Boating on the Siuslaw River and more..

We've been working on so many boating projects, that last week Dan and I decided to pack up our inflatable Dinghy and explore the Siuslaw River in Oregon.  This river is about 110 miles long, and flows west to the Pacific Ocean coast of Oregon.  We launched our dinghy in Florence, OR and headed up the river for 15 miles to the bridge of route 126 in Mapleton.   It was a beautiful day as the photos will reveal.

The dinghy gets inflated via Dan's batteries in his van.  We then put our harnesses on, which I made from nylon webbing and hauled her down the ramp to launch her into the water.  We had a number of people watching us, but I think it was mostly because of our zebra motor.  This was Daniel's art project to make our motor less desirable for the pawn shops in Mexico. (I guess unique outboard motors do not sell as well.)

Check out the extra long oars that we put on the dinghy.  I love to row and these will certainly make the boat row a little better than the oars that came with the dinghy.

The boat moved along pretty well and we never even went full throttle. When we first took off, Dan felt the boat to be a little sluggish.  Then he remembered - the wheels were still in the water!  Once the wheels were brought into the upright position, it zoomed along even faster.

The lower part of the Siuslaw River passes through the Siuslaw National Forest, a productive timber region.  Years ago, the river was used to transport the logs and thus there were pilings all along the river as we motored inland.  These pilings either corralled the logs or kept them from jamming up on the shoreline.    This is a tidal river, so the water level fluctuates with the tides of the ocean.

Heading upriver towards the old railroad bridge.

This bridge no longer seemed to be in operation.  And neither was this old steam shovel.

And then we came upon the most interesting spaceship house/boat on the river.  Made of some type of concrete.  It would rise up and down along with the levels of this tidal river. Rather freaky I thought.

Next we came upon the cormorant condo's.  There were so many of these birds just hanging out in these dead pines.  I wondered if the trees were dead before they arrived and took up habitat there, or if they actually caused the trees to die. ???

Finally I decided to try my skill at driving the dinghy.

And Dan took a rest in the bow.

As we went farther up the river, the growth on the pilings became even greater.  As you can see, they become great sculptures and large floral arrangements all along the river.

It was so nice to actually get out on the water.

We also got to test out the new liner that I made for the bottom of the dinghy.  Our new friends and  fellow sailing cruisers from S/V Madrone - Angie and Mike, have a dinghy like ours.  When I noticed it while in South Beach Marina, I asked them why they put a carpet in the bottom of it.  They explained that theirs had developed tiny holes in the bottom floor because of small sand pebbles, coral etc which probably got brought in on their feet.  Over time, the abrasion of these tiny particles wore into the lining causing small leaks.  While it was repaired, the carpet was a preventative measure.

Dan and I decided to do something similar, based on their experience.  I decided to try sewing an inner lining with Sunbrella fabric.  It would have sides for the hopes of capturing any foreign debris  and would be removable when we deflate the boat.  The following are some of the pictures of the process.

I am using Dan's workshop to lay out the fabric and attempt to cut the shape of the dinghy floor.

Here I am sewing the liner.  It got to be rather big, so I made a make-shift table extension to hold the extra fabric.  After doing these projects, I have great respect for canvas sewers and sail makers.  It takes great skill.

Here is the finished liner.  After we tried the boat on the river, I decided that we also needed side pockets to hold our water bottles and perhaps a few other odds and ends.  That was completed today.

Then.......

My creative juices got going, when I started to think about how we could use our Stand-Up-Paddleboards as sit upon kayaks.  Using a folding bench seat that my sister Marji gave me many years ago, I designed a seat for my SUP board.  I had to reinforce the fabric with a sunbrella on the outside and I replaced the foam padding with a water tight foam packaging pad we had salvaged from a dumpster in Newport.  Because one usually needs to brace their feet in a kayak, I decided to make stirrup straps from nylon webbing that are adjustable for various leg lengths.  The last dilemma was how to keep the seat attached to the board.  This was solved with sewing two nylon straps onto the seat and using snap buckles to attach it to the board.  Here is a picture of my masterpiece.

We packed up the SUP boards and drove to Dexter Lake for a paddle on one of the many hot days we had in Oregon this summer.  We both got to try out the new kayak seat.  While it will not win any races, it worked pretty well.  We are both anxious to try kayak surfing in some waves while in Mexico.

Dan tries the kayak seat and decides he might like one too.  So that is next on the list of projects to be done prior to departure.




Once the major boat projects were completed, I was able to mention a few not so important, yet probably helpful tasks that were kicking around in my head.  Our hatches have no screens and there is always the possibility we might run into areas that have BUGS.  Oh no, who like mosquitoes?  Not me.  So Dan came up with a form for the no-see-um netting.  It was a much more involved project than we thought at first - as I am learning most boat projects are that way.

Dan made frames out of starboard, cut the width in half and screwed them together to make a sandwich construction.  Here he is applying the glue onto the inside half of the frames.  The no-see-um netting gets placed on the glue and then the top frame gets screwed on holding everything together.  It was a clever idea for the aft cabin hatches.

I am trimming the extra netting off with a hot gun purchased from sail rite.  It has proven to be the best "tool" that I have used thus far.

Now it is time to really start bringing down our gear that has been collecting in the shop.  I love pulling my little red wagon and Dan actually prefers the "more manly" wheel barrel.  The ramps at South Beach Marina can get mighty step especially during low tides.  It requires hanging on tightly or the load will end up in the water.

Dan is bringing a load to the boat.

I took on the task of organizing our supplies.  This not only means putting the stuff away in what ever places we could store stuff, but also remembering where the stuff is put.  An inventory spreadsheet was created and will hopefully help us to know what we have on board and where we might find it.  There is a general list, a medical list and a food list.  Each list is divided by cabin, location, category, item and quantity.  Time will tell how it works.  It was actually an enjoyable project for me.

Angie is cooking in the galley.

 couple weeks ago, we got together with another sailing couple.  Angie and Mike from S/V Mallone had us over for dinner on their Taswell 43 ft sailboat.  We brought tuna, corn on cob and veggies from our garden.  It has been a lot of fun for me to start meeting other boaters.  They have an incredible blog as well regarding their trip to Alaska. There are incredible pictures on their site:   http://svmadrone.com  For those readers who are not familiar with nautical terms (like myself, but I am learning), S/V stands for "Sailing Vessel".  So our boat would be S/VMalo.

Apparently in the cruising world, people make "boat cards."   Angie and Mike gave me theirs and it was the first boat card I ever received.  I was so excited. I loved the fact that a picture of the sailors was on the card. Dan had already started designing ours but it was not yet complete.  I encouraged him to put our picture on the card.  This was the finished result.

front of the boat card

Back of the boat card.


Stay tuned for the next post!