Getting things in order

Colleen and I have stepped up our efforts in planning, boat provisioning, equipment installations, repairs, financial conversions to e-service, and much more over the past two months. Next week is our planned time for departing Cricket Cove Marina in Little River for points south.
We have established e-accounts with everyone that we do business with. What a task! We are trying to become paper invoicing and mail free while on the boat. It is quite difficult to try to live a totally e-life.. We are now e-dependant: no land phone, no internet, no mail except monthly forwarding by our friend Joanne, and no cable TV. We will be using a Verizon MiFi router for email and internet along with our two cell phones and a wireless printer. For us to have an office space, I have built a fold-up desk to cover that open cabinet where an original picture tube TV was located. We have placed a printer in the master stateroom for when we absolutely need a paper document.
I have installed a 2000 watt inverter for all the 120 volt circuits on the boat. When we are not docked or running the generator the inverter produces 120 volt power from a bank of golf cart batteries that we also installed. When we are connected to shore power or fire up the generator, the inverter then changes function and becomes a high amperage battery charger to replenish the battery bank. All this so that Colleen can quilt in quiet without the sound of the generator running. Lucky for me, a side benefit of producing 120 volt power from batteries is that I can watch TV and we can use the microwave and other appliances in silence. That is until the batteries run down, duration unknown at this time. I have installed extra shelves in almost every cupboard and closet on the boat so that we can store all of the items that we will need to make "Cool Change" our second home. Although the boat was virtually turn key, we have supplemented the galley, the spares aboard, the linens, and of course the tools aboard. Every trip to the boat was accompanied by a task list of 30 to 40 jobs for each visit. One of those jobs was to cut out all of the gasketing and lousy caulking from the large front windows to stop some leakage that was occurring. The new caulk is so much more pleasant to look at....and the leaks are gone.
Since we purchased Cool Change in late May (actually on our wedding anniversary date) we have spent about 40 nights on the boat. It has begun to feel like home to us albeit a second one. During that time Roger, my best friend from age 12, and our oldest son Michael, who lives in Portland Oregon and I motored "Cool Change" up from Florida. It was a trip of some 504 miles and "Cool Change" performed flawlessly as the twin diesel passed the 1000 hour mark. Since arriving in Little River several friends have visited us on the boat. In early October Al & Marla, friends from Florida, drove their motorhome to Little River and visited us on the boat. We spent a great weekend with them and had a wonderful cruise north on the ICW (Intracoastal Waterway). We passed through the historic Sunset Beach pontoon swing bridge and continued on to Ocean Isle Beach, Calabash and Holden Beach areas on the ICW. The pontoon bridge is the last remaining cable-drawn swing bridge in the US, I am told. The bridge's cable system jammed and we were trapped on the wrong side of the waterway for almost 3 hours and could not get back to our marina until it was repaired. A high rise concrete bridge was being finished when we were on the boat 3 weeks ago and the pontoon bridge is most likely gone now. On that trip we met up with Annette and Jim, friends in Charlotte. They have a home on Sunset Beach and invited us over for a shrimp feast. The next day they joined us on the boat along with Jim's brother and sister-in-law for a chilly cruise south on the ICW into Myrtle Beach and back. Jim took the helm and is an excellent skipper.
We now have a big pile of final things to pack into the car and take with us next week. The panic of getting all of the last things and tasks completed has now passed and we are ready to shove off next week. We just have a few commitments in Charlotte early next week to take care of. Then off we go.
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Wayne