Richard bought Gordon Thompson's Suzanne and checked in December 16, 2007 with the following picture. Webmaster Note: Gordon had a website for his boat including a lot of pictures - much of which is reproduced on Suzanne's page

A couple of months previously Gordon sent in the following picture of Fire Escape's new deck paint job.

Richard McConnell sent in the following report on January 3, 2008

How I acquired my boat from the Thompsons:  I knew that I wanted a full keel sail boat in the 22ft to 30ft range.  I had seen other Dolphins on the web, but when I saw Gordon's webpage I was pretty sure that was the boat for me.  I called him on the phone and we talked a little and I told him that we would come up to take a look.  So my wife, Mary, and I flew to Portland went to Gordon's house and bought the boat.  I told him I would be back to tow it to California as soon as there was no snow in the Siskyous, probably around March.  We were unable to get the boat until May.

Once we got it home we started the renovation.  We sanded and refinished all the teak on deck, put new nonskid on and painted it. After the renovation, we put it in a slip in Alameda Estuary where we performed sea trials and became comfortable with the boat.  We named it Fire Escape because I am a retired firefighter.  Gordon and Suzanne were gracious enough to invite us to meet them at Port Townsend where they had their new boat and we spent three weeks touring the San Juan Islands with them.  They were very patient and we are very grateful for the knowledge and time they devoted to our enjoyment of the San Juan's. Before we went up there we had jack screws installed on the trailer which sure helped traveling such a long ways.  We have made some modifications to the interior adding a food box on the port settee and some cushion covers, window curtains, V berth covers, sail cover, tiller cover and winch covers out of sailrite material. Our only plan this year, other than routine maintenance, is an electric refrigerator.

Enclosed find a picture of the day we returned home from the San Juan's.

Richard

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December 2, 2009. Richard sent in pictures of Fire Escape's interior with her new electric fridge and galley box (behind the dolphin on the red snap on lee cloth).

The black and grey unit is a Coleman 40 qt capacity 'Thermoelectric Cooler Model # 5644, with both 12v and 110v power. Click here to go to the Coleman link

The Galley Box

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