Delays & Delights in Daytona, Post 26-06

So… This post is not what I had expected it to be about. I wanted to write about a wonderful two-night passage to Key Largo, instead it is about being delayed in Daytona for another week. At least, in the middle of all this, we had a special guest onboard the night before we attended a presentation he did about his non-stop, solo sail trip around the world.

Jimmy's pre-offshore inspection of the rig.

Departure Preparation 

After returning from our last road trip to visit doctors, friends and family, we focused on getting Utopia ready for a two-night passage down to Key Largo. The plan was to depart Tuesday morning after attending a two-day workshop with the Florida Water Environment Association (FWEA) which wrapped up Monday afternoon. Our checklist items were getting checked off, and the weather window was looking great for a 7 a.m. departure to hit slack tide at Ponce Inlet.

 

Delayed For Phantom Parts

As usual, I defrosted the freezer in advance of a big trip to the grocery store. Friday morning, Jimmy picked up a month’s worth of groceries, enough to make it to Key West and placed lots of great food in the refrigerator and freezer. That afternoon he noticed the temperatures in the fridge and freezer creeping up and that there were no ice crystals forming on the cold plate within the freezer.

Upon further inspection it was clear that the refrigerator system was no longer cooling. To save our food, bags of ice were purchased keeping the contents under 40 degrees. Everything that was frozen became thawed.

Current refridgeration system.

 Jimmy jumped into trouble shooting mode with no luck, eventually calling for a service tech to come by the boat early Monday morning. Let’s just say this did not turn out to be a great experience. In short, he said the compressor was bad and could install one in the coming week. Our thought was that if it was easy to get the fridge fixed now it would be worth the delay. Thus, we gave up our weather window and asked the marina to stay one more week.

Friday rolls around and the technician states that the compressor was on backorder for at least another two weeks. Another contractor did warn us of this technician, and this made it apparent that it would be best to cancel the order and get the fridge fixed further south. Had he taken the time to order the unit on Monday, we could have learned of the back order in time for our original plan of departing Tuesday.

In the meantime, we continue to buy ice from the marina office, eating as much meat as we can before it spoils and tossing out the items that are questionable (chicken anyone?). Once offshore, the fridge will probably inch above 40 degrees, and we’ll have to toss out anything with spoiling potential. Jimmy has been calling around Key West looking for technicians there to try to get this fixed before Utopia heads to Mexico.

Delightful Moments

One of the reasons we stayed in Daytona until the first weekend of February was because FWEA hired a keynote speaker that I had recommended to them for the annual Leadership Development Workshop: Jerome Rand, and I was introduce his presentation and to moderate questions, as well as serve on a panel of past FWEA presidents.

I had the opportunity to meet Jerome in 2016 when he was the director of water sports and guest activities at the Bitter End Yacht Club (BEYC) in the British Virgin Islands. At the time he was planning a solo, non-stop circumnavigation. When he took off the following year, several of us followed his route as he spent 271 days abord Mighty Sparrow, his 32’ Westsail (we traveled to BEYC with ABYC members Robinsons and Ganeys during the Pro-Am Regatta week). After his successful voyage, he wrote a book and started a podcast. Eventually he began doing speaking engagements with yacht clubs and for corporate events.

Several years ago, I began to listen to his podcast. I enjoyed that he shares his solo experiences, and interviews everyday sailors, people I can relate to. Like many podcasters, he encourages listeners to send an email, and I did so after one of his podcast episodes. I cannot remember what I wrote to him about, but he and I have been emailing back and forth for a couple of years now. When the topic of our Appalachian Trail hike popped up, he expressed an interest in chatting with me about the hike for the podcast. After not being able to get our schedules to align, even for a virtual meet up, we decided that his trip to Daytona for the speaking engagement would be a perfect time to finally meet up.

Jerome Rand aboard Utopia

On a very chilly Saturday afternoon, Jerome drove over to our marina and visited us aboard Utopia. Jimmy cooked dinner while Jerome and I sat down in the salon and chatted about backpacking and sailing (Episode #404).

I felt very honored to have Jerome aboard Utopia, yet it was only the icing on the cake. The following day I had the opportunity to introduce Jerome to the volunteer leaders of FWEA. I had always been curious about his presentation and was very much looking forward to it.

Jerome's

presentation did not disappoint!

Jerome did an incredible job with the presentation, taking the time to focus on resource management and highlighting a potable water dilemma during his voyage. I kid you not, there was not a single person in the crowd of 60 looking at their phones or laptops. This was not a room of sailors, but engineers and other water resources professionals. Everyone was enthralled by the hour-long presentation. I entertained questions for 20 minutes after his presentation before having to close out the session. After which, during the pre-dinner happy hour, Jerome sold out of every one of his autographed books, both the main book Sailing Into Oblivion, and his kid’s books (which are super cute)! The evening ended with more time with Jerome and my fellow colleagues over dinner.

When I returned to the workshop the following day I heard numerous compliments on Jerome’s keynote presentation. I was very happy that the crowd enjoyed hearing his talk since I had not heard it before but felt it would be very good. For the second day of the workshop, instead of ducking out part way through the day to prepare for an offshore passage as planned, I lingered the full day to enjoy time more time with colleagues making the best of our departure delay.

Destination Key West

So, we are now looking for weather windows for jumping south. With this delay, and the need to repair the fridge, we plan to make large jumps all the way to Key West, skipping Key Largo and other sights, including Bahia Honda, along the way. Perhaps next winter we can make Bahia Honda a required stop.

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Post 26-06