SV Three Quarter Time

June marks five years since we began our journey from Alaska to Mexico.  We have had many cool adventures, met some amazing people that we not only consider friends, but also family.  We have watched people either continue their cruising lifestyle, or end it for one reason or another (health, money, boredom, satisfaction of completing a goal, etc).  We have always stated that we don't write our plans in stone.  This mantra helps us to be more fluid in our travel plans, and flexible with how our future would be impacted by our daily decisions.  That being said, over the last few years, we have really made some major upgrades to TQT.  During the winter of 2019/2020, while in Mazatlan, we had an almost 90% upgrade done, and decided that while she is very much in newer condition, this is the best time to list her for sale and offer another family the opportunity to appreciate TQT's stability.  We ourselves have decided we enjoy catamarans a little more tha...

March 11, 2011 was a milestone date for me. It was my 40 th birthday. It was also the same day of the magnitude 9.0 earthquake that struck the Tohoku Japan coast. The tsunami that followed had a devastating effect among so many communities in the Pacific, and caused terrible destruction in Crescent City, California. Six-plus years later, locals were still discussing the impact of the roiling seas upon their marina, boats, and fishing industry. I am including links to several videos I found from that day online here: Raw video from youtube Raw youtube video with sirens Aerial view from a helicopter Prior to leaving Oregon, while we were still in Newport, we visited a “dock” in the downtown area that came from Japan! It made it's way across the Pacific over one year after the earthquake and settled on a Newport beach.  Meanwhile in Crescent City, although they rebuilt much of the marina, the area still seemed “off” to many because of the aftereffects of the tsunami...

The view of the Yaquina Bay Bridge from Three Quarter Time The engine replacement took place over the winter and spring months. Sydney and I moved back onto the boat in early May, after spending 8 months in Alaska working and visiting with family and friends. Paul continued working over the summer in the Lower 48, and one week a month, was able to come back to TQT and help prepare for her August departure. During that time, a new group of Coho Hoho sailing vessels was working it's way south for warmer waters. It was then that we also started making new friendships with non-Coho vessels that also left behind the Pacific northwest, with Mexico and beyond as their destination. We are grateful to have met folks on Bella Nave, Lorien, Cayuse, Simplify, Westy, White Raven, Severance, Tuwamish, Malo, and a few others while in Newport. It's all about safety when watching a solar eclipse Lincoln Beach, Oregon (just a few miles north of Newport) was the starting point...

On August 19, 2016 we attempted to leave Newport, Oregon and catch up with our fellow Coho Hoho sailing rally members.  Unfortunately, our engine lost oil pressure (we later learned she threw a couple of rods) and we limped back into port.  Within a few days, we both had jobs lined up for the winter, to keep us busy and to help pay for the engine replacement.  We were looking at around $30,000 to replace the iron jenny with a newer one on Three Quarter Time.   Yet as luck would have it, and explained in a previous post, we found a donor engine on a farm outside Portland that had less than 2,000 hours on her, and she was offered at a fraction of the cost of a new engine!    However, there is no lift available where we were at for  recreational  vessels, only  commercial  ones.  This added to the complexity of our engine replacement.   Paul had to remove the old engine by himself, using a block and pulley system, as ...

Three Quarter Time (photo credit Debbie Brethauer S/V Bella Nave) Hello!  Debbie here!  I would like to offer our most sincere apologies for letting this blog trail off after we broke down in Oregon in August 2016.  We lost that forward momentum that was needed to keep you all up-to-date on our repower for TQT.  It was a very draining experience and was especially difficult for us because we lived separately for around 7 months while I worked in Alaska and stayed with family and friends, and Paul worked for a contractor that took him across many cities and states in the US.  We only saw each other every 3-7 weeks for a one week visit each time.  During the Christmas holidays, we were blessed with more time with each other.  This week, I will write a blog each day to get you all current with the engine replacement, getting back on the open seas, and finally making our way further down to bluer waters.  A lot has happened since that fateful t...

Over the course of last winter and spring, we joined this great rally to help us get from Port Townsend, Washington, pretty much all the way to Mexico.  We attended very informative seminars presented by the Coho Hoho, and even got to participate in a raft-up in Blakely Harbor.  We made some great friends, shared awesome stories, and eventually 7 sailboats left together on the 14th of August from Port Townsend.  The night before we left, there was a FANTASTIC pirate-themed party put together by the folks at Cruising Outpost.  On the 1st night, a few of us stayed overnight and fueled up in Port Angeles, but eventually all of us made it into Newport, Oregon.  Since Paul and I are only a crew of two, we opted to spend an extra night in Newport to get much needed rest and prepare for our journey to Eureka.  We left port on a beautiful morning, passing the ever-present sea lions, traveling through the often tricky bar, on our way out to sea.  We were about ...

We have cut the umbilical cord that was Seattle and Tacoma.  We are finally traveling around Puget Sound and, when weather permits, we are honing our sailing skills.  We are currently updating and repairing some minor issues on the boat (thermostat, electronics, etc), but have been on the hook whenever we get the chance.  We've seen some cool wildlife to note, no whales yet, but several varieties of the feathered-kind. As we were fueling up at the Foss Harbor Marina, Grant (an employee there) was kind enough to offer water to this mother duck, whom has nested for two summers in a row here in this hanging flower basket.    Her eggs did not survive last summer, but we are hoping this years eggs will survive. We worked our way to Blakely Harbor, across from Seattle, and saw this eagle hanging out on shore foraging for food; he was quite the opportunist. After spending a night in Everett, we traveled north to Coupeville, then on towards A...

During the winter months, Paul took a job out-of-state to help pay for new sails, work on the hull, and other various upgrades.  Debbie and Sydney stayed on the boat and took care of TQT during the rainiest winter on record in Seattle.  We didn't have any updates during that time, but will be playing catch-up this week before we set sail on new adventures.  Stay tuned as we catch you up on pictures, accomplishments, and stories! Debbie, Paul, and Sydney

Hello All, Debbie and I had intended to write more often, however the lack of internet access has left us a little lazy.  I have a ton of stories stacked up inside my head waiting to get out.  Unfortunately without the instant gratification of posting the stories and receiving the feedback that every story teller craves, we have left those stories untold.  We are in a beautiful little harbor literally in downtown Seattle.  You would think that WiFi would be a given and to some extent it is.  It appears that a fluke with the harbors setup has left the system wanting.  As the tide lowers and rises, we go in and out of the WiFi repeaters range...strange no?  During the course of our travels, most of which has been in largely unpopulated Alaska/Canada, when we have stopped in we find that the WiFi is often available, but it has such a poor broadcast it rarely makes it out past the first few docks regardless of where we have been.  That is the long v...

Many of you are aware that our family experienced several losses after Paul and I began  our sailing adventure.  A grandson, a brother-in-law, and then on August 9th, my father Henry.  On the day he passed, I was out on the deck of TQT photographing humpback whales, one came extremely close during the moment my father left us.  I was able to fly back to the East coast to say good-bye to my dad (his burial was two weeks ago today) and be with family and friends.  I would like to share with you the eulogy I wrote for my dad. On behalf of Cora, Bernadette, and myself, I'd like to thank you all for coming out today to say our final good-bye to my dad. My dad was one of those guys that always appreciated a good joke, considered his friends as family, and knew the value of a hard days work. Many of you know that I moved to Alaska right after high school, so most of my fondest memories of my dad are from my childhood. There is a time period many of ...

During our travels we have learned many new skillsets, the least of which is becoming better weather diviners than those we have regularly become accustomed trusting for that info.  Weather is so far our biggest concern.  A close second is tides, however we will leave that for another day.  Weather from miles away can and does affect the waves, wind, and our general comfort.  The mountains, passes, and glaciers etc., all have cause and effect on our weather.  With a little practice, all of the different scenarios can be stitched together with the information gleaned from the “cough” “cough” experts, to give some idea of our daily and extended forecasts. The one thing that we cannot predict is the fog.  Not so much that it will be there, but in what form… I have dealt with fog in many different forms and scenarios in the past, but have recently discovered that fog is alive.  It can be impressive and terrible all at the same time.  One such i...

We left Valdez and motored-sailed non-stop, until we got to Yakutat 55 hours later. A big “Thank You” to Melissa and Kent Sonnek for the delicious wine and SeaSalt Caramel cheesecake! What a great send-off for the next segment of our journey.  No seasickness to report, or really bad weather either. Our only concern was that Sydney still isn't comfortable going “potty” on the boat. This led to not just one, but two beds with accidents on them, thus making it difficult for us to find a comfortable place to sleep during each “shift.” We had to settle on taking turns on the bench seat in the galley (main cabin). These shifts basically consisted of two hours of rest, not really sleep. So while Paul would take watch looking for other ships, debris, etc, I would lay down for two hours, 2.5 if he was able to let me sleep more and vice versa. We would then switch and then he would rest for 2 (+) hours while I kept watch. After a few of these shifts, I was reminded of the m...

To all of you following our misadventures, this is a sad one.  Most of you have realized that our initial launch to cross the Gulf of Alaska has hit a few speed bumps or, if you rather, big waves.  If you were following our progress on the Delorme map, you could probably tell that our progress during our crossing from the Hinchenbrook Narrows was beginning to get rather slow.  Our attempt was severely diminished by the natural current pushing directly on our nose, coupled with the 30 to 35 knots of wind directly on our nose.  There were extreme gusts getting up near the 40's and then there were the waves occasionally coming over the bow and pilot house.  To make matters worse, I had become sea sick for the first time in my life.  All of that is the normal part of the trip and was not the worst of it.  Allow me to back up a few days. The first issue that plagued us was a broken-down truck.  The abridged version is as follows: we borrowed my dads...

We are down to less than a week before casting off the lines in Valdez our home port. Everything has gone very well for us no major challenges, just nervous excitement. we leave Fairbanks for the foreseeable future on the 22nd of June. carrying with us the last few necessities and lots of food. Our intent is to spend a few days on the dock double checking everything on the boat. This first leg of our trip will be the longest we spend at sea for the next year.  what do we mean by the longest? when we get to Juneau we will spend the majority of the next year in relatively protected waters. However to get to Juneau we will spend several days at sea in the Gulf of Alaska. while this may not sound like a big deal it is, this area of the Gulf has little to no place to run if bad weather rears its ugly head. In addition to lack of cover there are no little ports to pull into if there is a mechanical break down. We expect this to be one of the best parts of the trip as well. most folks wil...

We have been having several garage sales over the last two months in order to lighten our load.  We had the final sale, which we renamed "moving sale," last weekend.  We still had so much stuff left over afterwards.  We truly have been blessed with the material things we've collected over the last so-many-years.  We have now begun the process of giving everything away that we can't store or take onto SVTQT.  This is a harder task than one would think.  "Hey, want a free tempered-glass dining room set that seats five?"  Um "sorry, we don't have room."  It's a little disheartening that we can't even give stuff away sometimes.  But such is life.  To the "Recycle Area" of the transfer site goes a LOT of our belongings.  Actually, many items were given to family and friends, many to the Women's Shelter, and a LOT went to several of the homeless people that Debbie photographed (with permission) for her final project at the Unive...