Some Assembly Required

You may or may not have heard, but we finally got our new mast after months and months of patiently waiting. It showed up this past Saturday morning on the back of a big ol' semi truck, with a big ol' truck driver who looked exactly like the stereotypical trucker from every horror film, late night comedy, and dateline TV show you've ever seen. He was larger than life, probably didn't own a shirt with sleeves, had a big ol' wad of chew between his lips, and smelled like he lived in the cab of that big ol' truck. But boy was I glad to see him. I was so excited that almost gave him a big ol' bear hug when he showed up, until I saw the tattoo on his sleeveless arm that said “I'm packin' heat”. I opted to not attempt the big ol' bear hug. I went for the more acceptable hand shake and “Hi, I'm Jeff.”

After paperwork formalities and some creative forklift driving, our mast was tucked in a corner of the yard for us to begin the task of unpacking and assembling a 60 foot aluminum pole that will hopefully take us around the world.

Getting this mast in our hands is a pretty big deal for us. We had been told multiple times, “It's almost done. It should ship next week.” After months of next weeks, I was starting to wonder if it was actually going to show up ever. It's amazing to me that our whole adventure was hinged on one piece of equipment. Granted, it's a pretty big piece of equipment, but still, without this one thing, our whole upcoming adventure would be a bust.

But now that it's here, I feel like we are suddenly back on track, I can breath a little easier, and for some strange reason, I'm now sleeping like a baby. It's a miracle.

For the next week or so, we'll be hard at work assembling our mast, attaching rigging, running wires to run lights and radar, and then finally having a crane hoist it into the boat. Once it's in and standing upright, I'll feel like there is nothing that can stop us. Anything else we have to do can be done while we are sailing down the coast to Mexico.

Other than a new mast in our hands and tons of other boat projects getting done, the only thing I have left to report is that Episode 1 of our new video series is now up on Youtube. The hardest thing for us on our adventure is the fact that our family and friends are not with us. Of course we would love it if you would visit us, but since that is not realistic for a lot of you, we have figured that the next best thing is for us to bring you along by showing you what we are seeing and doing. Hence the video series. So grab some popcorn, get cozy on the couch, and get ready for some highly riveting videos, and don't forget to subscribe if you would like to be informed when the next video comes out.

I can't seem to figure out how to get the video to work if you are reading this on a mobile device, so the link is here.



That's a big mast! (that's what she said)


Brenda is still crying about her blister from working on the mast.

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