To Sudbury today, and back, getting Heliotrope's starter motor repaired.

Park in downtown Sudbury, across from the Vianet building. We had an excellent lunch at a new, upscale lunch place nearby.

For years things have been a little iffy in starting the little diesel on board of Heliotrope. Most of the time the engine would start, but once in a while, when you turned the ignition key, nothing happened—and this could be problematic, especially in rough weather or when trying to claw off a lee shore. Always, up to now, a certain amount of fiddling, switching on and off, etcetera, would result in the engine starting—but the instances of malfunction have been increasing over the past few years, and given the way of things mechanical, a total failure was certain, and almost certainly occurring in a stressful situation.

So this morning Norm came over to Kagawong and pulled the starter, something that hadn't been done for 38 years. As anyone who has worked on old equipment knows, removing a component after 38 years of attachment is impossible. Add to that the inaccessibility of an engine stuffed into the bilge of a sailboat and it becomes obvious that Norm is the only person on the planet who could have done it. Took him less than an hour, too, and he still has some skin on his hands.

Soon as the starter was off the boat we put it in the truck and headed to Sudbury and a repair shop Norm recommended (and called on our behalf). The place looked like a dark cave littered with gobs of metallic slag, but the people inside were incredible. ""I'll get right on it," said the guy at the counter. And two hours later the starter was rebuilt.

It will be good to have an engine that starts. To a small degree I kind of liked the uncertainty, always figuring it would be a fun challenge to utilize plan B (which every good sailor always has), and in the past I've quite enjoyed being engineless and having to sail into a dock or marina only under sail. (I remember coming in somewhere, sometime sans engine and receiving a round of applause from all the bystanders.)

But, when grandkids are out on the boat cruising around with their parents, I believe a yacht should be fully found, with an engine that is always ready to go at the turn of a key.