We kicked ass and took names this weekend

For the past month we've been working on the truck, trying to get it up and running again (for the lowest price possible). Saturday we managed to get the truck running again! We had anticipated having to drop the transmission out, in order to get the broken off piece of the starter that was jammed in the flywheel, out. For weeks we had been hammering at it, pulling it, rotating the harmonic balancer - everything we could remotely do shy of taking out the transmission, or taking it into a mechanic ($$$). Finally, we figured Saturday was our last attempt. We had reached the decision that we needed to take out the transmission, it appeared we had no other option left. With the help of Skip, a local sailor and resident badass, we were able to tear the metal piece lodged up in the flywheel out...WITHOUT TOUCHING THE TRANSMISSION! Yay!! We replaced the starter for $150 and we now have a running vehicle again.

We've also been spending the past month (plus) on working out the details and decisions of anchoring out. Since we arrived in the Keys, we've been scheming to get the boat off the mooring ball and onto an anchor. Why? It puts an additional $150 in our pocket every month. We've been picking up the gear to do this in bits and pieces for months now; getting the chain last month, the anchor several weeks ago, the tackle last weekend, the anchor light still working on. Overall, the endeavor ran us several hundred...but we'll be able to put that back in our pockets in two months. We had moved to a new mooring ball Friday so that we could keep an eye on the anchorage location we wanted. Sunday morning, first thing, we saw that a boat had left right where we wanted to anchor out so we put the keys in the ignition and motored over. We dropped anchor and are sitting pretty. The anchor is a little bit of an overkill for the size boat we have....we should have three 35 lb. anchors, instead, we scored a cheap (and massive!) 110 lb. anchor. We figured one of those ought to do the trick. We couldn't even fit it into our 9 foot dinghy, we had to borrow someone elses.

We love the new area we're in! Dolphins play under our boat, and manatees are in the area! We watched them chasing fish right under the boat - we would have grabbed better shots but we were too captivated to pull ourselves away.

We caught a picture of a Spotted Eagle Ray just below the surface of the water, he was just hanging out next to our boat.

Barry - this one's for you!

 

Barry and Anne sent us an Arizona flag. If it were a year ago, we would be flying it proudly! However, due to more recent political circumstances, we're not as proud to wave it. It's will remain a new addition to the boat, but Anne gave us the idea to put a counter statement around it so that no one in the harbor thinks we're racist, Republican, crazy, or all of the above! Thanks again guys! We'll think of you every time we see it!