Update: 2006

To fill ya’ll in on what has happened since our last update at the end of 2005.

 We spent January 2006 with our oldest daughter in Kennesaw Georgia.  Vilkas was taking her time drying so we delayed heading south for a month.  In February we headed south and rented a house in Port St. Lucie a short drive south of Fort Pierce.  We wanted to keep a closer watch on Vilkas but nothing changed, Vilkas was having a hard time drying out.  We stayed in Port St. Lucie through April and then decided to take a road trip north with stops in Charleston to visit our son back to Atlanta for a short stay and then onto Baltimore to visit Ugne’s parents.  Along the way we visited Savannah for a couple of days and then stopped at Bed & Breakfasts in New Bern, NC & Elisabeth City, NC.  

We stayed in Baltimore about a month and then took off on a trip to visit my sister in lower Michigan, then onto Wisconsin to visit my mother and one of my sisters.  While there we did a day trip to Green Bay to see the tall ships. 

While we were in Wisconsin we found out that Vilkas was finally ready to get a new bottom.  Wanting to be there while the yard finished the work we took off on the long drive back to Florida stopping in Atlanta for a couple of days.  We rented the same house again for a month while the final touches were completed on Vilkas. 

Finally Vilkas was ready to go back in the water and we splashed her on August 28 and moved back to our old slip on F-dock at Harbortown Marina.  Then the work began, it took us about 5 days to get her cleaned up so that we could move back aboard.  After being on the hard for a year with all the sanding on her hull as well on other boats near by there was not a spot on the boat inside or outside that was not covered with dust.  

The splash occurred on a Thursday and before we could get her cleaned up we had to get her tied up for a tropic weather system that was approaching TS Ernesto.  We added several extra lines and headed back to the house.  Since the house we were renting was a mobile be decided that we would get a room at a near by hotel which we did.  As it turned out Ernesto was not much of a storm when he went through Fort Pierce so we only stayed at the hotel one night then moved back to the mobile.  On  Tuesday we were back aboard Vilkas attempting to get her into move-in condition.  That took us two more days. 

Finally we were able to move back onboard. 

We had planned on completing a couple of tasks on the boat and then head to the Bahamas’ for Christmas.  But because of some family commitments we changed our plans and spent Christmas with our son in Charleston. 

We were back on board Vilkas to celebrate the end of 2006 happy to be back aboard and continue our adventure.