Tuesday, December 22, 2015

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

May the blessings of this 2015 Christmas Season be showered on you and yours. We continue to enjoy our Summertime life on the coastal waterways...and our summers at the cabin at the lake in Maine. One of the biggest changes in 2015 was losing one of our strongest supporters when Darcy’s dad passed away at 97 and 3 months. He certainly lived until he died. Well done, Oric O. O’Brien! The other big change was when Erin’s husband Brett accepted a professorship at the University of Maine. By June the Ellis family had bid farewell to their Atlanta life. Erin and Brett teamed up to carry out a major home renovation in Orono, Maine while Emily, Bailey and Cupcake bonded with Nan and Pop at the lake. Settled into their new home, they are really enjoying the rhythm of life in their new community. We continued our 15 year tradition of joining the Ellis family for Thanksgiving. Those two weeks were filled with festive family events. We woke up one morning to a world of white with temps in the 20’s! As Christmas approaches, we have moved our trawler from Georgia to South Florida where the climate is more tropical. Our future plans are to spend the summer of 2016 exploring the Erie Canal and cruising Lake Champlain as we progress along on The Great Loop Tour. We invite you to follow us on our blog: wallyanddarcy.blogspot.com Our cell phone continues to be 828-231-5025 as well as our email: wallyanddarcy@gmail.com Love, Darcy and Wally

Saturday, October 31, 2015

Getting to know beautiful Old Town Brunswick

One of the joys of spending October in Brunswick, Georgia is exploring the revitalized Old Town clustered near the East River with its active shipping port. Like Savannah, pocket parks are tucked in each of the neighborhoods dating back to the 1800’s. Gen. James Edward Oglethorpe, Georgia’s founding father, was a champion of the common man. The green spaces with their towering live oaks, statuary, fountains and benches offered a cool, inviting gathering spot for after-work activities. They still do. The homes vary in size and architectural detail. Fancy gabled peaks with stained glass windows and shingle details are found in both the Victorian and Craftsman Bungalow design. Mingling in some of the blocks are the smaller and simpler shot-gun homes reminiscent of New Orleans. Following a sign pointing down Albany Street, we discovered the Lover’s Oak, a tree that has survived since the birth of our nation.

Tuesday, October 27, 2015

Moving from one tiny house to another....

After Wally’s family gathered to celebrate Grandmother June’s 96th birthday, it was time to start the shut-down process for our cabin up on the knoll and the lakeside camp. It seems to take only a few days to open up our Maine cottages in the spring, but weeks to shut them down in the fall! Why is that? The Ellis family is loving OronoMaine (always spoken as one word), so we can rest easy knowing that. It’s time to resume our life on the water. Our new home is Brunswick, Georgia. Dating back to the turn of the century, the Old Town is bustling with activity as Ben Affleck’ s upcoming movie Live by Night is about to be filmed. Set in Ybor City of Tampa, Florida in the 1930’s, the movie will be have the iconic backdrop of the Cuban community re-created in the heart of downtown Brunswick. It’s quite a sight to behold. Situated near Georgia’s southern border, the Brunswick Landing Marina is sold out as mariners await the official end of hurricane season. To make it more attractive for the boat owners on 15 docks to mingle, the marina provides free adult beverages at the Mon.-Wed.-Fri. 5pm Cocktail Hour at the Yacht Club. Most participants arrive with finger food to share, making it even more fun to linger for more than an hour! Some insurance policies permit re-entry into Florida waters as of Nov. 1st, others as of Nov. 15th. Ours is the latter. We have always spent Thanksgiving with Erin and Brett and their growing family, so this year the tradition continues. Around Nov. 14th we’ll begin the drive back to Maine. We have elected to participate in the Community Thanksgiving Dinner sponsored by my brother Kevin and his right-hand gal Cheryl. Their Quad County Snowmobile Club in Springfield, near our lake, provides a welcoming family atmosphere for everyone to gather together and be thankful...with the food for the meal donated and labor provided by club members. The six of us will stay at the cabin for a few days, carrying in our drinking water and heating with the split wood that we stacked in our woodshed. The temps have already dropped below freezing... so it will be an adventure! Now that we are back on our trawler “Summertime”, we have resumed the upgrading and cleaning routine that seems to take over all cruisers’ daily existence. All around us are boat owner’s busily spiffing up their boats, getting ready for the winter cruising season. We aren’t as “quick and fast” as we used to be, but we’ve made peace with that. Having a car allows for a leisurely work schedule. We can now complete the numerous trips to local stores to get the necessary bits and pieces to complete the on-going projects. We have already replaced the winch that lifts the dinghy, the windless that lifts the anchor, the electronics...GPS and RADAR... that guide us in navigation and the old DVD player with a new one with DVD/ Blu-ray capabilities. Threading new cables (to run all that new equipment) through the inconspicuous slots in the boat has proven to be tricky. It’s also a job that involves patience, a good sense of humor and two sets of hands, one pushing and one pulling! We already have a list of items that can come off the boat and items that we need that are back at our cabin. We have ordered new wall-hugging LaZboy recliners for comfortable seating in “Summertime’s” salon; the one’s we presently sit in will go to the cabin to be refurbished in the future. The trip back to Maine also gives Darcy a chance to touch base with her rheumatologist and discuss with him how to proceed with the Prednisone-reduction regimen. Every day of pain-free mobility is surely a blessed gift!

Saturday, October 17, 2015

A Summer Full of Surprises

Darcy was now able to resume her gardening, kayaking, swimming and hiking. Wally finally got his wish for an ATV. Our new Yamaha Viking was going to be perfect for off-road adventures and carrying tools and building materials around the property. Life back at our Maine cabin looked like it was going to be quite predictable. But wait! What is this? Our daughter and family have sold their home in Atlanta, GA and will be moving to Orono, ME ... just 70 miles from the lake. Our son-in-law Brett has accepted a position as Professor of Mechanical Engineering Technology at thee University of Maine. Yippee! Our sweet granddaughters, age 51/2 and 8, and their four-footed playmate joined us for the next 81/2 weeks and we quickly got trained up in kid and puppy care. Biking, fishing, jigsaw puzzles and Quiet Time were added to our daily repertoire of activities. Bailey, right away, chose to give up her training wheels, peddling with amazingly confidence. Big sister Emily was mightily impressed. Erin and Brett became “tear down and rebuild” experts on their newly purchased 1958 Cape Cod-style home in beautiful downtown Orono. They would break away to join us at the lake for R&R at the end of most weeks. Wally’s woodshop became a work-over area for the Orono project. Wally also spent a day-overnight-day almost every week on site working with Erin and Brett, returning to the cabin showing sure signs of exhaustion. With Brett’s muscles and engineering expertise added to Wally’s keen desire, our blacksmith shop received a roof extension, increasing the covered work space by at least 1/3. The space is now so attractive that it beckons for multi-use activities...a relaxing reading nook, perhaps. It's been 50 years since Darcy graduated from Mattanawcook Academy in Lincoln, Maine. Her Class of 1965 has been meeting monthly for four years in anticipation of this year's Homecoming celebration. Thanks to Carol and Linda, two devoted classmates, the Class of 1965 will long be remembered for their enthusiastic participation in both the parade float and the reunion party. The Celebration of Oric O’Brien’s Life was scheduled for August 15... with most family members and close friends arriving at the lake a week before. In preparation for the gathering, Darcy arose early and walked down to the camp that her dad had summered in since 1952. Using the family artifacts found in the Florida home and the Lincoln, Maine homestead, she created vignettes of the life and times of her dad and arranged them in the spaces between the exposed studs above the camp windows. It was a labor of love that she devoted herself to from 5 to 7 am every morning. Emily, Bailey and Cupcake brought her back to the “here and now” by running down the hill from cabin to camp, charging through the door, and announcing, “Pop says breakfast is ready, Nan...come on!”