We got out of Vermillion without much issue and were having a nice cruise over to Put-in-Bay. The weather was great and was one of those warm but not to hot summer days. I had called Amy on our way past Kellys Island to let her know we were close and would be there in about 45 min. This when the engine decided to die. Luckily we were right between Kelly's Island and Put-in-Bay so we were close to some sort of civilization and help but for now we were adrift and I really know very little about engines in general. After looking around we were not in much danger of hitting anything soon so I ventured down into the engine room. I didn't see anything out of the ordinary but wondered if maybe we had run out of fuel as the tanks felt pretty empty when I tapped on them. I decided not to drop anchor and called Tow Boat US. In about 45 minutes they came out and towed us into Marblehead. We filled up the tanks putting in 443 gallons in a two tanks that are supposed to hold 450 gallons. I think it was safe to say we ran out of fuel. Now I got the opportunity to figure out how to prime the engine. Unfortunately this engine has a thumb pump. I'm not sure why. My little engines in my sailboats had electric pumps that make this process really easy. Seems today was not to be my day. I spent about 2hrs in the engine room pumping that dumb pump until my thumbs would do no more and I had tried anything else I might have to use as leverage against it to continue pumping. After about 2hrs and a lot of sweating in a hot engine room I got the thing going and we were off again!
Luckily the rest of our trip over was uneventful but both Annabelle and I were looking forward to a swim when we got there. This would be our first time trying to pick up a mooring ball and I knew there was no way anyone was going to pull the chain 12 ft up to the bow of the boat to run a line though it so we planned to have Annabelle on the swim platform and I would try to drive up to the ball while she ran a long line from the front of the boat though the ring on the ball. Luckily it worked on our first attempt! After we got the first line on she jumped in and swam up front allowing me to drop the second line down to her run it through and pulled it up. We were both really happy to make it into the island that night and were craving pizza from our favorite spot.. Unfortunately they were closed. We took that as a sign this was not our day. Found Amy and headed back to the boat for the night.
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