one. The weather forecasts for the summer weekends were looking good and it is going to be a fun relaxing summer. We launched the boat in April just before I was scheduled to take a trip to London (canceled due to a silly volcano in Iceland) and then to Tel-Aviv. As many of you may know I have a new job this summer (with not nearly all the perks = time off – as I had last summer). I am working for a company called Storwize - they do real-time data compression and I am with my good friend there Ed Walsh (the guy in the bottom left hand picture) who is our CEO. I digress. Needless to say I have been doing a bit more working this summer than boating but I am sure the end of the summer will see some catching up. Donna’s family from Peru is coming this summer and we are very excited to take them for some boat rides.
In the spirit of getting caught up, I’ll have a few short posts here just to get us back on track. Stay tuned!
Well, after a ‘late’ start – late being relative – the countdown clock said we would put the boat in the water on the 16th but the weather was too poor. However, the stars aligned (and a volcano went off) that canceled my trip to London so on Monday the 19th the Donna Julie II was launched for the 2010 season.
The trip went well, and just like the day we left, the LNG tanker was leaving the harbor so we had to wait around for a while near Donna’s office (the Design Center) and then we made it into our slip. I haven’t lost the parking touch. We docked and we are now ready for the new season.
Next weekend I’ll be in Israel so I hope that the weather isn’t good enough for boating so I don’t miss anything.
More updates to come as it is the boating season again.
I just looked at the counter and noticed that there is less than a month until it is time to put the Donna Julie II back in the water for another season! (Actually I cannot tell a lie, I have received a number of emails from friends saying ‘the boating season is right around the corner’.)
So what has happened this winter? Well, quite a lot. Dan from East Coast Flightcraft and my buddy Brian and I all shared some season tickets to the Bruins. Yeah, they had a crap season but it is still a nice get away for an evening. Speaking of hockey, the US played some great hockey in the Winter Olympics this year in Vancouver but just couldn’t pull it out in the end. Too bad, I love the Olympics, wish we could have repeated 1980.
Also, I got a new job. I now work with the CEO from my old company at a company called Storwize. I have never worked so hard in my career but I have to say, I have also never felt like I have been able to add so much value. The company is great. We do something very unique – Real-time, random access compression of data storage. (Maybe not the most interesting topic for boaters, but a very cool technology.) I started a new professional blog, The Storage Alchemist, The job has also brought me on my first trip to Israel (2 times) with a trip to the Gloan Heights for some wine, and I have been to London a couple of times as well, and not to mention all the travel around the US. The boat will be a great place to unwind from the job when I get a break.
Donna’s Showroom at Venegas and Company is also EXPANDING! That’s right, her new company is doing super well and she is growing. You can also visit her Linked In and Facebook pages. I am very proud of her.
Right after the 2009 season ended we took at trip to NH to visit Tony and Kathy for a send off for their daughter who joined the Navy. Hope she is enjoying it now that she is passed bootcamp. Also, CONGRATS to Tony and Kathy, they upgraded their boat this season. I can’t wait to see it!
We got the blog listed on the home page for The Constitution Marina - I have to that Bruce from Save the Harbor, Save the Bay. This year we are not only going to blog about what goes on during our fun times this summer, but we are also going to try to do a little more good and be a bit more informative about what is going on around the harbor. I mean, we wouldn’t be having all this fun if we didn’t have the harbor to begin with right? (I promise I won’t get ‘preachy’ – but I can’t vouch for Bruce who I have also made a contributor to the blog – Bruce, WELCOME!) If your not big on traveling around a bunch of web sites you can always find Save the Harbor Save the Bay on Facebook and see what they are up to.
Just as a quick shameless plug, they are hosting a fund raiser on March 31, 2010 at the Intercontinental Hotel in Boston. Take a quick look at the short video “Water Power” – It is two minutes and worth a watch.
As in true form I’ll give you an update on the Boston Boat Show of 2010. It was great to see my old friends from East Coast Flightcraft (ECFC), but the overall show was not good this year. I heard a rumor at the show that in 2009 4800 boats were repossessed in the US and now there are only 800 of these boats left. The bad news, new boat sales are down and that makes me sad for guys like Dan at ECFC because they do such a great job with selling, service and support. The good news, used boat prices are actually going up as the inventory goes back down, so if your looking to upgrade, get ready.
Lots of weather this winter and spring did a number to “D” dock. My I am sure the dudes at the marina will have it all sorted by the time we bring the boats in for the summer.
Photo’s courtesy of Ryan who I am sure will be posting some great stories this summer as well.
And finally, you all have to check out the new Boston Fishing site. Paul’s site is fresh and new and he is getting ready to have a great and prosperous fishing season. Tell all your friends, book some corporate fishing, he has even stepped into the 20th century and even takes Paypal! Way to go Paul, best of luck this summer and catch a ton of fish, especially tuna!
Okay gang, that is all for now. Be prepared, I may update the face of Boston Boating Blog and I plan on doing a lot of updating, I have a new camera and video camera so there promises to be some multimedia this summer.
Okay, I am not a fan of folks that create blog posts that say – “Sorry I haven’t updated in a while…” so I am not going to apologize. Instead I’ll tell ya about what ‘we’ (the marina folk) have been up to as best I can and tell you we are all upset the season is over and we are all looking forward to the 2010 boating season. (If you don’t believe me, I was convinced by Ryan to find a ‘count down timer’ widget to put on the blog that is counting down the days until April 16 – the day after tax day – to put the boat back in the water – check it out.)
So the big delay in the blog was after the Labor Day party I took off to Germany for 2 weeks for work. It was a great trip. The middle weekend I ran into one of my college roommates I hadn’t seen in 18 years – since college. He and his family are living in Munich. Chris took me around Munich and gave me a great tour and we got caught up – it was great.
The other season, come to find out, that a bunch of us are passionate about is the hockey season.
This year my friend Brian and I have a few seats to a bunch of Bruins games. Ryan is passionate about the B’s and on Halloween Tony, Kathy, Ryan, Paul, Betty, Frank, Dale and bunch of other folks got a box at the Bruins. They had a blast.
We will be looking forward to the Boston Boat Show this year. It is always fun to look at new toys. Rumor has it that Kathy and Tony upgraded already We shall see and are anxious to check it out.
Tony and Kathy held a great party at their house in NH for their daughter who is entering the Navy. It was great to see them, they have a great pad, and a bunch of folks from the marina showed up and we hung out and had some FANTASTIC food.
Other than that not much is going on. Donna and I frequent our favorite Korean / Japanese Restaurant in Newton called Apgujung. Jim is the bar tender there and he is super friendly and has become a good friend. He even helped us celebrate Labor Day at the Marina. I highly recommend checking out the joint. Jackie, the owner is a great guy, always makes you fell welcome and does some great experimentation w/ Sushi and other dishes.
Steve and I are also working on Paul’s new web site for Reel Pursuit. I am psyched to do it and I hope it lives up to Paul’s expectations, we want to make it great.
Donna and I are also redoing our kitchen, well I should say Donna is redoing our kitchen and I am sure it is going to be AWESOME. If you don’t know, Donna is a kitchen designer by trade – the best in Boston I may add and is the Owner Operator of Venegas and Company. If you need a kitchen in and around New England, its worth a trip to the Boston Design Center and check it out.
The marina Christmas party is in a couple of weeks and that should be fun. We have a bunch more hockey to see. I am planning on having folks over to watch the Olympics this year. Olympic hockey is always great.
Well, I am sure there will be lots more news between now and the Boat Show – which is usually the start of the Boating Blog for the season, however not sure there will be many updates between now and then. So, Merry Christmas, Happy Holiday’s and Happy New Year to all. May it be safe and I look forward to boating and blogging next season.
There it is, look at that weather post for yesterday. Easily the best day of the season so far. After a failed attempt last weekend – due to an torrential downpour, we postponed the boat launch until today. I headed to the marina at 6:30 am, took a taxi to East Coast Flight Craft (where I have the boat serviced – and they do an outstanding job) where we would take the boat to Salem for an early launch on a high tide.
I happened to mention to Dale, great service guy at East Coast, that last year one of my trim tabs had stopped working, so in a jiffy, Dale did some troubleshooting and found the problem. This put us behind schedule about 2 hours, but it was well worth it in the end.
We trailered the boat through Middelton and Danvers and launched the boat in Danvers. Every thing went smooth. Boat was waxed and looking sharp, it started right up when we put it in the water, I backed it off the trailer and was on my way at about 10:30. It was warm, and sunny, and the water was nice a calm. I brought the boat out the channel and after the no wake zone fired her up to about 2800 rpms and in no time flat was easily doing 30 knots. I took the boat around to Presidents Row in Boston Harbor in about 45 min where I coasted in the rest of the way at about 10 knots and enjoyed being one of the only boats in the harbor. I gave a call to Donna Julie, working in HER new showroom at Venegas and Company in the Boston Design Center. I drove by the ICA, the New England Aquarium and the left side of the shoreline. I put up all the ropes and fenders and called in to Constitutuion Marina on Channel 69 so see if my slip was ready to pull into. It was, and with that I headed down the fairway and – all by myself, put the boat in to slip E 60. I washed her down, powered her up, and covered her and we are now, officially ready to start the 2009 boating season. Stay tuned for more updates and follow Captain SteveK on twitter for updates.
Okay, so I have gotten a lot of crap for not rounding out the end of our boating year. A lot of people have asked, “Where is the boat?”, “Did you take it out of the water?”… etc
The answer is yes, but not before one of the GREATEST boat rides ever of the summer. My sister, my wife and I made one last run to Stellwagon and let me tell you we saw some of the greatest marine life ever, including this HUGE Ocean Sunfish (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_sunfish). Here is Donna getting friendly with “Fred” as my sister affectionately named her / him / it… As we got further out, we also saw a bunch of whales. In fact, my sister actually saw one jump out of the water and make the big splash while Donna and I were facing forward and missing the show. According to my sister anyway, the show was fantastic. We got pretty close to them as you can tell. Donna also spotted a huge school of Tuna fish jumping which we weren’t as lucky to get so close too but it was amazing none the same.
We knew heading home that day, that we had one of the best days ever.
The next day Donna and I refueled the boat and headed North to Beverly where we would dock the boat one last time and our very good friends from East Coast Flight Craft would pick up the boat and store it for us over the winter.
Here is us getting ready to head North.
At least this is one guy I won’t miss this winter… So that was our summer… It was OUTSTANDING. This winter we are really missing the boat.
Hence the title of this blog, Year End, Year Begin. What is it they say every “new year” “Out with the old, in with the new”? Well, you know what time it is? It is New England Boat Show time. That is right, January 12, to the 20th, the place where it all started a year ago is happening again.
My dad came up on Saturday and he and Donna and I walked around the show looking for that perfect vessel. We saw some interesting boats I will tell you.
Well, if you get a chance to make it to the show, maybe I will see you there. If not, I am sure I will see you in Boston Harbor – in April you can look for us, we can’t wait to get out there.
Oh, I also had a comment on one of my blogs from a guy in Florida who also owns a Cobalt. Thanks for the note. I will keep posting and hopefully people will keep reading.
Now it is time to sign up for my captains license…
Donna and I took off on Friday to head for Martha’s Vinyard. The seas were with us, but the weather was a bit of a challenge. We got to the marina at 10 AM and it was nice and sunny and by the time we got out to Hull, you couldn’t see 1/4 of a mile. It took me a while, but I programed the GPS while drifting to the mouth of the Cape Cod Canal and we were off.
It was very exciting when we got there. Here are some things we saw along the way…We saw the Borne Bridge, Another bridge I don’t know the name of and as we made it through the canal we also saw the ship for the Mass Maritime Academy. (9/13/07 – I have since been educated that this bridge is called the Train Bridge and The Cape Cod Canal RR Bridge which spans the south western end of the canal is one of the largest vertical lift bridges in the world with a lift span of 544 feet, a total span of 806 feet and a high water clearance of 136 feet (in the normal up position). Built between 1933 and 1935 by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for the purpose of maximizing both marine and rail movement… – Thanks for the info!)
Next we cruised through Buzzards Bay and saw an interesting ship as well as a small marker in the middle of the bay. Next we went though Woods Hole. Everything they tell you about it is true. Very “squrily” I watched a Sea Ray in front of me almost loose it’s back end in some very trubulant water but the skipper got control and came out of it okay. Next it was off to Oak Bluffs Marina. It was an easy 30 min cruise across to the Vinyard and we were there. We were able to get a slip and after some tricky “pylon” parking we were in and ready to hang out. I will say, there is nothing as exhilarating as taking a trip like that and successfully getting to your destination. It was a great adventure. Here is a photo of our spot…
That night Donna’s friend Catlin showed up and we all went to dinner. The next day we took off for a tour around the Island from our good friend Doug… Doug and his wife have a place on the Vinyard so it was very cool for them to show us around. Doug, Donna and Catlin all jumped into the water for a dip to cool off. Then we cruised around the island a bit more and then headed for home.
That night, Catlin had gotten all of us tickets to see Ben Taylor (son of James Taylor and Carly Simon) play some of his music. It was AWESOME!
After checking buoyweather.com earlier in the day, I realized that we should probably head home tomorrow as Monday there was a small craft advisory. So, on Sunday, we got up, had some breakfast and then headed back to Boston. This time it was Donna, Catlin and myself. Another fantastic ride. We had a lot of fun and the trip was great. On the way back we saw some cool boats in the canal and we saw “Codzilla” the BHC boat out of Boston Harbor. I think Donna and Catlin had a nice time too.
It is sad to say but the boating season is slowly drawing to a close. We have over 200 hours on the boat this summer, which is unbelievable if you ask me. I am in hopes that we keep in in the water until Nov 1. We have made a lot of great friends this summer at the marina and in our boating travels this summer it will be missed.
I will add more to our blog over the winter. I plan on going to Boat Sales school for Cobalt. It should be a lot of fun and any excuse I can get to hang out around boats during the winter will be great. I also plan on going for my Captains license this winter so I will keep you all posted.
But, for now, as my dear old dad always says, Keep it off the Rocks!
Today I went out on the open seas with my friend Steve. I did not know this until today, however Steve is very famous. Steve has just been awarded a very prestigious award, from the Boston judges of news papers on his outstanding skills as a “witty dude”. Now, I have always known Steve to be witty, however, in this recent scare around identity theft, Steve came up with a very crafty title, in stead of “What’s in your wallet” (clever slogan from Capital One) Steve came up with “Who’s in your wallet!” I like that… but I digress…
Steve and I took a nice tour of the harbor of Boston and today I did something I had never done before. I went into Marina Bay, asked for a slip for lunch, parked and went to the restaurant and had a nice meal. I know, doesn’t sound like much but since my increase in driving confidence after my classes with Jim, I have a lot less fear about parking and going into places.
After our lunch, we toured around George’s Island and then back to the dock. Pretty easy trip today.
Tomorrow the weather looks fantastic! Updates to follow.
Okay, so it has been a while since I updated this crazy thing. It is one of those things, you start and you have the greatest intentions, but then you get busy, and well, you know…
So this summer we have done a TON of boating. We have spent over 200 hours on the water, 150 on the Donna Julie II alone and this week we are headed out on vacation. I am not sure what we are going to do during the week but for Labor Day weekend, we are headed to the Vinyard. I am excited about this.
This summer we have seen some pretty cool stuff. We were out in the harbor when the turned the Constitution around. We saw the 4th of July fireworks from the dock. We have also made some good friends at the marina.
We have seen some pretty amazing boats in the harbor as well. This is a photo of the “Turmoil” owned by the Founder of Lands End. This is a beautiful boat used for exploring. After one of our new marina friends did some research we found that this boat had circumnavigated the North pole starting in the Pacific Ocean. The only boat to do this since the early 1900′s. Additionally this boat carried a Hinkley Picnic boat as it’s run about. (Very Nice)
Also, as you can see, my dad made a couple of trips down and this time he did some “skippering” of the boat. It has been nice to have him down for a visit. He takes the train, I pick him up, we do some boating, catch a burger and then he catches the evening train home.
A few weeks ago this summer, I went to Knoxville, TN to see the launch of the new Cobalt 47. This is one BEAUTIFUL yacht. It has a ton of cool features such as the Zuse drive system, a “skyhook” connected to the GPS system and an in-board modular control system by E-Plex. And for just $950K this boat could be yours. No, I didn’t go to buy one, but I do hope at some point during this winter I can help the guys at East Coast Flightcraft sell one and perhaps make some commission $$$.
Also, it is getting close to the time when I can start my captain’s license classes. Who knows, maybe if I sell a company or two more, I can retire and drive the Ferry back and forth to P-town…
Aside from just more of the same – heading out of the harbor on some new adventure, it has been status quo. I promise to keep up the blog – especially during this vacation and as we venture off to Martha’s Vinyard this coming weekend.
Keeping it between the buoy’s this is Captain Steve signing off.
Air Temperature: 78 Degrees Water Temperature: 51 Degrees – wish I had my suit.
Donna and I took the day off and did some power lounging on our power boat. We had a great day – again!
We took a ride up to Gloucester and saw some more of the sites in the harbor. We also say some big fishing trawlers heading out to drag the ocean.
We also saw various other sites while in Gloucester – a nice old wooden boat being restored, the lobsterman coming in with a flock of sea gulls and a good samaritan towing someone in.
As we headed back to Boston Donna drove. She is really getting the hang of this whole captain thing and I am really getting used to relaxing.
We took some time and floated out in the open ocean and saw the sites. The Environmental Police came out and said “hi”. Two trips two boardings. We have some safe waters here in Boston.
I figured out how to use the GPS to tell me which course to follow. I knew I would figure it out.
During our ride, we confirmed the new arrival of the Donna Julie II. We are very excited for that.
We pulled into our slip at around 6:30, and again, we did a good job parking. Now that I am used to it, I am going to throw everything off with a bigger boat. Oh well. Practice, practice, practice.
We shall see and are anxious to check it out.
