Let the packing begin!

We have a contract on our house. We have to be out by the 20th of November. Talk about stress. We need to separate what goes into storage and what is going on the boat, mainly clothing. We also have to set up our mail forwarding, change address and take care of a bunch of other administrative items.

The boat is still on the Lake and we still have a few items left to do before moving it. We need to keep it on the lake so we will have some place to go after we close on the house. I also found out today the lake level is up again from all the rain we have had. The dock where the boats are hauled out of the water is almost under water. If the lake goes up another foot it will be under water which means no boats can get pulled. As it is now we can't even think about moving the boat until December. Hey, we're retired and everyday is a Saturday so it doesn't really matter.

YIPPEE Retirement!!!!!

We made it, finally. Both Sandy and I turned in our computer equipment to our respective companies on Wednesday September 30th. A day that will be remembered by us for a long long time. What this means is that our cruising plans will start moving forward in earnest.

Last week I installed the SSB radio equipment. I still have the antenna and the counterpoise to finish up. I will post photos when completed. I also received our life raft. I purchased a Winslow 6 person standard offshore raft.

I have finished getting the permits for our radio equipment from the FCC, received our 2010 U.S. Customs sticker and have applied to the Bahamas Department of Agriculture for permits to get our cats into the Bahamas this winter.

We have left to bottom paint Xpereince and move her to the coast. We are planning to move to Mobile Alabama sometime after November 15th. We would like to spend December in the Florida Keys and then head over to the Bahamas until April before heading up the U.S. east coast to the Chesapeake Bay where we will spend summer of 2010.