Quick update

Hey everybody -

It's been a while but I want to give you a quick update on things and then I will come back with further details of the last week of Graham's trip down the river to Mobile ( I made copies of his log book to write from)

I went down with Matt & Jenny to Mobile, AL this past weekend to see Graham off and help him get ready for the Gulf. Melody & Chris drove down as well so Chris could join up with Graham. We had a busy weekend but also had some fun - I will put some pictures up later. We got the boys some last minute supplies and they managed to re-paint the top of the boat all white in 5 hours on Saturday. It was a record time for a paint job on the boat! The reason it needed to be re-painted was b/c the boat originally came with parts of the cockpit/deck painted brown. This made a huge difference with heat inside the boat and on your feet outside the boat. It was amazing to feel the difference the white made in keeping the deck and inside cool.

Graham appreciated the help of Matt, Chris and Melody on the paint job (jenny & I ran other errands during the paint job) in the sweltering heat. He could not have accomplished so much in a short amount of time without them!!

Matt, Jenny and I drove back to Nashville on Sunday night. It was a tearful goodbye for Graham & I even though I'm very excited for him. I miss him so much already but I know this is the exciting/fun part of the trip for both Chris & Graham.

They left around 1:15pm on Monday afternoon from Turner Marine and I got a call around 7:45pm that night from Graham. He said that they were still in Mobile Bay moving very slowly b/c the winds were blowing in the opposite direction from where they wanted to go....they even motored for a while just to keep moving. It had taken them about 6 or 7 hours to go maybe 10-12 miles. Tropical Storm Edouard had already passed by Mobile and was out of the way for them but some of the winds from the storm were causing the slow moving trouble.

I probably won't hear from Graham too much until he gets to the East Coast but he is going to check for signals when he can.....It's possible to get cell service from within 30miles of the coast and they plan to only be around 100miles out at the farthest. We shall see how it goes -

In the meantime, I will put up some posts from his river trip and will develop his pictures to post as well.

Thanks for all the love & support!
Cristy