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GYRFALCON Coffee Table Book
If you would like to take a deeper dive into all things Gyrfalcon…. This spring Nancy put together an incredible coffee table book about the boat for guests, visitors and potential buyers. Here’s a link to a PDF version. It’s a large file, best downloaded and viewed on a computer....
AK 2026 Days 5-8
This blog is a cut/paste from our Facebook posts for those who don't do FB. Click on the youtube links to see animation. Day 5 Our goal today - somewhere in the vicinity of Cape Caution. There are 3 open water crossings on the way to Alaska. Since they are...
AK 2026 Gyrfalcon heads north! Days 1-4
We're on our way north to Southeast AK! This blog is a word-for-word repeat of the Facebook posts that we have been putting up daily as we cruise north. We're posting here for the non-FB users. Click on the Youtube links for animations of our travels. Day 1 We left...
We’re moving on…and looking for the next caretaker for the Gyrfalcon
After 13 years packed with amazing adventures (and occasional moments of outright terror), we have decided that it is time for us to move on. We are selling the Gyrfalcon, and will be looking for a smaller boat that will be easier for 2 senior citizens to handle. As you...
Faux fir for a real wooden boat
For the past 12 years, we have had 5 grey painted plywood hatches along with 2 fir hatches in our stateroom. At some point, there must have been either fir hatches that got replaced, or a fir floor that was cut up for renovations and replaced with ply. Mostly...
Updates for non-FB folks (trip to AK 2023)
We've been busy the last few months, and have been updating more on FB and less on blogs. For those not following us on FB, here's a summary of the past few months, mostly copied from FB posts mostly. If' you've been reading these blogs, you'll know that we upgraded our...
Smaller spring projects: Starboard generator seal replacement, electrical upgrades, and others TNTC
At the end of last year, a seal on the starboard generator developed a small leak. While we were hauled out, we decided to replace the seal. Ushana disassembled the generator. It was tight quarters (not usually a problem on the Gyrfalcon, but it was this time due to the...
Floor timber and associated repairs: Part 2
What we're doing Here is a color-coded diagram that may help explain these repairs. It's complicated... Dutchmen After removing the shafts and their assorted bearings, struts, etcetera, (see last blog), the delignified wood was removed from the floor timber. Fortunately, the soft wood only extended a short distance into the...
Floor timbers and other repairs: Part 1
What’s been happening with the Gyrfalcon? Well, a lot. Late last fall, we took the Gyrfalcon over to Port Townsend for some scheduled upkeep involving bearings, stuffing boxes, shafts, and a generator, and then we took off for New Zealand (by air, not by boat). This blog is about the...
Whales, whales, and more whales
Our summer has been wonderful—so much wildlife to see! The whales have been especially spectacular. The only thing that is disappointing is our throttled cellphone hotspot bandwidth, so we’ve mostly been posting on our FB page and on our miniblog through predictwind (see previous blog or website for link). We...
Follow the Gyrfalcon as we head to Alaska!
After a few weeks on the hard in Port Townsend, we are on our way to Alaska. You can follow our progress on our own page at Predict Wind (shows a chart including our route and a mostly daily mini-blog--see arrow below). Here's the website to bookmark: https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/Gyrfalcon/ The chart...
OPTIMIST’S PRE-SEASON OFFER and COVID-19 Update
We've been a little quiet on the GyrBlog front. We've been busy with work at Seagen (Nancy), keeping Nancy fed (Peter), several upgrade projects, and pondering the future of the pandemic. We totally understand hesitancy about booking summer plans when there are so many unknowns about the future path of...
