May 22nd Journal Entry

The sun shown all day Saturday. The weather was very warm, and not too humid. I talked and talked, first to Bess, then to Nun, with the mailman and with Eric. Lovely day, Thanks!
I strolled to the Lutheran Church in a light, variable breeze this morning. The wind was smooth on my face. Four people without being asked said, I should not be floating for a while. Two worried about flood waters overflowing the Mississippi Valley. One thought the thunderstorm warning with 2 and 3 inch hail should be keeping me at home.
I had a fine time singing and Pastor Steve said I should stay around a while. On the walk home I thought about all that these people had said and about similar remarks made by folks at the Farmers' Market yesterday. Seems you are telling me to wait. I'll hold on at home for another week.
Lots of rain this afternoon. One burst put an inch of water on the ground in less than 20 minutes. Lorrie brought chicken home and the across-the-street neighbors had a dispute going that involved the police. A not boring day.
Good night, Lord.

Designing the Houseboat 1

 Last week, I began the pleasant task of designing a place to live and a boat to float in for the next stage of my journey down the New River and then the Ohio River. This short trip is the preview of my continuing travel along the Great Loop. If the boat is a good one I may live aboard for some years in a number of countries.

I started by reviewing all the houseboat plans and views I could find on the internet. Some of these dated back to Old Popular Mechanics issues from the 1950's. A very interesting set of drawings come from Jay Benford, who designed houseboats with ferry boat lines in the early 70's.

Next, I thought about a concrete structure, because I had once read a book on ferro-concrete yacht construction. I laid out a possible design and figured the weight of it. From this I computed the draft (that's how much water it would take to float it) and decided that I would not always have so much water to float her.

Then, I started thinking about high bouyancy systems, like docks and floats that do not require deep water to manuever. I contacted one dock engineer at Dock Hardware and discovered the sizes of standard polyethylene wrapped foam floats used to float docks and breakwaters. Docks are usually built from such floats crowned with steel, aluminum or wood platforms. Breakwaters use the same floats that are then weighted by concrete to rest low in the water and resist wave travel.

The standard measure of flotation for these wrapped foam floats is 65# per cubic foot. Now, even though the engineer used this figure, I think he over estimates. Salt water lifts about 64# per cubic foot and fresh water about 62.4#. I will use 55# as my design figure so I will not under estimate my flotation. This also gives me a 10% safety factor in fresh water and 15% in saltwater.

The floats come in standard sizes, in multiples of 2 and 4 foot lengths. I think a 4' by 8' by 3' float block will give the best lift per draft ratios. Each block can lift 5280#. These blocks cost approximately $620 shipped to the building site, wherever that will be. So each pound of lift costs about $0.12.

I think twelve (12) blocks would float almost any structure I might use. So 63360# of lift costing me $7600 will be one of my design restrictions.

I paced the slip widths at the docking area of Claytor Lake State Park in Virginia. These can take a vessel of 24' beam, so I will use this as my maximum width, because I will do quite a bit of freshwater docking. Length can be much longer and as long as the boat can turn within its own length at a near stop, it can be up to 50 feet at this same facility.

The image below occured on Stumble and I thought I could design a houseboat to display it. So I need a long first story and a smaller second story for this houseboat. That also give rise to roof garden structuring and solar collections. Ignore the roof here and imagine one that is flat above the mushroom and again above the girl. A sort of USA train caboose shape would be fine.

This two story concept led me to give up on the ferro-concrete building idea completely as a concrete two story building with concrete or even steel walls becomes outrageously top-heavy. Somewhere in the neighborhood of 63,000#, which leaves no margin for safety once furnishings are fitted in.

So I began to explore the idea of floating a prefab steel or aluminum building. These are much to pricey for my pocketbook at the moment, so I thought further and decided that a modification of international steel shipping containers would do the trick.

I am looking into costs for these, but at the moment they really interest me. I am thinking two 40' containers welded or bolted side by side with a third 20' container on top. This would give me two decks and the desired shape.

I will add more thoughts tomorrow. Right now I need to review the Wall Street Occupation statements coming out of various encampments.

July 6th Journal Entry

On the 4th of July I was floating on the river again. This time in the inflatable that I got from sail boats to go. I was having difficulty rowing and simply could not find a way to sit that would let me use the too small oars. This was not the boats fault but my own as I'll relate in a bit. Anyway, I was having problems when Daddy decided to open up the sky and dump down buckets of new water.
Got to a muddy bank, pulled the boat ashore and started unloading in the rain. I stomped down a patch of stinging nettles, pitched my tent and carried everything inside of it. I even dragged the boat inside the tent and used it as my sleeping mattress.
For most of the day and far into the night the pyrotechnics Daddy put on kept other folk indoors. I woke at about 4am and used some inner hickory bark, a few paper towels and a great deal of puffing breathe to get a fire going. I stretched my fish stringer between trees and hung my clothes up to dry. I went down to the bank, laid broken branches across the oozing mud and walked to the water. I washed my socks and trail running shoes before hanging them up to dry.
I cooked up a meal of beans and nothing else and went looking for raspberries to eat. There were many and if I had needed to stay there I saw that the rabbits had made many trails through the brush. But I did not need to say. At 1pm I reloaded the boat and tied to find a better way to row. No luck at first.
I pulled up on a sand bank and pondered the problem. it finally occurred to me that I may not be  using enough inflation for the boat floor. I blew it up more and it worked much better as I could then use some of my equipment to sit up higher. still the oars were too short for my arm and especially for my less than perfect right shoulder.
Back on the water I moved downstream until I came to the Peppers Ferry bridge crossing. River traffic was forbidden at that point because the bridge was under construction. Two two lane bridges were being built to handle traffic for the Radford Military Arsenal. The river was to remain closed until the end of July. Stymied I rowed back upstream to the Radford Municipal Launch site and unpacked again.
I spent the afternoon and night reading and resting. I called Jammie to ask for a ride home. She came and got me with her mother the next evening.
So here I am back in Wytheville planning to get back on the river after my daughter, Liz has her wedding in August. It is a very good thing that I am in no hurry to complete this journey.

May 24th Journal Entry

I spent Monday walking, sometimes in the rain, sometimes in the sun. I went to the library, to the U-Haul rental place and to the Dollar General store. Along the way I bought coffee and chocolate. What more could I want?
Today, i started up to the bank hoping to get some money so Lorrie could buy gasoline. I took a bag of aluminum can along for recycling. The heavens split on my way home from recycling. I had turned around and forgone the bank when the first drizzling started.  My, by the time I reached the library, running and dodging under trees and awnings, I was soaked. The temperature dropped ten degrees in less than an hour.
I made it home during a storm lull, jumping streams flowing against and over the sidewalks. Mikey came home after the rain and I got a ride to the bank. During the afternoon, the temperatures climbed above 80 degrees and dropped hard as two ominous clouds passed to the northeast. The storm top anvil was towering and building on one.
Sprinkling now and more rain coming. Good by, sleep well.

May 22nd Journal Entry

The sun shown all day Saturday. The weather was very warm, and not too humid. I talked and talked, first to Bess, then to Nun, with the mailman and with Eric. Lovely day, Thanks!
I strolled to the Lutheran Church in a light, variable breeze this morning. The wind was smooth on my face. Four people without being asked said, I should not be floating for a while. Two worried about flood waters overflowing the Mississippi Valley. One thought the thunderstorm warning with 2 and 3 inch hail should be keeping me at home.
I had a fine time singing and Pastor Steve said I should stay around a while. On the walk home I thought about all that these people had said and about similar remarks made by folks at the Farmers' Market yesterday. Seems you are telling me to wait. I'll hold on at home for another week.
Lots of rain this afternoon. One burst put an inch of water on the ground in less than 20 minutes. Lorrie brought chicken home and the across-the-street neighbors had a dispute going that involved the police. A not boring day.
Good night, Lord.

May 16th Journal Entry

My laundry is dry and folded. I am reading and warming leftovers that have been in the refrigerator since last week. Packed all that I am taking back with me in black garbage bag. Curtis the cat immediately marked the bag saying "this is mine not yours." At least, he missed the clothes and only hit the outside of the plastic.
I cut flowers today and filled the vases, setting some in each room. Read some, answered my email and now wait for Jammie to take me back to the campground.  She got me back here at around 7pm. I put things away in time for another rain shower. Jammie had told me on the way back that the weatherman was predicting five more days of rain for this week.
Good night Lord.

May 15th Journal Entry

Rained so hard the day I left... All night long, everything is wet outside of these cloth walls. I walked to the shower house with tiny streams rolling beside me. Even more coming back. I will need to go back for grooming later, but I am hoping you'll show me a piece of blue sky first.
You did! I went to the docks and back. I am now sorting stuff. Some I will load onto the raft when it comes, the rest I will store in the house basement in Wytheville. Stopping that now because it is raining again. Found that several strings of my seeds ans seed pod jewelry had started to mold. Guess, I'll be using plastic and wood only on the rest of the trip.
The rain stopped just long enough to cook lunch. It took a lot of scurrying through the woods to find enough dry kindling, tipping rotting logs and rubbing sloughing bark. Twice gusting wind shook my sheltering oats to rain big droplets on the barely started fire. Poof and start over. But it did get done.
Jamie is coming to get me maybe? I have most of my equipment sorted, but I have had no text of call from her about when she can come here. Most of the time, today, I have had only one reception bar on my cellphone. Oh, well.
Jammie called at five and said she would be here at 6pm. I recon I can sleep on my memory foam mattress tonight. When she came I loaded two totes of clothes and papers into her pickup. There is also a bag of laundry. She told me that she had forgotten about getting me until after her second job. She told me that Lorrie and Mike were on their way home from Puerto Rico. They had an exciting trip.
We unloaded my stuff at the basement door and Jammie said she could not come in. I dried the white quilt which had bee dripped on and started doing my laundry. I fried sliced potatoes for supper.
Mike and Lorrie made it home at 9pm. They were tired, from too many activities and had not rested on the cruise. Still, they were sun-kissed. They went right to bed, they must work on Monday.
Night, daddy.