We have a new crew member! Don Yonko

Our new dinghy arrived today! Since our Tug is named after our grandmas, our tender is named after our grandpas Don Danell and John Blaskovich. Jim’s grandpa’s nickname was black Yonko, there was also a blond Yonko. Yonko is Slavic for John. I believe this has nothing to do with skin color but hair color 😛 I started to order vinyl lettering for the dinghy, but after some research, that doesn’t fare well on Hypalon, so not sure how we will apply the moniker.

It was quite the adventure getting the new dinghy home. We took the baby dinghy (that we were going to trade in) over a couple of marinas. We used our new rain bibs that we understand we will live in up in Alaska. Other than being ridiculously long, they are super comfortable and I won’t mind living in them! Adam from Fresh Air Dinghy Repair met us at the public dock. He launched our new boat and retrieved the baby. He then thoroughly went over all the systems. He had a few bad reviews, so I was nervous, but those fears were unfounded.

We took a little spin around our marina, the wind came up so we headed in. We love, love, love, it, and know it will serve us well over the next few years.

Since it was now late afternoon, we didn’t want to start up any new projects, so we drove to Seattle to Fisheries Supply to pick up the anchor chain. We also picked up a windlass maintenance kit, we’re pretty sure it has never been serviced. We always dread that traffic but it wasn’t too bad going in. We ate dinner in town waiting for rush hour to be over, there was a 26-minute slowdown.

We have our work cut out for us the next clear day (forecast calls for rain). The windlass needs to be serviced. We also need to mark the anchor chain, so when we are paying it out we can keep track of how much scope we have out. We are going to mark it every 30 feet coordinating using red, yellow, green. If it’s in the red, if you lose track, you will at least know it is less than 100. Yellow less than 200. Green less than 300. Yes, we did get 350 feet of chain for Alaska. We have had many opinions voiced that this is too much weight in the bow. 1) Our windlass gypsy only accepts chain – adding rope rode sounds like a good way to lose a finger or two and 2) We know firsthand someone who has the exact model of our boat, spent last summer up in Alaska, is going again this year and has the same amount of chain, with no adverse handling or dragging their anchor in the middle of the night (no dragging = good sleep)

Your interest might be waning at this point. I thought this was a travel blog? Tenders and anchor chain, boring. I know I’ve probably lost both my children at this point 😛 The big adventure begins March 13th. Stay tuned.

Talk soon.