THE BLOG
Hurricane Irene Batters a Boat!
When the hurricane Irene hit us in the New Bedford area of Massachusetts I broke the rules and went exploring in my van. I loved the crashing waves in the south end of the city until the police threw us out and told us to go home. Nice try!
So, we went down the coast from Fort Taber past the old Smugglers Den and around the corner to get onto Rt 18 then down to Route 6 and up toward the large marina that is just past the bridge there.
People were out of their cars and looking at the violence of the ocean creeping into our Buzzards Bay and even over the hurricane barrier to throttle the boats at anchor and at dock. This boat called "Satisfaction" from Port Townsend, Washington, was broken free from it's mooring and was taking a beating against the rocks. There was nothing I could do at the time.
Now that I have become a member of TOW BOAT US I know that they would have in usual weather come to rescue the boat and might well have come to rescue this boat this day if they knew it was there. At the time I didn't have a single idea of what I could do or that all of the others watching this disaster could do.
This was an exciting day, but I was glad that I didn't own the boat being bashed.
I love my boat ! What a piece of work she is.
I have a 34 foot Pequod and as I have said, I love the boat. It has a forward sleeping berth that could hold three easily but two are often enough.
It has a full sized refrigerator, a stove and oven as well as a microwave. It has a full bathroom with a shower sink and toilet. Besides all of the necessary gear I have a great Garmin GPS that I love using! There are two CB radios on board as well.
The living room area has a couch that pulls out to sleep two and the dining table lowers to form a bed for two using the cushions from the seats and backrests.
I bought her this Spring and worked to renovate her. I put in a rebuilt engine that cost me a bundle of dough and added two new carburetors to her twin 225 horsepower Chrysler gas engines.
You can navigate from the upper deck as well as from the salon area. On a nice day I really prefer the upper deck because the view is great. Learning to run a boat that size with two engines was interesting as I had never done so before. The first time I took her out where I was at the helm, I felt great.
You can make a 360 turn in a boat like that even if you couldn't have imagined it possible. The trick is to put one engine in reverse and the other in forward gear. Don't use too much throttle and it is a nice tight turn. Beautiful!
What is the first song that comes to mind?
When you think about a sea shanty which one is it?
For me it is "Drunken Sailor" the first one that I learned... or was it "Blow The Man Down" a song I learned in childhood.
If you wanted to sing and/or play a sea shanty, a good place to start is the website here as there are more than 240 songs available.
I guess you would have to hear someone sing them to learn the
melody and chords but that isn't too hard.
Some Songs have chords in them on the sheet and some I have recorded so you can hear a 30 second preview of those songs.
That is a good way to gain the inside scoop on what sailors did when at sea in the days of wooden sailing ships, greasy decks, heavy hauls, bad weather and a lot of pulling on lines to adjust the position of just about all of the sails, whales and bales aboard or coming aboard.
How To Transpose A Song or it's Chords
Well this is easy for a lot of people who can count to ten, or perhaps as high as twelve. There are names for each note in a scale and the names are also what is used to determine the root or the fundamental note in a chord. For an example the chord C is made up of three notes, the first, the third and the fifth in the major scale.
The scale notes for the Key of C are the easiest they are C - D - E - F - G - A - B - C. So the first is C the third is E and the fifth is G - that is how to build a major chord. Use the major scale and choose the first, third and fifth of that scale. In fact you can do that for any Key! Here is and example of the Key of G - It uses one sharp and that one is F#. Here we go the scale is as such - G - A - B - C - D - F# - G. The notes in a G major chord are G - B- D!
Here is how to transpose a songs chords or change the key of a song that is for example made up of G - Em - C - D for a chord structure. To transpose it to the Key of C use C - Am - F - G. Follow the rule for transposition. Each chord moves the same distance in the notes of the scale. G is the fifth of the Key of C. Use that to change the other chords a swell. Try it - it is fun. Here is a web page on this site that has a lot more information about chord transposing. How To Transpose A Song Chords
