WE'RE SINKING!!!

We thought we had the world in the palm of or hand until today last night when I descended into the tank room and found about 800 gallons of water in the bilge. You can see a rust line in the photo to the right that shows how high the water was before I pumped it out. I wish I took a moment to snap a photo but I was a bit too freaked out at the moment. It took a day to get the place relatively dry and I broke a few pumps in the process. Luckily, the only sections that took on water were the forecastle and the tank room, both located consecutively at the forward most portion of the boat.

A problem like this could mean one of two things:
a) we have a burst pipe and the water is coming from within the boat or
b) something shifted while we were in dry dock and there are now one or more tiny cracks allowing water to enter from below.

The latter is more severe. Our good buddy Carter Craft bravely tasted the water and it appeared to be salty, suggesting possibility b. We shut the fresh water off overnight and found a slight rise in some sections of the bilge. This also points to the second possibility. Boats this old usually have to pump several times a week so perhaps time is catching up with the old Yankee. Either way, it is apparent that we are in worse shape after coming out of dry dock even though our insurance company is much happier.

Stay tuned for updates.