Hiawassee River Weekend

We had hoped to have the time to take an extended excursion up river...Watts Bar Lake, Fort Louden and Tellico Lake, etc. But, unfortunately Rob's work schedule temporarily got in the way. They are moving their office space to another office in the same building, and as luck would have it, the time we picked to go up river turned out to be in conflict with the timing of the office move. So, for now, this extended trip was postponed.....but we took off for the weekend and headed up river anyway!

The Hiawassee River is a tributary to the Tennessee about 25 miles up river from our marina. It is a beautiful (smaller) river with great bird watching and some awesome scenery. We have been up here a couple of times previously...most recently last Thanksgiving to see the Sandhill Crane migratory flock.

We anchored for the night in a shallow-ish embayment near Hiawassee Island. There was quite a bit of weed growth that narrowed our choices some, so we just made the best of what the river would give us. Here's a couple of pics of our anchorage at sunset...quite peaceful...



The anchorage was a bit more exposed than we prefer, but it worked out fine. One snag that came our way was thanks to some weeds that drifted past about 9:30 pm. One batch of weeds got sucked up into our generator cooling water intake line and all of a sudden, the generator quit, which meant that our air conditioning and a bunch of other stuff that was running, immediately shut down. It was rather a surprise, but after only about 20 minutes of fussing with the strainer and cleaning the intake line, we were back in business...and no other surprises for the night!

We also determined as a result of this trip that we don't really like it when the doggy walk spot is 1/2 mile from the boat by dinghy...at least on a dark river. Making this journey after dark was a small adventure, and not really one that we want to repeat often if we can avoid it. All worked out just fine, but it wasn't all that simple or enjoyable.

 

We found a stark contrast in the boat traffic up there that we really liked...there wasn't much! Our lake can get kind of crazy busy on weekends, which we were reminded of as we got closer to home. But while we were up there, we had cruising like this:

It was really pleasant, with periods of time where we saw practically no boat traffic at all. All in all, it was a nice weekend...we only wish that it had a been a week instead!



Bad Breaks Lead to Good Times with Rich and Verna!

Let's start with the good news first...

We had a great time seeing Rich and Verna! They had flown to Atlanta to see Gabi perform as part of an Atlanta Ballet class that she participated in this summer. After dropping Gabi off at the airport to fly home, they drove up to Chattanooga to meet us for Friday night and Saturday. It was wonderful to see them and get all caught up, and it sounds like both Lara and Gabi are doing great! We were a bit late getting into Chattanooga proper on the boat on Friday (more on this later), but managed to hook up with R&V after dinner.

They found a nice B&B to stay at (and their room and breakfast were free thanks to a fiasco at the inn the night they were there...but that's a story for them to tell). Saturday was really hot (like every day recently) but we made the most of it. Rich and Rob took a boat ride for a couple of hours, of course including the obligatory tour of the engine room that 2 mechanical engineers just must do whenever possible. Much of the day was spent just hanging around trying to stay cool, and catching up on everyone's news and plans. Since Verna and Rich had a full southern breakfast (including fried chicken) we didn't end up eating lunch until about 4pm! A short and hot walk around 6, produced dinner which was comprised of milkshakes and latte's...yikes!

We had a great day overall...too hot and too short, but we are really thankful that R&V made the effort to come see us...thanks guys!

Walnut Street pedestrian bridge at night.

Now...the week leading up to this visit wasn't so positive. A lot of work had to be done in a very short time if we were going to make it to downtown Chattanooga in the boat to see R&V. The difficulties started a week prior...we'll try to be brief...

• Returning from a great weekend trip, we encountered some unusual noises and vibrations. Preliminary diagnostics, including a mask and fins trip under the boat to look at the prop led to nothing appearing to be out of the ordinary.
• We made it back home with no further problems, but still feeling unsettled that something was not entirely right with the boat.
• We finally determined that the raw water impeller was compromised, which led to a lack of cooling to the shaft seal. The shaft seal is pretty important...it is located where the shaft to the propeller goes through the hull of the boat, and is responsible for keeping the water out of the boat, but allowing the shaft to turn. Well...it was fried.
• We had the boat hauled out of the water on Thursday to start the repair work. The rudder had to come off, then the propeller, and then the shaft had to be disconnected from the engine. All this was needed in order to remove the old seal and replace it  with a new one. Then this all had to be reassembled.
• We got the boat back at 6pm, and then starting at about 7pm, Rob crawled around working on the stuff that had caused the failure in the first place. The short version is that this work lasted 'til about midnight.
• A sea trial on Friday morning was very comforting as we determined that all of the repairs had been successful, and that we were good to go. Unfortunately, by the time we were able to get this all accomplished and ready the boat for travel, it was much later in the day than we had planned...but we made it eventually.

Here is the old seal in it's failed state...that black plastic goo looking stuff is NOT supposed to be there:

And here is the shiny new one that we installed...with a couple of spare seals added so that we have an easier time changing out the next one:

Always wanting to look on the bright side...we took advantage of the "opportunity" that being without a boat (home) for the better part of a day presented. With the 2 dogs to manage and no real internet access other than our phones, we decided to take the opportunity to visit Lookout Mountain. This is a popular tourist destination, but more importantly it was a critical site of some major battles that took place during the Civil War. Chattanooga was actually a town divided...part of the town was staunchly in favor of the Confederacy, and part was loyal to the Union. So this site along with others in the area were very fiercely contested. Here are a few pics of our visit to Point Park at the very top of Lookout Mountain.

The really short version of this entire blog entry is...all's well that end's well. And this saga ended with quality time spent with family. All the rest of this is much less important than that!