Second-hand sailor

We are not on Kintala this weekend, moving day for Daughter Youngest and her daughter Kali. With a 3 day work trip scheduled to start Monday and a garage full of Kintala projects, staying in the city just seemed like the responsible thing to do. Days lost to a flu bug, work at work, and real winter temperatures have slowed progress in the shop. March 1 is barely 7 weeks away and the Tartan is far from a working boat at the moment.

Though I am clearly the master of a second hand boat, (or perhaps it is the other way around) that isn't the reason I'm feeling like a second hand sailor. It has been over a year since Deb and I have seen big blue water from the deck of a boat; uncounted days since Kintala was towed home with a shattered drive train. Rope callouses have long faded, replaced by sanding block and screwdriver callouses. I would worry about getting seasick at the dock should a good wind blow, but the lake is so low that Kintala is basically sitting in the mud. She doesn't rock much.

Hard to call one's self a sailor when one doesn't go sailing and has a boat that can't go sailing. Ah but there is hope. Winter-broken-shallow lake-season in St. Louis just happens to be the same time of the year that cruisers uncounted head for the islands. Their first hand sailing stories fill blogs galore, night passages, narrow channels, anchoring hilarity's, sandy beaches and clear warm water!

None of them are on new boats either.