living aboard – The Seadog Life

Sailing from IJmuiden NL to Harwich UK (2018-05)

Owner — Sun, 10 Jun 2018 07:39:10 +0000

Seadog crossed the North Sea and sailed to England and had some adventures along the way.
On 8 May the Seadog and crew headed out for the first big trip to the UK. The first stop was Amsterdam to calibrate the birthday of my sister on board in Amsterdam Marina. The next day we first had to do some more preparations, then headed off to the seaport of IJmuiden. Along the way to IJmuiden we had to help tow a boat with engine troubles. Turns out a few days later we would also need to be towed into Harwich – UK with engine troubles of our own.
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Trip to The River Orwell / Harwich – UK

Owner — Sun, 20 May 2018 10:23:46 +0000

On 8 May the Seadog and crew headed out for the first big trip to the UK. The first stop was Amsterdam to calibrate the birthday of my sister on board in Amsterdam Marina. The next day we first had to do some more preparations, then headed off to the seaport of Ijmuiden. Along the way to Ijmuiden we had to help tow a boat with engine troubles. Turns out a few days later we would also need to be towed into Harwich – UK with engine troubles of our own.
Below some pictures and video clips of the journey from Huizen to Amsterdam, then from Amsterdam to Ijmuiden and from Ijmuiden to Harwich. We started with a crew of three, but are now still in Harwich trying to fix the engine troubles and one of the crew had to head back to NL. All things considering we’re actually having a very good time. The weather has been nice and will stay nice for the coming days. But we’re also really looking forward to the journey home. More about that in the next blog post.

The cold weather in February 2018

Owner — Sun, 04 Mar 2018 09:18:24 +0000

Here are some more pictures of the current weather in the Netherlands.

Ice, rain and snow

Owner — Wed, 20 Dec 2017 12:25:40 +0000

As you can see there were some snowy days here in the Netherlands. But nevertheless work continued aboard the Seadog.
On the starboard side some of the holes that were made to access the through hull bolts were patched up. And this time two hose connectors were laminated at starboard and port side at the back of the ship to allow excess rainwater to flow out of that hallow space in the top of the hull. Which are connected right into the drainage pipes underneath the waterline. Also all hoses aboard the entire ship have now have been replaced by new hoses with stainless steel hose clamps. Plus, the storage lockers at the back of the ship finally got there much-needed cleanup as well.

The building of the custom fridge / freezer has not halted, but only had some minor progress in favour of the above tasks. All the needed supplies are now aboard, so hopefully more on this subject in the next post.

Party Time Aboard the Seadog

Owner — Sun, 17 Sep 2017 15:51:06 +0000

First solo sailing trip with the Seadog

Owner — Tue, 15 Aug 2017 20:57:09 +0000

The maiden voyage!

Owner — Sun, 26 Feb 2017 09:40:24 +0000

It finally happened, the Seadog made here first real maiden voyage!
And the weather gods were certainly working in our favour on this most auspicious day. The moment we left the harbour the sun started shining and kept it up the rest of the day, even though the weather forecasts were pretty bad.

The engine was still running a little hot, but after lying at anchor for an hour and flushing the engine cooling chambers one last time with some more cleaner all seemed OK.
We then changed our course to the nearest island and the engine seemed to perform superb.
Even when running the engine at very low RPM, Seadog slices trough the water like a knife through butter, with considerable speed.
Don’t believe me? Check out the video clip below.
The next projects will include installing solar panels, battery banks, an inverter and building a custom fridge, so longer voyages are possible without losing all those luxuries.

Kayak trip to Elburg (NL)

Owner — Sun, 22 May 2016 11:05:23 +0000

Every year in the weekend of Pentecost (White Sunday) our family has the tradition to go camping near Elburg (NL). After being incredibly busy with preparing the Seadog so that the tarp could be removed, plus moving all my belongings aboard (most of which where still stored at my parents house and in their shed) now I finally had some time to relax.
One of the items that is now aboard the Seadog is the kayak. I had purchased this kayak about two years ago, but had only used it ones, or twice and after that is was stored behind the shed. This thing was to big to store aboard back then, because much of the restoration work still needed to be done. But now that most of the outer work is finished the kayak can be stored on top of the cabin.
This makes it very easy to just grab the kayak and go peddling whenever I feel like it. And that is exactly what I did a few days before the Pentecost weekend. It was such a nice feeling to be on the water again and peddling in a kayak, that I decided I could just go peddling to Elburg for the upcoming Pentecost weekend. So I made some preparations and scheduled the time to do it. I calculated it would take about 3 days peddling to get there, and 3 days to return, plus the 1-2 days to stay and recover from the journey.
After scheduling some free days from work and preparing the gear I was ready to start the journey on the 11e of May. It was extremely good weather for the first 3 days and I only had to wear swimming trousers, although it was kind of tough to pedal against the wind. And for some reason I had headwind almost every day.
The journey back I did had some rain showers and very low temperatures (especially at night), but even with the bad weather it was still a lot of fun. It really felt like being one with the elements and nature and I will definitely be doing this more often. And when I leave the Netherlands to sail around the world, this kayak is definitely going along.

The Seadog Life now has a Facebook page

Owner — Sun, 01 Nov 2015 14:53:25 +0000

Seadog under sail back in 1974

To broaden the exposure of the Seadog Life to the world, the website now also has a Facebook page. If you are reading this and are willing to help the Seadog out a little, please like the Facebook page and share it with all your friends and family. When you like the Facebook page, new blog posts will show up in your Facebook timeline so you will know when there is a new story. Also please click the “like” button in your timeline if you like a post, because this will greatly help The Seadog Life become more popular.
You can find the Seadog Life Facebook page here:
https://www.facebook.com/theseadoglife
The “like” button can be found in the black and white cover image.
Many, many thank!

Nice work!

The Seadog is back – theseadog.life

Owner — Sun, 01 Nov 2015 13:00:26 +0000

A bight new horizon

Today is the start of a new paradigm for the Seadog blog. It has been a while since the last post. Also the frequency of new posts has been rather irregular, but this is all about to change. I have been hard at work to create a better looking layout, design and a better concept for this website. Also the domain name has been changed from http://aboutseadog.com to http://theseadog.life to reflect this change.
The new concept for the website directly ties in with the new domain name. The Sea Dog (.) Life will still be a place where I will write about the restoration of the Seadog, but it will also focus on living aboard a sailboat in general. This new concept will (hopefully) provide helpful tips and tricks about living on and restoring an old sailboat. Some new pages and menu items were added to reflect the new concept. More information about that can be found in the “About this Blog” pages. The “About the Seadog” page has also been added. On this page one can find the historical and technical data of the Seadog and the Formosa 37 design.
From now on there will be a strict schedule in the frequency of post. Meaning there will be a new post ones a week on Sundays. Since it’s been a couple of months since the last post, I will first be adding posts with information of the restoration work that has taken place since then. The dates of those posts will be set to the days on which that restoration work took place (and the photo’s where taken), which will be weeks / months ago. This means those post will added below this post.
For a quick sneak peek of the restoration work till now, check out the photo’s below. Of course a lot is missing in this quick overview. To check all the restoration work be sure to check out the new “Restoration” section of the blog.
I hope everyone likes the new design and will find this new concept entertaining as well as useful. If so, please be sure to share it with friend and family who might like it as well. Happy reading….

Seadog back in 2011

Breaking apart the cabin

Cabin from inside without wall

Cabin wall fully removed

Rebuilding the cabin

Rebuilding the cabin roof

New cabin finished

New cabin painted

Removing teak deck

New cabin fully painted

Finished painting the deck

Teak hand rail restored

New portholes permanently placed in new cabin