Hoot Mon's 1st refit/ cleaning

On January 27-31, 2010 - John and Mark spent our first night on Hoot Mon after arriving late the evening of Wednesday, January 27th. Their task the next day was to unload from Hoot Mon the equipment and supplies that had accumulated over the years. It turned into more than 8 dock carts full and filled the entire bed of the pick up and most of the crew cab rear seat. It was hard for them to stay focused on the task and not stop to ponder what stories were behind many of the items. On Friday (29th), John, Mark, Pete & Peter Roach (Sailing with Grace) helped move Hoot Mon to Mandarin Holiday Marina in Julington Creek on the St Johns River. They timed the move with high tide but still did quite a bit of river mud ploughing and even bumped a good one on a sand bar on the way into the marina. Hoot Mon's 6'6" draft will be a challenge. On January 30, 2010, Widget arrived from her adapted physical education teachers' conference on Jekyll Island and started cleaning the boat. As you can see in the photos it cleans up well. We'll finish the cleaning next time we travel to Hoot Mon. John and Mark began plumbing the sinks and showers into a new sump box that will be located in the bilge. They will also be installing the holding tanks that Hoot Mon had existed without for 31 years. Up to this point, the head sinks had drained into the toilets. This was okay since the heads drained straight over board and not into a holding tank. With installation of holding tanks, the sinks needed to be re-plumbed away from the heads or we would be filling the holding tanks unnecessarily. Even though the re-plumbing task is a task, CSY's present a reasonable space between the cabin sole and the hull in which to work. The galley sink was already plumbed to drain through the hull and we'll use that through-hull for the grey water coming out of the sump box. Saturday (30th) and Sunday (31th) were cold and blustery. Getting dock lines and fenders adjusted took priority over inside projects. Tough weather for boat projects. Physically we headed back to Atlanta but our heads and hearts remained in Jacksonville.

January 25, 2010 Hoot Mon sale complete

We are the 2nd owners. We have decided to keep the name Hoot Mon in honor of its former owner, Phylis Fleming, age 87, from Jacksonville. As soon as I meet with Phylis, I will be posting the history on the boat with some photos.

On January 25, 2010....we became a CSY boat owner!

Survey of Hoot Mon

More photos
On January 9, 2010 John, Widget and Mark(2nd son) went down to Jacksonville, Florida to have the CSY surveyed. Gary Frankovich performed the survey of Hoot Mon for us. He had survey Magic, our Creekmore 36, 4 years earlier. The boat checked out; a sound hull with no blisters and a well kept Perkins 4-236 diesel, the two aspects with which we were most concerned. We took Hoot Mon out on the water with a temperature of 30 degrees and a wind chill of 10 degrees. There were NO other boats out on the water. I wonder why! The survey took 6 hours and the report we got was very positive, very few issues with the boat. The motor started right up, depth finder worked, and the sails were in good condition. The only obvious issues we could see with the boat were that the infamous CSY chainplates will need to be replaced and that it was bare. We will need to add stuff to the boat for long distance cruising.