This weekend started with the first part of preparation for leaving Norwich for winter storage: checking the engines. We know we're old fashioned, but we always check the fluids in the engines, V-drives and transmissions as well as the condition of the belts and hoses before going anywhere. Once again, all looked well.
We also did some shopping for the supplies we'll need to winterize the engines and water systems. This year, Wal Mart came through with the best prices we could find for potable (pink) antifreeze and engine oil and filters.
On Sunday, we had lots of rain, courtesy of hurricane Matthew, which headed offshore but left us with really lousy weather. But, as you can see from the photo above, there were quite a few boaters like us who were there to take stuff off of their boats.
A-dock, our summer home where we have had so much fun, looked pretty drab in the rain.
We also started taking any liquids off the boat that could freeze, excepting things that Frances and Pooka might need over the next week. We use those plastic crates that you can buy at discount stores and we filled a couple of them. We also off-loaded our pink anti freeze. Yes, there are 15 gallons of that stuff.
Here's why we do it this way. Our winter storage yard doesn't enable us to get very close to the boat with our car. Carrying a lot of antifreeze can be very difficult and energy consuming.
We think that it is always the safest way to run antifreeze through every plumbing element of the boat. Yes, we drain the water heater and then let it refill with antifreeze. That means we're protected from the on-board fresh water tank and then through every hot and cold water line on the boat, including the air conditioner. To winterize the engines, we connect them so that they suck up few gallons of pink antifreeze until it spills out the exhaust. Then we check the quality of the green antifreeze in the heat exchangers that actually cool the engines.
We hate to leave but we have to very soon.
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