Preparation and Shake-Down

With R&R in the water and almost of her refitting completed, we are beginning to load clothing, provision food and drinks, check boating equipment, and plan for this summer’s voyage. We’ve made many trips from home to boat, and will make many more over the next few days.

I arranged for a US Coast Guard Auxiliary vessel safety check. Rumor has it that displaying a current-year’s USCG safety check sticker makes it less likely that law enforcement will stop a boat randomly.

My pre-test for the USCG safety check confirmed that all required equipment was on board and operating. I did learn that emergency flares can’t be more than three years old and therefore picked up new flares for R&R’s orange emergency box.

I dusted off my Captain’s Log and Captain’s Planning Sheet spreadsheets, revised them for our trip North, and used the Navionics app to build the first few daily routes to be uploaded to our Garmin chartplotter.

Despite more than 125 day-trips during our Great Loop voyage, the first mate and I took four short shake-down cruises with family and friends to enjoy boating and rebuild “muscle memory” of checking off pre-cruise checklists, working lines and fenders to dock and undock, and other daily boating tasks.

It feels good to regain our boating rhythm!