Our new ride... Hobie Mirage Oasis

We've got a new ride...

Yesterday, Bob was lucky enough to catch a classified on Craig's List minutes after it was posted for a 14-foot, 2-person Hobie Mirage Oasis kayak.

Similar to this, but a previous model... no fishing rod holders :(

The seller took us out to Green Cay Marina to look at it and it was a no-brainer... excellent condition.  The price was the cost of one Mirage drive unit by itself! I'm so excited.

We peddled it back to the boat and it was a piece of cake even with towing the dinghy behind us. When we've finished our afternoon coffee we plan to take it for a spin. Go peddle power!

To make us "street legal" we plan to buy something like this:

Revere Comfortmax Inflatable Belt Pack Manual Type III Personal Flotation Device

Here's a video from the Hobie web site.

See why I'm excited by our newest purchase... We can also make a new dinghy and swap the Mirage Drives between it and the kayak. Cool...

So it goes!

Lost Dinghy - Trellis Bay, Tortola, BVI

Has anyone seen this dinghy that went missing Friday night at Trellis Bay, Tortola, BVI?

It is a 12-foot Walker Bay Genesis RIB with a "rather bashed up looking" 25HP Mercury outboard (I believe that their nice 8HP outboard went missing not too long ago). It also has the markings of T/T Nauticat of Fowey.

Nauticat of Fowey is one of our favorite charter catamarans and we hope that Ali & Bill recover their dinghy.

You can see their charter brochure here: click for Nauticat's brochure.

Dinghy theft is akin to horse thiefing, in my opinion, if not worse!

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I want this folding dinghy

We plan on building Bolger's Tortoise. We have had three and are very happy with this boxy boat. It rows great, carries a load, and nobody is going to steal it at the dinghy dock.

But, we would really like a space-saving, folding dinghy and this one from Wooden Widget seems to fill the bill.

6' 2" Fliptail Folding Dinghy

What's not to like?

Read more about it at BoatBits.

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Good Experience OFFSHORE MARINE St Thomas USVI

We had a good experience yesterday that I'd like to share...

The day before yesterday we lost overboard the piece off the end of our dinghy pump hose... you know, that special adaptor necessary to inflate your Caribe dinghy? Bob is very good at finding things underwater but we couldn't look for it right away because we were going to catch a bus to go up to the mall.

Yesterday we went to St Croix Marine and they didn't have the Caribe adaptor as they are not a Caribe dealer. We then went online to check West & Defender.  Then we decided "What the heck? Let's call Offshore Marine in St Thomas and see what they have to offer."

Chuck in the parts department was very helpful. He said that they had just received a shipment of these thingies the previous day. Well, that's handy for us! As we are in St Croix, Chuck drove down and put it on the seaplane. Such service! The seaplane is still only $10 to ship a small package like this. It is faster and less expensive than Express Mail.

So, thank you Chuck & Harold.

Ooops! Check Dinghy Painter Occasionally

Yesterday when I went to tie up the dinghy at Island Water World (SXM) I was surprised to find that I had both ends of the dinghy painter... One end had the U-part of the shackle that used to be attached to the bow.

Wow, were we lucky!

Normally for the dinghy painter we make an eye splice in one end of the rope and loop that through the U-bolt in the dinghy so there is not a fastener involved. I don't remember why I backspliced a shackle into this painter, but it doesn't appear that we moused it... either that or the plastic wire tie came off.

This could have been very embarassing, not to mention frustrating and expensive, if it had come loose when tied to the back of So It Goes. Quite often I check to make sure that the dinghy is there. Especially if I hear a dinghy passing by too close at night.

So, check your dinghy's painter and make sure everything's OK.

RIB Inflatable dinghy tube repair - ClamSeal

I've been wanting to mention this wonderful product since last November but with this and that, I never got around to it. The ClamSeal is a two-piece thingy that clamps together. One part goes inside the tube and the other part goes on the outside. You screw down the nut and you have a tight seal. For pictures, visit Bob's Boat Bits blog to see the installation of our second ClamSeal repair [CLICK HERE].

Back in November, the day before we were leaving to sail over to the Virgin Islands to attend the to charter yacht shows in St. Thomas USVI and Tortola BVI, our Caribe 9L got a small puncture. It was in a difficult place to repair and the first patch we did, didn't take. The puncture was in the bow very close to the seam with the strip with the grommets in it. There was not enough room to get enough patching material to make a good seal. It was time to go so we stowed it on our foredeck with a very slow leak.

Our first boat show was in Tortola so we just made do by pumping up the dinghy a bit each time we used it. When we arrived in St. Thomas, our first stop was to see Harold at Offshore Marine, the Caribe dealer, to see if we could have someone patch our dinghy. Yes they could, but the guy was on vacation and would not be back for another 10 days. So, it was back to pumping up the dinghy before each use.

We went to Island Water World over by Yacht Haven Grande to see if they had a ClamSeal because they had them at the St. Maarten store. No luck there, so we bought a replacement valve but we were a bit nervous about installing it as we couldn't find instructions, plus we'd be back in St. Maarten soon and we're doing OK...

When we got back to St. Maarten we bought a ClamSeal at Island Water World. What a wonderful piece of gear. It's kind of frightening to make a 2-inch slice in your tube to install but Hey Presto it works and was EASY. Some people probably wouldn't like the look or perhaps not like that it is not flush but it makes our little boat distinguishable :)

Last week we admitted that we had another puncture. We were saying that the tube was a bit soft because it was cold last night... We found the little pinprick hole and tried a bit of crazy glue first but the next morning the tube was a bit soft again... So off to Island Water World. They only had two ClamSeals so we bought both of them.

Visit Bob's Boat Bits blog to see the installation of our second ClamSeal repair [CLICK HERE].

I think that anyone who has an inflatable life raft should take a couple of these along. I don't remember the book (was it "Adrift"?) but it was a guy in a leaky life raft and the instructions on the repair kit was to apply to a dry surface. Duh! How are you going to keep a leaky life raft dry when you are using it.

So, thank you Barton Marine Equipment Ltd for a great and reasonably priced ($30) product.

You can buy a ClamSeal through Amazon.com: Sea Eagle ClamSeal Instant Repair kit