4 weeks out for the Trip

Hi,
Getting you up to date with preparing for the Trip. We plan to start mid May, journey from our home in South Coast Massachusetts down through Long Island Sound, East River to New York Harbor, to continue our river journey up the Hudson, into the Erie Canal, then Oswego Canal into Lake Ontario, cross that to Kingston Canada, up the Rideau Canal to Ottawa, then down to Montreal at the St. Lawrence River. From there we go seaward on the St. Lawrence to Sorel where we enter the Richelieu River taking us to the US border and Lake Champlain. At the lower end of Lake Champlain, is the Champlain Canal which takes us back to the Hudson River to retrace our way home. We decided against making the Great Loop to Florida as we still have many items to change or update on our boat for a longer trip. This journey will take us about 2 months with all we want to see.

We purchased our boat(Puffin) 2 years ago from the original owner (1982). At that time, 2015, we still owned and operated a small Inn north of Boston, so were unable to put much needed time and effort into the boat. Last summer, 2016, we enjoyed a little time getting used to and sailing  Puffin, and also waited for 3 new grandchildren arriving in the early fall.

To date, we have spend as much $$$ as finances allow to get ready for this trip.
Last weekend, we spent a day at Defender Discount Marine www.defender.com  in Waterford, CT, for their Blowout Spring Sale. This place is huge, with lots of parking and a lot of everything for boats and boating, and on a Friday there were cars parked out to and on the main road at 11:00 am.
We find Defender has the lowest pricing on most marine items. You can also visit West Marine stores or online- higher priced, mostly for the pleasure boating consumer, Jamestown Distributers in Bristol, RI, (mostly an online presence with a small retail store) and Hamilton Marine in Maine.
The mast is painted and Dean is putting the radar, radio antenna, masthead light,
loudhailer/PA horn and searchlight on our 8 ft wooden mast. This shorter mast enables our boat to go under bridges and easier time with locks and canals. But because the radar dome will be installed on a slanted mast instead of vertical I had to customize the brackets to make it fit on the horizontal plane.
The toilet has new gaskets, is cleaned, and now reinstalled on the boat. Thank goodness for that. We purchased the parts needed from a supplier in England which shipped to us at a reasonable price.
The boat is uncovered so now we can clean out the lockers, discard what is not needed, reorganize and add what we need for our trip.
I, Suzan, have my lists for kitchen, bed, and bathroom supplies.  Each time I go to the grocery store, I can check items off my list.
One of the color schemes  I wanted was to get pillows and coverings to go with the dark green cushions and window curtains. The great color out this season is pea green or seafoam green, neither goes with Puffin's British green. So- fabric store it is, to make covers that co ordinate. A feat in itself, yet accomplished, using red and red/white accents.

Next time-launching and do sea trials of all systems on Puffin before our journey. And-- the kitchen pantry will be stocked.