Uh-Oh! Will we need a PLAN: Phase 4?

Monday, June 3, 2024

Walt and I slept well and awoke to a bright and breezy morning. By a little after 10 am, we had left the dock at Okeover (with some difficulty because the wind was shoving the boat away from the dock, and it was hard to hold it in place with the center line—the “breast line”—while the bow and stern lines were untied and pulled aboard—Walt was able to hop onto the deck just as the boat was leaving the dock on its own!), and were planning a five-hour sail to a destination to the northwest. We were happy that the new chart-plotter seemed to be behaving as it should, but suddenly and most disappointingly, its screen went dark, just as the old plotter’s screen had done on Wednesday—OH, NO! What IS wrong?

We decided to head for Squirrel Cove, about two hours away, where we’d stayed on Thursday, so that we could anchor and Walt could try to figure out what was actually happening, since it was not likely that two chart-plotters, one a refurbished old device and the other brand new, would malfunction in the same way. After disassembling things, looking at wiring, and doing a good bit of thinking, Walt came to the conclusion that the problem was NOT related to the chart-plotter itself, but to a defective computer chip (that contains our maps) that was causing the navigation system, for some unidentifiable reason, to shut down when it was in place; when it was removed, both chart-plotters functioned properly!!

After some searching around the boat, Walt located a replacement chip, and after its installation, the new chart-plotter was put into its proper place in the cockpit, just in front of the helm. It immediately began to provide us with the information that we need, most especially the radar overlays that are essential when we are traveling in fog or in the dark! Walt intends to order another data chip to be sent to our son Martin in Vancouver, so that he can bring it with him when he and our friend Hans join our crew in Port Hardy on Vancouver Island on June 15. That way, we will have not only a back-up plotter but a back-up data chip—very good things!

With a proper diagnosis of the electronics problems made at last, we were able to spend a relaxed afternoon reading, writing, and listening to the wind whooshing through Braesail’s rigging and occasional passing rain showers rattling on the roof of the cockpit enclosure and on the windows. With our anchor firmly embedded in the cove’s muddy bottom, we’re anticipating a secure night’s rest, even if the winds increase as predicted—and there is no need to formulate a PLAN: Phase 4!