Rolianne Afloat and Abroad

We did it! While sailing in the Bay, we catched our first eatable fish! A beautiful (and delicious) stripped bass (or rockfish). Gutting it aboard in a bikini was quite an experience!!! All worth it. Served it with Old Bay spices. All about local taste!!!

It’s done! No more car! No more dock! Just us and Rolianne... And Chesapeake Bay.  When I first looked at the map months ago to see where exactly we had bought a boat, I never realized how big the Bay was. It’s huge! With tons of little creeks to explore. So early Wednesday morning, we took off as we just wanted to go and explore our new playground. We left for Annapolis. It took us way longer than we expected, but it was a fun ride with nice winds of around 15 knots.  We arrived in Annapolis thinking that we could just arrive and park at the public dock. Nope. It’s kinda tricky for bigger sailboats, or maybe are we just not used to Rolianne yet. Anyway, we had to back off from the dock while everyone was looking. And while a huge boat was trying to get in. Not our most glorious moment. 😅 Especially that we realized later on that the paint was peeling off our boat where the water was hitting the hull!! We were super bummed about that, still are. We bought some paint to try a

On a reçu le paddle board. Il va très bien. L'ouragan Florence ne vient pas. On a installé le radar. On part de la marina aujourd'hui. J'ai hâte d'aller nous ancrer et d'aller à la plage!

While Florence was making its way onto the Carolinas, Sam spent the weekend at Casa Rio Marina while the kids and I went on a road trip to Washington and Baltimore. We spent Friday night at our new friends' place. Romain and Julianne were stoked to play with kids their age, in fact so excited that they went to bed way pass their bedtime. Oh well, it was all worth it! Thanks Juliette and Antoine for having us over! We all enjoyed staying at your causy home, going to the aviation museum (where the kids learned to fly the first plane ever built by the Wrights brothers!) and having lunch outside before heading to Baltimore. On Saturday, I catched up with someone I hadn't seem for a long long time. Again, thank you so much for welcoming us in your home! And for showing us around the farm market where I stocked on fresh produce for the week to come... Back at the boat, Sam had pretty much finalized the preparation for the departure. We still need to fill the propane tank and t

As Florence will be hitting the Carolinas, Maryland just declared a State of emergency. The problem is that Maryland, just like all the other states threatened by this hurricane, received a lot more rain than usual in the past weeks. The soil is already filled with water, so water will just run in the streets like crazy. What this means for us: As we are in Chesapeake Bay, we are in a high risk of evacuation because of life-threatening and potentially historic flooding. We are still not sure how this will all play out, but be assured that we are on the look out for the next step to take. So far we are looking at two options. The first one is to get the boat out of the water, and to leave the area. This would cost us 850$ US, which is a lot of money. But if this is what we need to do, we'll do it. The second option is if flooding is the only danger. No damaging winds. Then we would take Rolianne out to the bay, where we would anchor it with a extra weight and a lot of chain. The ki

So our engine is a Yanmar 3gm30g 27hp, original with the boat, so it's 30 years old.  These are great engines and will run forever but you need to look after it and maintain it.  I began with having a look at the impeller in the raw water pump to find that there was one leg missing.  I managed to find it in the heat exchanger!  Changed the impeller.  Then realized there wasn't quite enough water coming out, in other words the pumps wasn't pumping enough.  Upon inspection I realized the pump cover was worn and would not create a vacuum.  So we changed that.  I also found second hand an alternator and a starter.  I also purchased all the fuel and oil filters we will need for the next year as well as a bunch of engine oil.  Cooling fluid as well, spare raw water pump gaskets.  While cruising out we noticed that the engine was slightly white smoking.  White smoke is a sign of water or contaminant in the fuel and restriction in the mixing elbow (where the exhaust meets the cooli

It would be a lie to pretend that living aboard has been only fun and games so far. As a family newly living on a 35 ft sailboat, we are facing different issues and this post is dedicated to these. First, as we are all adjusting to living in a limited space together, the kids argue a lot. For pretty much anything. Fighting instinctively for their  own living space I guess! No actual fight yet, apart from the accidental kick in the face while playing in their bed or the not so accidental pintch while arguing about the harmonica. 😂 They just keep on picking at each other all the time and to be honest, it's driving me insane. It probably doesn't help that Sam and I are both still spending a lot more time working on the boat than usual, to be prepared for September 14th (date when we will finally sell the car and leave the marina). We're working on that issue by finding activities that the kids both enjoy, so that there is no competition between them. Greg, the broker that