Hydro creeping forward

We have recently been working on the decking and top sides of the hydro on evenings and weekends.  House construction is taking most of our time. There are no good photos yet of the top sides but we will wheel it out to the sunshine and get some this weekend.
Here is a month old image of the glass skin being affixed to the sponsons...

Flood Tides

Joaquin is hammering Bermuda and historic flooding is taking place in South Carolina.  Here on Pamlico Sound, we are experiencing a wind driven surge.  When steady wind blows from the North East, water is driven into the sound's inlets along the outer banks.  The water has nowhere to go but up.  Right now it is at 3.9 feet above normal sea level.  The wind is expected to blow all night at 25 knots.  We shall see in the morning how much additional water plies on.
Here is a photo of our skiff in our slip.  There is about 6 inches of water above the dock planking.

Cape Lookout!

Cape Lookout is a short day trip from Oriental. It took about 2 hours total to get there and this includes 2 ferry rides.  The first ferry was from Minnesott Beach to Cherry Point.  This is a car ferry across the Neuse river.  The second ferry is a passenger ferry from Harkers Island right up to the Cape Lookout lighthouse.
You pack in what you want for the outing and pack it back out.  There are no trash facilities or food on the island.  This is great because it makes it more of an adventure.  There are some nice paths through the dunes and sea oats on the island.  It is about 1/2 a mile wide where we landed.  After a couple of hours on the Atlantic side, we got some of the last tickets to climb the lighthouse for the season.
The current lighthouse was built in 1859 and is quite impressive. It is solid masonry construction with a 10 foot thick wall at its base that tapers on the exterior down to 2 feet at the top.  It is 163 feet tall and very windy at the top!

Here is a link to the Google Map of the area...

Town and Country...

Oriental, NC. is a great mix of things, beautiful waterways, friendly people, great seafood, small town charm and wildlife.  People will stop you on the street to talk.
The wildlife sometimes comes right on in to visit or maybe hack into your computer.
Check this fellow out.  He crawled down the chimney at 3:30 on Monday morning.
The dogs started barking.  It was a bit of a shocker.

Meet Mr. Raccoon: the original hacker.

Somebody needs a hug.

Hydro: Glassing

After an initial sanding of the hull, we glassed the flat part.  We used some heavy bi-axiel glass from our scrap bin.  A little more fairing was needed on the pontoons.  This was done last night.  Today we sanded the fairing material out then started adding a layer of mid-weight twill glass to the pontoons.

We have 10oz twill cloth that overlaps the bi-axiel on the bottom.  Once we glass the other pontoon the center of the flat will have one layer of 17 oz bi-axe and 2 layers of 10 oz twill so 37oz of glass.  additional reinforcement will be needed on the interior of the pontoon/hull joint.  There will be great stresses here at speed. We added red pigment to the epoxy for fun.  The finished boat will be red.

Hydro: Stripping

We are in a big hurry to finish this boat.  It will be skinned in glass and painted.
No fine carpentry here, we are keeping it real and stripping it with pine.
The bottom of the hull will be done tomorrow and we will begin sanding and glassing...

Pro GT hydroplane

While waiting for our building plans to be finalized, we decided to start another boat project.

We were expecting to dive into a sailing dinghy, our 12 year old decided he wanted us to build a race boat.  There are classes of these boats that race all over.  It was unknown to me.  So we decided on a class that is called Pro GT.
Now we are building our version.  It is a strip built racer.  Once it is finished and race tested we may mold it to produce composite versions.

Sea State 10.5

Our new board is finished and ready for trials.

It is a shorter version of our 12 footer.  This board is 10.5 feet long with a 32 inch max width and a fine entry.  It has less rocker than the 12 foot touring board.  It is designed to riders up to 160 pounds.
Of course it is 100 percent carbon fiber.
The access port is a convenient location to store important items.
This board is available for a trial paddle in the Oriental area. Give us a call. 252 639-0147
It will be built on preorders only for the time being.  We will be setting up shop here as soon as possible.

Summer!

Fay Bond is a great hostess.

I can't believe July is over.  But August is here.  Enjoy it.
Here in Oriental a family down the street anchors the summer with a watermelon cutting.
Fay Bond and family started the tradition 49 years ago.  (That's 1966.)
The whole town shows up and it's the best watermelon you have ever had.

See more here:http://towndock.net/news/bond-watermelon-feast-2010

Everyone's invited!

Here for the sailing...

During the summer especially and possibly all year, there are Wednesday night races here in the waters off Oriental.
Our neighbor regularly sails with the owner of a J 70.
They needed a third and fourth crew so Aug and I got a shot at racing a serious performance boat.
We helped step the mast yesterday and Jerry and Jim showed us how to properly tension the carbon spar.
Today the hull was wet sanded and a couple hours ahead of the start, we craned the boat in.
This evening it was all sailing with ideal conditions (12 - 15 kt wind) and 8 boats racing.
Here some photos:

J70 Shamrock ready for the races.
August is setting her down softly.

Captain Jim

Harbor view

Harbor view in Oriental.

In amongst the tall pines...
Here I am walking the property and figuring out the site plan...

New Port of Call

We moved to the lovely town of Oriental, North Carolina.
A few years ago we visited it on a family trip after learning about it on the excellent site:

http://towndock.net

We bought a lot down here and if you are interested in sailing, you should too.
Our plan is to build a home and then to set up a boat shop.
Here are some views around town and a Google view of the area.
Come visit!

Ingo having an evening sail in the inner harbor.

August is manning the chase boat.

Big and little shrimp boats are plying the local waters.

Soft shell Blue crabs off the dock

Oriental's town dragon swimming in the pond.

Checking out the facilities.

Snide signage around town.

The shrimping is good now.  The fleet is in.

The larger neighborhood.