Belle is famous! She is presently appearing on the AGLCA home page. They used the picture of her (shown above) and her flag as the link to a blog post on having a cat aboard.

There had been a question asked about what to do to bring a cat on board and a few of us responded with posts about things we had done.

Susan got asked to supply a picture. She dug through a stack of them and sent the best ones, and they picked the one with Belle playing with some light line.

In the process of looking at them I remember that for Christmas the year before we left, Belle got a full body life vest. We put it on her to try. She immediately became stiff legged and just stood there. But she soon lost her balance and toppled over. No problem, use the handle and stand her up. “Meow” and topple. We did that a few times before deciding that the vest wasn’t going to work. We ended up getting a long handled large crab net to fish her out of the water if it came to that.

The cat article they wrote can be found here

http://www.greatloop.org/photos/Belle1.png is the banner picture.

A year ago (9-10 July 2014) we were on Beausoleil Island

Hard to think we’ve been on the water for 180 days. It seems like yesterday that we were having dinner in Delaware City. We have covered 2564 nautical miles or 2949 statute miles, so from a distance standpoint we are at the ½ way point. Unlike our poky progress through Canada we’ve made some huge jumps. In the last three weeks four days were over 50 miles long, one was 96 nautical miles (110 statute miles) So we are getting close to being back on plan. There are some long days coming up, but we are also planning a three day trip to New Orleans.

So far we’ve been in 11 states (Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, New York, Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois, Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee and Mississippi)

We took a long break in Green Turtle Bay to go back to Pennsylvania for a funeral and a few extra days to rest up. We were able to see the most amazing grand daughter in the world. She is in that pre-walk stage, I’m going to guess as I post this she is now walking / running. She is also working on saying “Capt Pop-Pop”, she should have that down by Christmas

Susan and I are both doing fine. We will both be happy to get off the river system. It’s intense driving, needing to watch every minute for trash floating in the water. Our locking skills are pretty good, but the long waits for locks still aggravate me.

We continue to meet really nice people, both on the water and off. The week of travel down the Mississippi, Ohio, and Cumberland to Green Turtle Bay showed how much fun traveling in a group could be. At the marinas we’ve met some very nice people who work there and boat there. We get quick smiles, offers for beer and a few places where there wasn’t a loaner car, local people have offered to take us places.

Quo Vadimus continues to operate well. I’ve been doing the maintenance cycles of oil changes, fuel filter changes, checking fluids, etc. The time between fuel filter changes has gone up, so it looks like I’m getting most of the sludge out of the tank. Mostly the water has been calm, it will be interesting to see if the waves in Florida stir things back up again.

Still lamenting the loss of Belle. For a few days after we would catch glimpses of her and occasionally hear her. I’ve decided that we’ll keep flying the “Cat On Board” flag until we get back home.

We have also heard from many of you either by email or your comments on the blog. It’s always nice to hear from you. We are planning to be home in December, we will work on catching up with you then. Until that happens we will continue to toast “Family, old friends and new” at Docktails.

Up until the end she had a great quality of life. Starting in March she had most of our attention and once we started on the Loop she didn’t have any need to share us with anyone else. Because we couldn’t really get grooming done to get her the Lion trim she loved, she got weekly brushing and we found another way to bond.

Belle had acclimated well to the boating life.  She had places to sleep while under way. She was sometimes confused about the locks: when we had to stop the engines, she thought the day’s trip was over. But once we started up, she would go and lay at the side of our bed and nap some more.

She knew our regular schedule, so days when we were still moving at 3PM she would come up and meow that it was time to find a place to stay. Belle loved to nap in the pilot house; with all the glass, there was always a sunny spot. But she never forgot her duties of making sure we got up on time. She would wait for Foster at the top of the salon stairs to receive her morning snuggles. When you come up a set of stairs and are eye to eye, it’s easy to stop for a few seconds for a quick ear scritch.

The trip made her much more adventuresome and a little more assertive. She spent more time outside in the last six months than she had in her entire life prior to the trip. While docked she would explore the bow and cockpit areas. She would join us on the fly-bridge when we had cocktails or dinner.

Belle got lots of kitty snuggles during the evening, sitting between the two of us on the settee on her blanket. Actually she had three blankets to help carve out spots that were hers. And she let us know if somehow we had left something in her spot. If there was something blocking her from jumping up she would bat at us with a paw to let us know she was ready to join us, or that something needed to be fixed.

Belle will be greatly missed because of her sweet disposition and because of the unreserved affection and love she gave us. 20 October 2014

On the water for 60 days, this is a quick status report.

Susan and I are still on good speaking terms, so from that standpoint the trip is going really well.

Belle has become more active and interested in her surroundings. She now sleeps at different places during the day rather than just her basket. The pilot house for sunny morning naps has been a favorite. She interacts more with Susan and I, following us around. Yesterday Susan was in a chair on the grass. Belle crossed the swim platform and made the 10 inch jump to the dock. Belle has also started to lay across the pilothouse door frames to see what’s going on outside.

Susan and I have both been biking more. I finally got the seat adjusted so that my knees don’t hurt as much. Susan has been out more than I and she now can ride an hour without much effort. (I’m still at the huffy/puffy stage.)

We both have pedometers. We both have calibrated pedometers. We just need to remember to take the calibrated pedometers with us when we walk. We are getting better, we now remember them half way in the walk rather than at the end. But we are walking lots around towns, etc.

We are also doing well on the exploring new places, trying new things. We’ve resisted the siren song of fast food and the chain restaurants. With only some minor exceptions the food has been very good. The http://qvmarine.com/about/food-we-have-eaten/ page has mini reviews.

My latest passion is for Ontario Butter Tarts (Thanks Phil!) A butter tart is butter, sugar, syrup, and egg filled into a flaky pastry and baked until the filling is semi-solid with a crunchy top. They can come in flavors, but I like the plain ones the best. I’m making an effort to hit different bakers to try the different ones out. The lead picture has ones from three different bakeries. The yellow is lemon, the same flavor as a Lemon Meringue pie. The other ones are the standard “plain” ones.

Quo Vadimus is working well. The propeller shaft goes through a bushing to exit the hull. This bushing has a wax coated fiber material in it to keep it from leaking. To keep it cool and not melting it is supposed to leak a little water. The water acts as a lubricant. Normal leak rates are ~5 drops a minute. Mine had been about that and in NY became 1 per second (about 6 gallons per day). In the recent weeks it was up to 2 drops a second (12 gallons a day). At Orillia I had both sets of shaft seals replaced with the new Goretex braided cord. They are designed to be drip-less. In the picture below you can see how worn the old cord was and in the center is the new cord.

Fuel usage is about what I had planned on, we are getting just over a mile (1.15) per gallon of fuel. That rate will go down as we start doing some longer open water runs at higher speeds.

Our docking and locking skills have gotten better. If you count a lock tie as the same as a dock tie, then we’ve done more dock ties in the last two months than we’ve done in the last three summers. We’ve done 31 locks in the Erie Canal system and 41 locks in the Trent Severn for a total of 72. (We’ve stayed at 52 different places). We have two more locks and the Big Chute Railway to do next week and then we have about a month to our next lock at Sault Ste. Marie.

Finally, we’ve met a lot of interesting people in the places we’ve been. Pretty much everyone has been friendly and helpful, some, like Freya, have gone really gone out of their way for us. Oddly, we’ve only met a few Loopers on the trip. Not sure if it’s because we are staying in odd places or that there are not that many loopers yet.

So for a TL;DR, we are having a great time, miss those of you we left at home. This is turning out to be the adventure we thought it would be.

She is doing well, she has sorted out places to sleep.

* Her cat bed in the salon
* A blanket at the foot of the bed on my side
* A blanket on the Salon Bench
* A blanket on the Pilot house bench

At night, on the pilot house bench. During the day, in her cat bed. While we are underway, at the foot of our bed (the rock and roll is far less there) and when we are up and about either the Salon Bench or the Pilot House Bench.

She has become a little more active, she will make an effort to interact with us. She has figured out where the brushes and combs are, and will go stare at the door until someone gets a brush. She has taught us when she wants water and food.

She still hasn’t gotten into the “We now do not get up at 5AM” cycle. She will come meow promptly at 5. And if you get up before that time to go to the head (marine word for toilet), she thinks you are fair game.

She will lay in the pilot house door sill and watch the geese. She will walk out on the back cockpit if we are docked. She will come up to see us on the flybridge if it’s smooth and we’ve been out for more than 4 hours.

She is eating her food, drinking tons of water and putting it in the correct place, so that’s all good.

And as you can see from the entry picture, she is interested in boat things, she was trying to help sort out one of the lines.

Bottom line is that Susan and I are doing very well, thanks for asking, oh yea the cat is doing well also.

She appears to be having a great time!

She likes her new food (and frankly at $9 a pound she eats better than I do) and has been eating about 1/2 cup a day.

She is much more interested in her surroundings, for the first time she went up on the flybridge. But we were underway and she got scooted back to the pilothouse.

Susan made her new beds, so she has a place on the pilot bench, the salon bench and next to our bed. She has used all of them on a rotating basis.

With the weather being cold, we didn’t get her clipped. So we have been brushing her on a daily basis which she really likes.

So for Belle the trip has been good so far!!

We’re a little concerned about our kitty, Belle.  She is about 15, a shelter kitty, so we’re not sure of her exact age.  She’s been with us for 13 years and was estimated to be 2 years old when I got her. 

The vet moved her to a senior diet last year for kidney support, and redid her blood work this year which is a little worse. She’s lost a pound (10% of her weight) and her creatine level is up, although still below the danger point.  The vet gave us meds to stimulate her appetite and a sample pack of prescription food which supports renal function.  We won’t transition her to the new food until we have been on the boat a little while because it would probably be too stressful for her, and she may not need it yet.  It’s a wait and see situation.  One thing I feel sure of is that she would be more stressed at not being with us if we left her at home, and she probably would not receive the care we can give her since we are with her 24/7.

At any rate we need to be aware that we may need vet services on the way, or we may need to restock this special prescription food on the way.