Cool down the wort

Once your boil is complete, you need to cool down the wort.  It is crucial to complete this process as quickly as possible to avoid contamination.  You want to get the wort down to about 70 degrees F prior to getting it into your fermenter and pitching the yeast.  I need to pick up a floating thermometer, it comes in handy both when Mashing and when cooling.  I had to make due with a meat thermometer and constantly washing/sanitizing during the process.  They make wort chillers which will speed this process up tremendously.  I may look into getting one of those as well.  They are basically just a looped copper tube that allows you to pass cold water through the inside of the wort.  I had this batch cooled down to about 80 degrees F in about 20-30 minutes.  I had to change out the water 4 times to get there.  80 was fine for me, because I needed to add cooler water to get me up to 5 gallons.  That brought me down to 70.