This story began on a beach in one of the most beautiful places on earth - Runaway Bay on Antigua, W.I. Towards the end of a two week holiday and after a charter to neighboring Barbuda, I was making every attempt to convince myself that I wanted to return to Ohio. And not being very successful.

The trip to Barbuda had really convinced me that this was where I needed to be. Not Barbuda mind you but the trip. What a trip! Travelling aboard the 63' catamaran Falcon in the steady 14 knot trades on the open sea was exhilarating. Boiling along at 12 knots, sometimes surrounded by clouds of flying fish, we sighted several sea turtles on the surface.

Our captain was Xabier Ross, the young son of the owner of Wadadli Cats. Like most of the residents of Antigua, Xabier was friendly and enthusiastic, and we swapped sailing and windsurfing stories at length. He was in a very good mood for this trip - he usually motored large numbers of vacationers around the sightseeing highlights of Antigua - what a fate for this beautiful, fast sailboat! The Barbuda cruise was only offered once every few months and it was obvious that Xabier was happy to be out on the open water.

Oh, I almost forgot - this is the story of the Slow Ride isn't it? Looks like I will have to add a page about Antigua. Well, back to the beach ...

Sailing has been a part of my life off and on since my childhood. It had been 'off' for several years when I found myself on Runaway Bay. As you might have noticed, the Falcon had whetted my appetite. When I say 'off', I mean that I had hardly seen Lake Erie for more than 10 years even though it is only 1½ hours away from my home.

EXCEPT for the time a couple of summers earlier when I went fishing with some friends aboard a Marinette 32. Lying on the beach trying to find reasons to want to return to Ohio, I remembered how clear and blue the lake had become since 'the old days'. Thanks to our friends the Zebra Mussel, the lake looked different than I had ever seen it. The pieces began falling into place ... it isn't Antigua, but for four of the six sailing months, I knew that I could have 'almost heaven' - oh no, now the West Virginia tourist board is gonna close me down ...

The Beach - Runaway Bay, Antigua

See? Yes, they are still making beaches like this - the jet skis haven't even invaded this one - yet. Anyway, ultimately I had to return to Ohio. When I did, I looked up my old friend Frank Thomas in Sandusky. I knew that he would be able to help me locate a boat. And true to form, he had a boat. Well, two boats. Well, a boat and a half.

Frank had purchased a Santana 25 from a mutual friend, a boat that I had crewed on years before. The Santana brought back many fond memories from my days hanging around the Sandusky Sailing Club back in the 1970's. Racing everything from Windsurfers (yes, they let us have a class as long as we had three boats!) to MORC and IOR boats. Bugaboo was purchased in 1976 by an excellent and competitive racing sailor, my friend and boss at the time Ray Ozmun. I crewed on her several times before moving inland in 1977.

Since Frank now owned her and had brought her back from many years of neglect, I talked to him about selling her to me. That didn't happen and in retrospect that was good. A Santana 25 in not a cruising boat and my 6'3" frame makes an already cramped boat insufferable. And the whole point of this exercise was to acquire a cruiser. My work as a consultant gives me a very flexible schedule most of the time, but keeps me very busy. I wanted a weekender - low maintenance, jump on her and go for a few days. For all of the romance I still held for Bugaboo, she belonged in the MORC fleet, not at anchor enjoying the sunset.

In process of restoring Bugaboo, the piston skirt in her auxillary had been broken. It is possible that yours truly might have been involved in this, but that's another story. Westerbeake, who had imported the engine wanted US$480.00 for a new piston. Remember, this is roughly a lawn mower sized engine.

Being his usual resourceful self, Frank had located and purchased an abandoned Midship 25 (which most people know as a Dawson 26 or Parker Dawson 26) that used the same engine. I loved this boat on first sight. An odd duck, she has a center cockpit and two very useful cabins. BUT it was pointed out by several people that I have a tendency to see the potential at the expense of not seeing the disaster.

She had been lying in her cradle for several years full of water - well mostly water - transmission oil and ... OK suffice it to say that she came equipped with two heads. All of the mahogany and teak in the cabins was soaked and ruined. She had been dropped in moving, pushing the prop strut up out of its bedding and bending the prop and shaft. She was generally pretty unappealing. This wreck was to become the Slow Ride.

After the obligatory wrangling and a few fights, we made an agreement: I could buy the Midship if I would take the two engines apart and build one good one from the best parts for the Santana. Fair enough. I finally talked him into letting me have the leftover engine parts with the boat, and the story began in earnest.

The soon to be Slow Ride after a quick cleanup

The boat was near Milan Ohio, an hour north of me and half hour south of the lake. During the three weeks (almost full time) it took to get her 'as close as she will get this season', I worked on building an engine from the castoff parts. If you ever need to know about Valmet Vire 7 engines, give me a call.

Vire 7 tip # 101: the Main Bearings are a #306 - the same as used in VW beetle rear wheel bearings.

The getting ready story isn't too exciting, mainly a lot of dirty hard work. After a cleanup that defines the term 'nasty', the repair work was rather enjoyable. The engine went together pretty quickly (I had just built one a couple weeks earlier), My old friend Tom Koroknay the notorious "Dr. Lyman" made an Oak buttress to help hold the strut back in place and I made trim parts to replace those that were unrepairable.

Vire 7 with optional test stand and manual starting kit.

Vire 7 as at Left, with fuel cell, auxiliary cooling unit and chief engineer.

When all of the parts came together for the engine - Bosch magneto bits from 'Da Phone' in Columbus, new bearings from Ohio Transmission and gaskets by silly putty, the time was near. Frank and I had moved the boat to Deep Water Marina in Sandusky and she needed only minor chores and an engine. The engine was tested exhaustively in my back yard in Morrow County - run it until the bucket of water started getting hot, shut it down, make sure it starts hot too ... transmission worked (well, I couldn't make it slip with my hands anyway). Ready.

Vire 7 tip # 102: The magneto points are the same as those used in the Type IV Volkswagen engines. (Thanks Phone)

The huge Delco generator that doubles as starter motor had not come back from the rewinding shop yet, but it started every time - first pull, so I decided that it was time. The manual claims that the engine/transmission unit only weighs 175 pounds, but on the way up the ladder it might as well have been two tons. It finally went up and in with no more damage than two missing ladder rungs, but its final two feet into its home were something else! As you can see from the photos, it is not very big. As small as it is, though, its allotted space is even smaller. Lost enough hide off my knuckles and wrists to upholster a small sofa. At last it slid (was crammed) into place. And smite me, the shaft even aligned! Excellent.

Ah, almost there. Engine in and all hooked up. Fore cabin habitable. My sister Marilee, down for a visit from Quebec even came and helped with the final cleanup and fit out (stick the registration numbers on the hull). Whenever my sister is involved in a project, I know that life will be good.

OK, now flag down Bill and see if the crane is ready. Great, Here we go!

In the always gentle hands of Deep Water, she's ready!

The next day and genius here finally springs for a new spark plug - $1.68 at the local parts store. And away she goes.

Vire 7 tip # 103: Always have a spare spark plug in the toolkit. You will need it.

This is the day! It's morning (had to clear the gas dock by 6:00am), the engine is running the way it was at home, and it is a BEAUTIFUL July day. Time to try the real stuff - get the running rigging sorted out, put the sails up and WHOA! This thing steers like a loaded dump truck sliding sideways down a mountain. A quick assessment and I noticed that the jib looked more like a miniature spinnaker. After finding the block mounting points that were added for the bigger jib - it works!

What started as a fifteen minute shakedown turned into the first overnight (well, the first intentional overnight). Headed for the North Bay of Kelleys Island and arrived just before dark. The wind was out of the North East, but I didn't feel like going around into West Bay and trying to set anchor in the dark after having been away from the lake for so long. That first night was a little rough. The next morning, though:

Dawn in North Bay - My First Cruise on the Midship

That first summer was wonderful, even though the boat didn't go in until after July 4th, it was perfect sailing right through the end of October.

For the next few seasons things were fairly uneventful, a minor repair or improvement here and there. The point of this boat was to enjoy her. And that I did.

The 1995 season saw some major changes for both of us. I had never been fond of the name given her by some previous owner - Double Bubble - presumably in honor of the two roundish cabin tops. Not only did I not care for the name, but try the proper radio hailing call: Double Bubble, Double Bubble, Double Bubble this is Someboat ... you get my drift. I didn't want to hastily rename her, though and besides that entailed work. But a boat name is like a tattoo; it should have some meaning because it is there for every one to see and will be there for a while.

Here's ol' Roy putting on the finishing touches. I had to make him stop rubbing, he was starting to wear through the gel coat.

Non Vire 7 tip # 101: The old superstition about renaming a boat being bad luck is just that. Towards the end of the 95 season, lost 150 lbs. of unsightly, useless fat.

During the 1995 fitting out, Roy and I also made a frightening discovery - the deck to hull seam had separated almost all of the way around the boat. That was discouraging to say the least, and my first thoughts were 'This is the end of her'.

After a little poking, prodding and mulling it over (that mulling is hard work), we decided that we could fix it without removing the deck. Without boring you with all of the gory details, the way the joint was made originally allowed us to effect a very solid repair in a day and a half. Whew! This incidentally cured some other problems: Leaking from the topsides, in rain or heavy heeling conditions (Duhhh) and that funny groaning sound she had been making in heavy seas. Two things amaze me: That I had never noticed this happening and how different she feels now that she is one rigid piece again. As Marilee would say, Hooray for us!

North Bay again - One of my favorite Almost Antigua spots

Slow Ride is an ongoing project, but now it seems like it will be mostly enhancements. After installing a new stereo in 96, I can now really enjoy roaring into the bay on a broad reach with the Tannahill Weavers blasting away on the pipes and fiddles.

Also on the schedule is bringing the aft cabin up to standard. It has been used mostly as a 'junk closet' for fishing gear and stuff, but I'm looking forward to making it nice - for company.

A small setback occurred in the fall of 96. I always use the boat right up to the bitter end - 31 October is the day they lock up Battery Park. There is usually a lot of great cruising after Labor Day when the tourist trade virtually stops. It is nice to be able to go to South Bass and not have it be like the Cedar Point Midway. Anyway, last year the 31st was on a Friday, and the weather was predicted to be crappy toward the end of the week. I called Deep Water about coming out on Wednesday (which was a beautiful day) and was told to stay home because they had boats lined up all the way back to the coal dock.

Well ... Wednesday night brought a storm: 50 - 75 mph winds and 12 - 14 foot waves on the lake. The high wind unrolled the roller furling jib and whipped it all night until Battery Park personnel mercifully took it down the next morning. Al Freeman says that it is repairable and I am anxiously awaiting its return. Think I might look into one of those prophylactic devices ...

07 May 1998:
Still haven't made the time to get this site more finished (hope for a complete redesign) but here's a bit of continuation: Al did repair the jib, made me very happy! No horrible accidents or anything in the summer of 97.

We did sail a lot. My favorite model likes to sail, so we made many trips to Middle Island and Kelleys for photo shoots.

I also met my friends who own wooden Lymans for many of their rendezvous. One memorable trip was a planned Saturday morning meeting at Lonz's Marina at Middle Bass Island. Friday was rainy and crappy, so I called the good Dr. Lyman and suggested meeting for supper on Marblehead. After an indescribable (as usual) meal at Jimmy's Gotcha, we retired to his picnic table at Tibble's for the obligatory "Board Meeting" and proceeded to solve the problems of the world.

After leaving Tibble's, I arrived back in Sandusky around 1:00 am. and tuned in the NOAA forecast, which claimed that the front was leaving. Looking up, I could see a line running WSW to ENE. To the south the sky was clear - stars and a nearly full moon. To the north were thunderstorms under the umbrella of the overcast.

I have always enjoyed sailing at night and the front appeared to be moving faster than Slow Ride could, so I decided to head for Lonz's. What a beautiful trip! The wind was from the SW at a nice steady 12-14 so we boiled along on almost a beam reach for the whole ride. And the sky! Occaisional thunderheads to the north and west lighting up like neon pumpkins while the moon and starlight from the south made it feel like a perfect sailing night. One of those sights that is not possible to capture with a camera, but is burned into one's memory.

As we approached the entrance to Lonz's I began to fret about finding a port-side-to dock that would help me dock gracefully in the wind and dark. Weekends at this marina are usually very crowded and many people duck in here to overnight. Upon entering the marina I got a very erie feeling - there was not a boat nor a living soul to be seen in this huge marina!

Apparently the weather had convinced everyone to stay home. The Lyman crew appeared Saturday morning and as they say "A good time was had by all" - all weekend!

To be continued ...

Enough about me, now how about the Boat?