We are now appreciating our previous visits to Maine during hurricane season. We knew we might be facing this eventuality being in Florida during August and September…more on that in a minute. Annette and I had been staying in this little AirBnB for the first two months. We both needed an upgrade so we rented a house near the boatyard. To celebrate our pending location we declared date night for a terrific evening out!

We spent the Sunday moving into our new place, more on that….Monday though got right work installing a power connections for the Single Side Band Radio (left fuses) and also the Outback Solar Charge Controller (right side black box)

Then there was Tuesday and Irma starting making threats to the east coast of Florida. As a precaution the boatyard workers started to make some preparations.

Wednesday then we make a quick trip down to Palm Beach to a friends condominiums to pull the hurricane curtains.  Keeping in mind this is our first hurricane experience.

A real rookie mistake was made….if we were more experienced we would have known to pull the table and planters inside..completely amateur.

So after moving all our stuff from the AirBnB and from our storage unit into the new house we had a wonderful two days there. Then Irma got serious and since the new house is on the water. My dear angel wife, known as the Admiral re-packed everything back together so we could stow it on the Magnolia-M. See the house is right on the canal shore and with talk of a 7 foot storm we thought best to have everything on the boat. Hence this is how the sewing room now looks!

The master suite…

The Galley….

All the while Annette was packing the house, I was getting educated on the industrial level storm shutters at the boat yard.

The question is always if you leave a hurricane threatened area you might head towards a more hurricane threatened area!! As the decision had been made to head north-west the phone rings and my friend Ty says come on up to the Villages! It was a was the perfect call at the perfect moment..so we were off! On the way we passed Mount Dora, one of the highest points in FL….its like 150ft!!

The drive should have taken us 3 hours but with most of South Florida heading towards North Florida so the trip took closer to 7 hours. Along the way we had plenty of entertainment!

Hurricane preparations continued in The Villages with a work party to get the outdoor furniture in.

Now, going back to that part about going into the storm rather than away…well we managed to pull that one off as well. In our efforts to avoid the storm we have in fact lured Irma well away from Magnolia-M as the storm track has shifted well west. It was funny to me that these guys had no furniture to move, no preparations to make except for another round of golf…kinda surreal….

Meanwhile back at Stuart Yacht Magnolia-M is starboard tied with and spider webbed to the other side of the fairway waiting for Irma to pass on by.

If all goes well we will be back aboard by mid week.

Weeks like these with the challenges, physically and mentally make us second guess our choice of this lifestyle. At least I do. Annette is such a trooper you would not believe. She puts her shoulder into it and gets it done. When I am at my worst she is at her best. Feeling lucky..be safe and will write when we are back aboard. We have gotta get this girl Magnolia done…too many adventures await!

9/11/17 – We obviously came through the storm fine. Now we are just waiting for power restoration so we can get back aboard and get to work.

So for the last 6 weeks working in the engine room the floor boards have made we crazy with these big freaking holes in them. I went to our carpenter showed him and explained I wanted to make some caps to cover the holes. He immediately went over and dropped an empty Rotella Oil Pail….oops….yes the holes are there to hold and secure pails of oil. An oil change for the Main and Generator takes 9 GALLONS so storage is going to be a issue or at least a question. Thank you Ray for not laughing at me!!!

One of the small projects was replacing the fuel tank sight gauges. A couple of .98 cent yard sticks from Home Depot added a better assessment to amount aboard. Each tank hold over 300 gallons!

Mid week I made a quick trip to Annapolis for Magnolia-S survey. It was an in and out trip but on the way home to Florida. I suggest the lack of smile is simply the hour, 0630 on the plane after a 0330 alarm back on Magnolia. The survey went well so we will hopefully get this deal closed.

In the old days whenever I got an upgrade on the way home I ordered a Baily’s and Coffee for breakfast to celebrate. It seemed to be a tradition worth continuing!

As soon as Annette picked me up at the airport though we were back to it This week is all about getting all the old dead wire out of the boat. There was dead wire in the pilot house, there was dead wire in the engine room……

Pulling wire is like making sausage, neither process you really want to witness. After going at it with a pair of dikes in hand, the right things seem to still be working.  Next will start on pulling the new wire for the electronics we will be installing.

In my absence, the Admiral continued her sewing and finishing up the duvet for the bed.

One side is dark blue, with a shell pattern

The other side is a coral pattern

These pictures did not come out well, but will give you an idea…..

To finish the week up I got the head finished with the shower apparatus and the shower curtain rod installed. Obviously cleaning the port-light lens has not yet been accomplished!

Hope you all have a good week! Be Safe!

Last weekend we took a break from Magnolia-M to celebrate my parents 50th wedding anniversary. We arrived in Detroit just in time for a Florida style thunderstorm. Thankfully as in Florida it rolled in and kept on rolling right out!

First stop was a evening of catching up with classmates. We have been friends all through elementary school and one KINDERGARTEN!!! Names have been withheld to protect the innocent!!

My parents was celebrated with a Mass at Church and then a dinner at my sisters house with a lovely view of the pond.

Even the Pope sent a note of congratulations!

Arriving back in Florida our old dock-mates from Pirates Cove days, Marty & John. They happened to be in town looking at boats! It was a brief but fun visit! Thank you guys for making time.

Ok, busted, it was a Twistee Treat week too.

Some how I lost my mind and decided to get a jump on my errands…right in the middle of morning rush-hour. A rude reminder of what we left behind!

In spite of all that was going on, the engine room but a two day cleaning. An amazing transformation from where we were.

Though a small step forward but I did get the head installed and operational.

The Admiral has been hard at work on draperies. She finished the pilothouse set and now moved onto the salon drapes.

Our “arbitrator” and design consultant Robin Antonelli gave us full blessing on fabric choice.

I think its really going to pop, only pop, not blow up!

Back to equipment..the coupling that connects the Lugger Power Take Off (PTO) to the Hydraulic Pump has been a real problem. It became corroded and froze to the pump shaft. We have had the coupling cut off but we are still gathering information and costing out options. In the meantime we we did get the Injection Pump rebuilt and installed. There was discussion of repainting but I insisted on ala-natural. Its a thing of beauty and I am going to polish that baby everyday. 

We finished up the electrical last week but I just got all the lines dressed and prettied up.

With all that we accomplished this week it was time for a fun Saturday afternoon…first Annette and I started with our first Happy Hour aboard Magnolia-M. We hope it is the first of many.

The real reason for the onboard happy hour is we were waiting for my Navy buddy Mike and his family to arrive. We had a nice visit aboard and then headed off for dinner! A lovely evening!

Hope you all have a good week! Be Safe A**2

The electrical system was certainly designed by an engineer..perhaps one who took one too many arcs across the gray matter.  God only knows, and I do mean he is the only one who knows why the configuration was so complicated . The table at the bottom chart below only begins to explain what happens in each switch position. I will only rant one more time, its NUTS!!! (I am done now)

As with Magnolia-S, all these systems are complicated already. Their configuration needs to be simple and easily understood. Things never break on these vessels when you are tied to the dock or on a quiet Sunday afternoon while you are hanging on the hook. Things go bad when a thunderstorm is approaching, when you are trying to get into a challenging inlet and the weather forecast is completely a work of fiction During these times when stress is high the last thing you we need is to try and figure out configurations in the midst of troubleshooting a problem.

With that in mind, I am working with a licensed marine electrician to implement the configuration below. I basically replicated what I did on Magnolia –S. Note there no switches in the below diagram. The configuration is what it is. You will see there is a fuse on the output of all power sources, but NO switches. 

When we we purchased Magnolia-S she had no LED lights. All lighting was energy sucking incandescent lights. The refrigerator/freezer was a 20 year old SubZero. Between replacing light bulbs and an energy efficient refrigerator/freezer we are reducing the battery bank by one Lifeline 8D. An 8D battery has a capacity of 255 ahr and weighs in at a whopping 156lbs. Getting one of those batteries off the boat is not a completely simple task. Once we got it out of the battery box in the engine room and up to the salon, out the salon door and on to the fantail.

We then slid it across a board to shore. All before 7AM!!!

Out work list below:

1) Remove & replace inverter input fuse with JJN fast acting fuse as per inverter manufacturer  recommendation.

2) Check battery charger with load tester for full rated output.

3) Check hull potential and proper operation of Galvanic lsolators (two) when boat moves to saltwater.

4) Reconnect inverter input transformer and run new ground cable to ground buss. (Rather  than bonding buss as currently installed) * Identify connection taps for owner and make  note on drawing.

5) Remove battery desulfator from engine/generator battery.

6) Re-crimp negative connections in navigation panel (on helm). Install fuse holder for  starboard side 12V panel.

7) Re-secure forward shore power breaker box. (Anthony will do)

8) Install 120V fuse holders for 120/240V meters and 12V meters in main distribution panel  and cap off and secure or remove unused 14/3 cable in main panel.

9) Re-label ship shore selector switch to read Aft shore, Forward shore, Off, Generator.

10) Recrimp battery terminal ends.

Anthony Adds
11) Install Xantrex LinkPro Battery Monitor (in hand)

12) Install Xantrex Battery->Battery Charger — House to Engine Start Battery (in hand)

13) Replace/Connect two start batteries instead of existing shared 8D battery

We had a very productive week! In addition to the above we got a number of other items sorted out.  Our refrigerator/freezer is dual voltage, 12vdc/120vac depending on what is available. Normally 12vdc when we are away from the dock and and 120vac at the dock. We have that all installed plus much more. Below our electrician is mounting some new and appropriate fuse blocks.

Below is the finished wiring MINUS the clean up and dressing of the installation. (Flying to Detroit in the morning and ran out of time).

I am very happy with the way things came out. The system is so much simpler and we hope more reliable than where we started. It was a good week and now for an even better weekend in Detroit!

These weeks in Florida are bringing back memories of summer spent in Pascagoula MS during Navy Days..pleasant early mornings, warm to hot morning followed by a passing shower. These showers alway render a very dramatic sky. 

Big news this week is Annette knocked out sewing the first two curtains for the Pilothouse. We each have opinions about color and fabrics so we retained a local “arbitrator” who helps bring us together on color and fabrics.  We did the same thing on the condo, the sailboat and now the trawler. In this case we retained East Coast Home Staging (http://eastcoasthomestaging.com/). Robin Antonelli  has been great to work with and our marriage appreciates it.

These are the first of many sewing projects Annette has ahead of her. As she has done before, she will make this our home. We are both excited about the color how Magnolia will end up. To that end I was warned there were 50lbs of fabric arriving on Tuesday this week…its going to be be beautiful…if we don’t sink!! Much more to come on this subject and hardy thanks to Robin Antonelli! PS Thats a temp tie back!

If you are looking for pictures of anything interesting you have already seen those…well except maybe our friend “Red” actually this guy is “Yellow” but that dang things are everywhere scampering around ALWAYS! They are always neat, polite and dang if they are eating bugs, I love them even more. Have not seen any bugs since we have been in FL…well except for the wasps that tried to build a nest. Thankfully to my experience with my friend Jack, made short order of that nest…ok now we are done with the interesting pictures…

Like I said, not much to see but I did get the old head (commode) out of the boat and pulled up the base plate (no pictures…intentional). 

After a good cleaning, prime and paint things are looking presentable.

I patched up the existing cutouts and Ray here in the yard put a fresh piece of Formica on the plate. Ordered a new hose and as soon as that arrives will install the new head and get that plumbed up.

In addition we did get the tank monitoring system tested out this week as well.

We obviously are not allowed pump sewage (“black water”) over the side except in the ocean. There are also some bodies of water, such as Lake Champlain that do not allow “gray water”  (sinks/shower) discharge. Most boats are not equipped with a gray water tank so we were lucky M/V Magnolia is all ready set up.

Tested out that system as well.

We have our electrician Steve coming back this week to help me get the Battery Topography right. The existing system very heavy duty but way to complicated. It took me a couple hours jsuts to build the chart below to try and understand all the various configurations.

Below is scaled up version of what I installed on the Magnolia-S. Though we might reuse a switch or two, the below has no switch requirement which makes the system instantly less complicated. We are also adding a little redundancy by providing a separate start battery for each the GenSet and the MainEngine. On top of that, we are actually REDUCING the size of our battery bank from 1785ah to 1475ah. As with Magnolia-S we will make MV Magnolia as comfortable on the “hook” as she is at a dock.

Part of my job this week will to be to remove the ancient battery monitoring system. I started pulling an tracing wires

and look what I found…the last known DB-25 serial connector in use anywhere in the world (Fake News).

In addition to the above Matt the refrigeration man came out and checked all three of our A/C units. Had to replace 1 pump but everything is working perfectly now..particularly in the all important sewing room. Sam & John the mechanics also put the Northern Light Generator back together. She fired right up and running smoothly. The main engine is giving us some trouble…a neglected water pump leaked on to the Power Take Off (PTO) Pump / John Deere-Lugger mating collar. The darn thing rusted together and the machine show is gingerly working to separate.  Hopefully this can be resolved shortly to the Main Engine too can get operational!!

That is pretty much it from here…if you are still driving..PLEASE be careful…its scary out there on those roads!

The first project of the week was to get rid of this “Rube Goldberg” monstrosity. Its purpose was to get rid of used engine oil. It did that by mixing the old nasty full of stuff motor oil that just cleaned your engine out and mixed into the nice clean diesel fuel just BEFORE it is injected into your engine to burn. “Yea, nah, that’s not going to happen!!”

My trusty screw driver and hose clamp nut driver made short work of “Rube” and that mess was gone. I am going to re-use the mounting board so added a couple coats of paint to freshen things up. Also in the freshening state. As might remember EVERY light on Magnolia was an incandescent bulb..not one LED anywhere. I have changed out all the lights above the engine room so next was the engine room.

All fixtures were modified to accept LED bulbs and in addition 8 additional LED fixtures were added.

The space is now brightly lighted and will making working in there much easier and much more enjoyable. The additional lighting did better illuminate how much of a mess we have going on right now…waiting on parts….argh.

One thing the Admiral wanted was a table that could be set at coffee table or dinner height. We located this this gas filled adjustable base.

Yes, that is a cordless drill. I was the last person in the entire world using a corded drill within the last year.

None the less we got to a workable solution using some thumbscrews though I need to trim the spacers a bit before we go into full time use.

I have been accused of spending too much time showing off the laundry room….I say, if you got it, show! LOL. The real reason the laundry room was cleared out was because of the picture to the right. That is the outboard bulkhead with the major cable run along with the inside the hull portion of the stabilizer system. This is the system we know the least about and one of the most expensive aboard. We are very anxious to to get this system inspected, tested and maintenance caught up. Sadly have to wait till we are pulled out of the water, which is waiting on the engine room going back to together etc…etc

I forgot to get pictures but the refrigerator/freezer location is cleaned out and should have that installed this week. (Nova Kool).

Now to the secret project……I was sitting in the guest stateroom looking around and about that time Annette came in with two teak support bars. As soon as I saw them I knew it was the piece missing from the puzzle I was looking at.  Still the project needed a little modification to make it useful….

With the addition of a table top to left, Annette ended up with a 3ft x 5ft sewing table

Lots of light too boot. Not the fold down bunk above as well, more in a minute.

Slide the table top tons of storage….

There is front access as well.

The cutting room for now is the Master Berth Fwd where the bunk makes for the perfect layout and cutting table.  The Admiral has begun work on the curtains for the Pilothouse.

I wish we could buy stock in that company…….

Thread was quickly put to the material.

Work continues….

Another gift though this one was not a surprise. In the Navy we slept in bunks very similar to this. My friend Jack Tennar has wanted a bunk like this at his house for years.

In addition Jack is also 6’6”…well my friend, I think we have as good as its going to get at 6’3”. Kathy there is another bunk in the same cabin outboard with a thicker mattress!!!

Its been a busy week, progress is pretty going pretty good. Hopefully have the engine room back together late this week. Should have the refrigerator in this week too…ie cold beer!

Week #2 is complete and we are making good progress on Magnolia-M. Below is the “Little House AirBnB” we are renting while we are in Florida. It is a great location and serving its purpose just right. We are walking distance to the boat yard the the tiny house is owned by an artist.

The grounds are filled with beautiful plants and trees with various “art” objects interspersed!

Yes, she ate the WHOLE thing!

Back aboard Magnolia we are making good progress. We are replacing all the rubber (hoses & belts) on both the generator and the main engine.

Truthfully most of the work is being done by our mechanic Sam. A very knowledgeable young man.

In addition to stepping and fetching I spend the after hours getting all the old grease and oil cleaned up. Add a little paint where we can. Below is the Northern Lights Generator freshly with tin foil protecting hoses and wires.

Magnolia-M is at Stuart Yachts a couple miles up a creek from the St Lucie River. Though the area is suburban, at the yard it feels like we are deep in the Okeechobee.

I try to be on board by 0700 which is the quiet time along the creek.

This 4-5 foot alligator swam right along the side of Magnolia this very morning…

The Admiral spent ALL day yesterday going through spare parts for the Main Engine and Generator. She is rebuilding her spreadsheet inventory like we had on Magnolia-S. She currently has 83 items being tracked. By the time we depart, I would expect that number to be between 600-800 items.  The spares below are in a cabinet we discovered for a “secret” purpose which will hopefully be revealed next week. Its going to be GREAT!!!

I took a quiet Sunday morning to paint the heat exchanger and some belt guards from the main engine.

In addition removed a shower rack and filled a screw hole. Add a in a couple coats of Gel-Coat a little sanding and it will disappear.

In addition we discovered this little gift a couple miles away last evening. I feel like it needs to sit next to the Kewpie in Lima, OH or the Spot in Sidney!!!

Have a big week, as I said will spread a little gel-coat, clean a sea strainer and hopefully settle on a galley refrigerator…and that is all BEFORE lunch. Have a great week, we are making progress.

Its been 10 days since we departed Annapolis and have to say we are feeling good about our accomplishments thus far. We spent July 4th evening, a wet and rainy night in Annapolis with friends Dudely and Cheryl (SV Belle Bateau). It was a lovely evening and a great way to kick off our journey…relaxed.

First thing on the 5th we picked up a baby UHaul, dropped off our rental car and headed to Alexandria where our storage stall is/was located. We were blessed to have the assistance of Annette’s Sister Rochelle and my cousins Dan & Lori come help load the truck. It was a well oiled machine and we were off to Hampton VA. Our first stop where we were offloading half the truck into a much less expensive storage location than DC!

A long day but we we got that “back half” offloaded. All because of the help we got on the front end! Thank you Dan, Lori and Rochelle. So much appreciated.

We had a leisurely 2 day drive down to Stuart FL (listened to a great book ). We offloaded the truck, dumped the truck for a Ford Focus Rental (so happy to be out of a truck) and of course first stop was a visit to Magnolia-M. The Admiral looked right at home in her new Pilothouse.

We spent the remainder of the weekend getting “old stuff” off the boat. We ended up completely filling the dumpster on day 3. It was pretty amazing how much stuff we were able to get rid of.

All cruising boats, sail and power are equipped with tanks for restroom waste (Black Water), Magnolia-M captures all waste water (Grey Water) from all the sinks and shower. First order of business was to get a handle on how that system is all connected and configured.  This is going to be our life for the forseable future. How is system x configured and how does it work…

Tuesday was Hydraulics day.  Magnolia-M makes extensive use of hydraulic systems aboard. The anchor windlass, bow thruster, stabilizers, get-home motor, aft anchor windlass and a hydraulic bilge but that in an emergency can pump water like a big city fire truck. We had JT from Industrial Hose visit and gave our Hydraulic System a thorough inspection. Each and every stainless fitting and hose connection was inspected. This is was one of those moments where the cash register could have run a real long tape. Luckily for us we came through the inspection un-scathed. Note: This inspection was about the “plumbing” it did not tell us about the conditioon of the “faucets, drains, washer and dishwasher,” that work is yet to come! In addition Magnolia-M received some pretty hardy comments for the good and solid design that was done on her at construction. All very good news!

Similar in nature as Tuesday, Wednesday was electrical day. Steve our electrical surveyor went through and looked over the topography of the electrical system. One issue I want addressed is the start battery. We have 7 HUGE 8D size batteries (1575ah)  one of which is the start battery for the 145hp Lugger/John Deere and the 16Kw Northern Lights Generator. I want those separated with their own battery. We did get great news in that our Trace Inverter/Charger and the Newmar Charger were both fully functional. Going into the event I had serious concerns about both which we able to exonerate both devices. Great news and we have 200a charger available! All really great news. We also found a few things but all minor in nature, great news!!

Below is looking into the engine room from the salon sole hatch. Battery boxes off the port and starboard.

Main engine, Lugger 145

Admirals Bridge – Sunscreen on the outside ports

Helm console

A never ending stack on manuals and schematics to study.

In addition to all the other things going on, the bench seat on the bow repair was started. The Teak seating had severely deteriorated. I was hoping to postpone this job till we got back to the Chesapeake but it could not be delayed. 

Of course the teak was secured with 5200…the most overly used adhesive in the world.

In addition to everything else, opened up the equipment console above the helm station. Just investigation at this point…

Another ongoing job was flushing ALL the raw water loops with Barnacle Buster. As can be seen by this sea-strainer, maintenance has not been what it should have been for a while!

Over this weekend I did get the bilge pump and switch removed, bilge cleaned and a first coat of paint down in the fwd bilge.

It has been an amazing 10 days, can’t believe only 10, but we knew what we were signing up for. This is going to be the norm for the next couple of months but we are really excited that we will be getting Magnolia-M restored to the vessel she should be. Much yet to come..and BTW, Magnolia-S is still looking to be adopted.

We returned to Galesville with a lot of questions in front of us. Would we be buying a new boat? How would we say good-bye to Magnolia. How would we….. and now tomorrow we leave our home of the last 4 years…that’s a heavier thought than expected as I type this so I am just going to ignore those thoughts for now….

In the mean time, life has been full of sharing time with family and friend. Below you see a SMALL number of the “GenIVs.” I promise at some point there will be a consolidated list but there MUST be a 100 of us by now. We were invited to the McAndrews Family reunion which was a wonderful afternoon of catching up and playing corn-hole!

McAndrews kids with once brother missing….

Hanging with cousin Jim and avoiding the water balloon fight!

Meeting up with Mandala (Ron & Nancy) for Taco Tuesday….okay, there was Ice Cream too! (Eyeglasses not removed quick enough)

Kind of a hard day when “she” got the sign….

One of the few pieces of equipment we are taking with us is the HAM Radio. It took me days to get the radio and equipment installed. Yet I was able to remove everything without a trace in just a few hours. 

Then our friend Kathy calls from New Jersey and suggests they come down for lunch because she wanted to say bye to Magnolia. I think we are all trying to figure out what all these changes are meaning…(see http://a2baker.com/magnoliablog/?p=7615) It was just the intermission we needed to take. A great pause in the packing and thinking. Its really about those moments when we are just together. In that way Annette I are blessed in spades!

With all the changes coming..it was time to embrace it. With Magnolia-M in FL and us here the only thing I could really do was and well work on PR materials. First we needed a logo. With some input from my friend Tim I give you the new Magnolia logo.

Well if you have a logo, well you have to have to have a Boat Card…we were finally able to incorporate the original Magnolia image that Annette’s niece drew for us.

We had to keep the back the same, our friend Michelle caught this picture of us and its a favorite.

So I guess we are back at the beginning….we remember vividly the excitement and trepidation when we started on Magnolia-S. She taught us so very much and along the way we brought her back to the fine cruising vessel she was intended to be. We will be heading off her tomorrow so for the rest of tonight we are just going to try and get a good nights sleep. Things are going to get exciting real quick so hang in there. Be Safe A**2

This is young lady is my friend Jacks daughter Christina. She is one of two young people that I held as babies and celebrated their college graduations. Christina I am so very proud of you! (She sure wears that Magnolia Cap well too!)

One of the earliest….

Christina’s graduation present was a week on the Outer Banks with her friends. It was great fun spending time with these young people.

At the beach house….

Its kinda cool when friends are friends for decades and not just a couple decades either!!!

A couple of guys who need something to keep them busy were gifted with a wasp infestation. It was man against bug, in the end there were no prisoners….

That other young person is Jacks other daughter Caitlin. Unbeknown us, Andrew (her BF) was going to pop “the question” this same week!  What a wonderful surprise!

It was a wonderful surprise and appropriately celebrated!!!

A truly wonderful couple and Andrew you is going to be a great addition to the Tennar Clan.

A very handsome family, and the best friends anyone could ask for. Blessed to have them all in our lives.

If that was not enough big news…Annette and I have been been aboard Magnolia for the last 4 years full time making 3 trips to the Bahamas, 1 trip to west coast of FL and 2 to Maine covering about 25,000 miles.

We have been thinking about expanding our cruising grounds. We really love living aboard but having a 60ft mast over your head kind of limits where we are able to easily cruise. The chart below shows the areas we would like to expand into.

We would like to introduce our new Magnolia. She is a 1997 Kady Krogen 42. She is extensively equipped and excessively ignored so she is will need a lot of love. As with Magnolia-S she can go anywhere in the world, she is only limited by her crew! Magnolia-M is built to cross oceans with a range of 3000nm, fully stabilized. Again, we are NOT crossing oceans just wanted the safest vessel possible for the voyaging we intend to do. All pictures are from current owner.

Main salon looking forward into the galley and steps to the pilothouse.

Dining table expanded for seating for 8.

Looking aft towards the cockpit (back porch).

Salon to starboard

Galley

Galley

Pilothouse

Pilothouse

Pilothouse setee that folds out to a double bunk

These are all old electronics which will be removed and the pilothouse cleaned up and streamlined

This is the master suite with queen size bed…

and a lot more storage than we have on Magnolia-S

This is a picture of the vessels overhead. We really like the teak on the overhead supports

This is the business end, engine room. Magnolia-M is powered by a Lugger 145hp diesel. Basically a John Deere engine block that has been modified for marine applications. In addition we have a 16Kw Northern Lights Generator. That baby can power several traditional homes!! Many of the boats systems are hydraulic rather than the traditional electrical that we have experience with on Magnolia-S. Hydraulic are going to be a new experience but we will get there.

We are looking forward to making her our home. Like Magnolia-S she has traditional teak joinery throughout.

The current plan is to move off Magnolia-S July 5th and take a baby u-haul to FL. Hopefully Magnolia-S will sell this summer, but if not we will plan to fly up in the fall, winterize and put her to bed till spring selling season. We have an AirBnB lined up near the yard where much of the refit work will occur on Magnolia-M, we hope to move aboard in September. We will plan to operate in the south FL area for the winter of 2017-18 until we build some experience with the new vessel. She is TWICE as heavy as Magnolia-S and about 4 times more complicated so we have our work cut out for us. So was that all some big news or what? We are so proud of Christina and Caitlin both. They are wonderfully kind ladies…and I am hoping they will smuggle booze into the old folks home when we get there…love you both