10/12/2010 PEBBLE ISL MARINA TO DOUBLE ISLAND ANCORAGE, TN

TUESDAY

TOTAL MILES TRAVELED TODAY:   40 NM

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY JACKIE AND ED!!

Things were going really good, we were going through the check list and preparing to start up. “What’s this water leak?” says Dan as he peeks into the starboard engine room. Water was leaking from our fresh water expansion tank. While this does not make the system unusable, it does make the pump work more than it should. First we jumped into a courtesy van with another couple and headed out looking for a new tank. After several stops, we decided just to live with it for a while.,

So now we are back on the Quest and starting the generator to pull in the power cable. Starts fine but soon it just shuts down, zip, zero, nada. Hummmm. Now what? Dan bled the fuel system and it started right up but shut itself down again. After sever more attempts to bleed the system with no luck, mega frustration set in. Hummmm, yet again. During the process of troubleshooting the system, he noticed that someone had installed the after-market, filter separator backwards. The entire time we have owned the boat, the fuel has been going through this particular filter the wrong way. So why malfunction now? When Dan serviced the filter last weekend, he installed a new check valve gasket. This prevented the fuel from going backwards through the filter! He is still marveling that he somehow discovered this anomaly.

So now it’s after one and we are just setting out for our day’s journey. Thank goodness we have nowhere to go fast!

The water is like glass, smooth and reflective. The autumnal palate is becoming more apparent and we are struggling to take it all in. “Oh, look at that tree!” “Ah, did you see that bird?” “Gee, look at that cute row of houses.” “Beautiful Cliffs!” “Wow, cool loader”(-that from Dan, of course)

SHADES OF MAGENTA

VIBRANT PUMPKIN

AT HOME IN THE SHALLOW SANCTUARY

JUST HANGING OUT

HOMES RIGHT ON THE RIVER

TOWERING CLIFFS

COLOR ON THE CLIFFS

CLOSE UP OF THE ROCK

 MAN PLEASING EQUIPMENT

The weather and impressive sky views are the hot thing today. It went from blue-blue skies dotted with fluffy white clouds, to threatening thunderheads, to thunderstorms and raging rain, to rainbows, to blue skies again, to more lightening and rain as darkness neared. Pretty impressive day!

BLUE SKIES AND BILLOWING CLOUDS

THREATENING

RAIN ON THE WATER

POURING DOWN

NOT A PRETTY PICTURE

CLEARING SKIES WITH WISPY CLOUDS

THE POT OF GOLD AT THE END OF THE STORM

UH HO, AGAIN?

Due to our extremely late start, we didn’t reach our anchorage at Double Island (MM 149) until after sunset. We inched our way into the beautiful anchorage and found C Horse, Miss Ruby and Blue Angel there to welcome us.

GLORIOUS SUNSET

Between the coming and going of the rain, Dan lit the BBQ and cooked hamburgers for a yummy dinner then we played a round of gin before retiring for the night in our peaceful resting place.