Monthly Archives: May 2008

latest, Madsu, Media

A River Runs Through It

There’s something magic about living in Vancouver, and it’s easy to forget what an amazing place this is.

This morning I got up and took transit from North Vancouver to Richmond. One transfer and an hour later, I was sitting on the deck of Madsu at Skyline Marina on the Fraser River in Richmond.

I spent the next few hours motoring down the North Arm of the Fraser – enjoying a completely different aspect of Vancouver – one you forget is there when sitting in city traffic.

By the time I was off the river and into English Bay the sun decided to show up – and my trip over to Howe Sound and Horseshoe Bay was a delight.

So many different aspects to the city in one short day. From sitting on a bus in rush hour traffic to watching a bald eagle feast on a salmon. Gotta love BC.

Madsu

Casino Sailing

We finally put Madsu in the water yesterday and sailed from West Vancouver’s Fisherman’s Cove over to the North Arm of the Fraser, and then up river to Skyline Marina.

We had about 20 minutes to kill while we waiting for the Midarm swing bridge to be available for a swing so we stopped by the River Rock Casino to check things out.

You gotta love having a casino within a short sail away…

Looking forward to exploring the river and making friends with all the working boats.

Madsu

Madsu Upgrades Slide Show

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After taking a lot of bits and pieces apart, I’m finally reassembling Madsu and we’re just days away from getting her back in the water for the summer.

In celebration, I put together this little slide show.

  • Use the + and – buttons to go forward or back, or jump using the thumbnail images
  • Your keyboard page forward and page back buttons will also work
  • Mouse over the image to see if I’d added any notes…
Media

Guest blog post at Vidfest

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I was asked if I’d do a guest blog post on the Vidfest site – the post is here.

I’m also moderating a session called Crowd Pleasers on crowd sourcing at Vidfest this year. That means I can’t see Eric McLuhan so I hope someone podcasts it. (OMG, our session is competing with MM’s son!)

Really looking forward to it and the rest of the festi-conference. It’s always sunny and hot during VidFest, and I figure that’s at least as accurate a weather forecast as we’ve had all year.

VidFest web site is here.

Madsu

Masthead Good to Go

Another crappy weather day, so no painting today, but I did work inside on bits and pieces of Madsu’s gear.

The masthead is done and ready to go. Yesterday I discovered that the new sheaves I got to replace the old wire sheaves didn’t actually fit.

I spent a bit of quality time with my Makita sander and the aluminum plate that acts as a spacer between the port and starboard pair of sheaves.

In the photo you can see the aft pair of sheaves – and the arrow points to the spacer that runs fore and aft and keeps the starboard side sheaves apart from the port side.

I didn’t want to sand too much since the sheaves just run free – there’s no bearings – the plastic sheave just runs on the pin – so I don’t want too much play in there.

The fit is perfect now – amazing what a little sandpaper on aluminum can do

With a new spin crane, a ridiculously expensive block for the spinnaker halyard, new anchor light post, Windex, and new sheaves for the all line halyards, Madsu’s sad little masthead has been transformed.

To keep me inspired while I’m working on this stuff, I’m reading There By No Dragons: How to Cross a Big Ocean in a Small Sailboat by Reese Palley.

(if you’re wondering what the hell that thing is sticking out of the TOP of the windvane, it’s the new ‘bird spike’ meant to keep freeloaders of the avian variety off the vane).

I should say that we sailed all last summer without the benefit of a masthead Windex. Instead we used Newport shroud telltales which were great, and we’ll keep them on board again this year.