Eight months and counting - still at it.

[Hilde's Log]

I cannot understand how the days can pass so slowly and the weeks blink out of existence in a snap. It's already been a month since my last post. I'd hoped we'd be farther along by now, but we've been working on small things or intricate things, and they don't finish up very quickly.

I've been sanding and varnishing some trim in the galley (the engine cover, for example), sanding and varnishing the plate rack, spice holders, and paper towel holder in the galley, and sanding and varnishing locker doors. Each door and each holder takes 2-3 coats of varnish on each side, and you have to sand and varnish one side and let it dry before you can turn it over to do the other side. In addition, the spice racks have pretty little rounded vertical wooden decorations that were a real pain to do!

I did manage to finish one bulkhead wall in the v-berth, but it's the only thing I can do in that area until we clear out the cushions, etc. currently stowed in there to keep the mess out of the main cabin.

First let me show you the galley. It's 90% done and I'm so happy with it. Bright, shiny, and clean!

This is a closeup of the spice racks, the plate rack, and the paper towel holder. They look great against the new white paint!

View of the whole galley. So much brighter!

Next, a couple of shots of some of the doors, in process.

Here are a set of 6 doors laid out for sanding on our port settee workspace. The three on the right are done. David had the clever idea of using a length of rolled cardboard to protect the surface of the settee. Great idea - wish we'd come up with it a couple of months ago.

First coat of varnish on the back of each door. The gleam is irresistable.

The most wonderful thing David has done for me this month is make shelves for various lockers. I had some shelves in two of the lockers that he made years before, but they were plywood. The new ones are made out of starboard and look great! I didn't have shelves in my "bedroom closet". It was supposed to be a hanging locker, but the back wall curves with the hull, which means everything hanging in the closet was bunched up and wrinkled. So David's new shelves have transformed that locker from a fairly useless design into a great dressar.

 Nav station shelves for my kitchen gadgets.

My new bedroom "dressar" - with painting/work clothes tossed carelessly on the middle shelf.

Had to show off the bulkhead wall by the new dressar. As you can see, I haven't done the dressar itself. Looks horrible next to that glossy shine. It's strange - I'm not a big fan of glossy furniture in a house, but I love the gloss on the boat.











 





Here are my new shelves in the main cabin. Last trip, the canned goods went there. I'm not sure what will be in there this trip.









David has been dodging weather for his outside varnish work. The cockpit has 5 coats (one more to go) and the durade boxes (the boxes the cowls sit on top of - see first photo below) have 2 (at least 4 more to go, because they are always in the sun. We've had storm after storm, so it's been hard to get anything done.

The durade box/vent/cowl. Looks like an alien life form, doesn't it? This is a vent that lets fresh air into the boat. Yes, the cowl is definitely going to be painted.

The starboard side of the cockpit. Doesn't the varnish shine? You can see the difference between 2 coats (above, on the durade) and 5 coats here on the coaming.

Here is a winch block, all spiffed up. I've done this devil a couple of times (and there are two of them). My efforts never looked this good.



















David has also been working with our single side band radio. He has his ham radio license, so he's tuning in and figuring out frequencies. The radio intimidates me completely, being a push-button monster with its own logic. I need to get over myself and learn to use it. Eventually.

Cap'n Dave on the SSB

We got the portside rubrail repaired, a repair we've been needing to do for years. We hired that out! Good move.

This is the mend on the toerail. You can't really tell anything because it's such a good job! Before, the wood was cracked and the rubrail (the metal strip) was sticking out. Now we can varnish this bit, too. Oh, joy.

David has installed supports in the quarter-berth for the new shelves he will lay in there in a week or so. The quarterberth is our "garage" so the space needs to be easy access and and be able to hold a lot of stuff. 

This is the quarterberth, minus all the stuff usually stowed here. It runs along the starboard side of the hull, from behind the nav station to the stern of the boat. David's project is to make sturdy shelves for all the flotsam we carry here. You can see the two lengths of support rail (the pale wood strips) that will hold the top shelf. The electrics are also going to have to be moved.

 All of which is a long-winded way of saying - we're still at it.

She's starting to look good!

[Hilde's log]

Fewer than 9 months to go, and we are making good progress. For those of us who like to finish things, it can be pretty frustrating to have everything out all over the place all the time. We are forever hunting this or that thing that has disappeared into the mess. Yesterday I was far enough along to wash and replace items that go in the galley, and that lessened the chaos a bit. I'll let the pictures tell the story.

Portside work station

Starboard settee holding area...also known as the Bermuda triangle

Passageway

The galley is being redone and is serving as a work station at the same time. In the first picture below, you can see the new white walls. They have really lightened the interior. I haven't yet sanded and varnished the dish/spice/paper towel holders yet. As a point of reference, the second photo below is one of the galley "before". The third picture below shows it in use, covered with various half-finished doors.

The NAV station is almost done. There are so many parts to it! On the left is the NAV station locker "before" - icky, that is. On the right is the locker after varnishing the outside and painting the interior bright blue. You can see the contrast in the unfinished area. David is going to re-install my shelves here. It's where I store my galley appliances, like my small crockpot. On the bottom go our work / sailing gloves. Strange bedfellows on a boat abound.

 

 

Below is part of the NAV station as it was being stripped. Now look below to see it all shiny with new varnish. Still have to clear out the shelves above and below that hold the radio, binoculars, boat horn, etc.

 

Above is a glimpse of the worst/best job - fixing up the head. That's the floor. The part that slants up has been painteed. The bottom with the grate has not. You can see what a difference the paint makes! I need to sand and refinish the grate, clean out under it, and then paint the rest of the floor. David did most of the head lockers (my arms aren't long enough to reach the back) as well as the main cabin locker and the v-berth locker. As you can imagine, the whole boat reeks of paint.

And we're also getting around to the trim on the outside! I use the royal "we" here - this is all David's doing. It took days of sanding to get the coaming clear of dirt, old varnish, stains, etc. This is two coats of Cetol clear (no color). Only 8 more to go. It's quite the challenge in this heat. He got it all ready and then had to wait a week for the random rain showers to disappear. Then it got so hot he could only put on the varnish in the morning after the dew had dried. Short time window. You can see the contrast with the toerail below.

I sincerely hope the next post will show everything DONE and us moved in. David says September 1. I'm more inclined to say October 1. I hope he is right.

More scrubbing and some shine at last

[Hilde's log]

Let no one tell you that refurbing a boat is not glamorous work. I post this photo of me in varnish/paint thinner protection mask to prove my point.

I've almost finished the port side of the salon, and have moved into the galley. Here is the galley before I tore into it:

You can see why it is time to do all this work, after 20 years of hard labor for the original varnish. Here is a closeup of the wood before I started:

Why it takes forever...I am scrubbing off the quick touch-up coat Raven's previous owner applied without (I think) sanding the original layer. That touch-up coat turned leprous and took a lot of scrubbing to remove. I do it by hand, being a dead loss at electric sanders.

The galley, mid-refurb. The wood on the right is done, except for the trim and the framing. The junk on the counter is going home with me to be sanded while the current varnish dries. I am also in the middle of a stack of drawers that are being re-varnished and having their insides painted.

And here is a glimpse of the future! See how the new varnish shines and brings in the light? It's worth it, just so very slow.

Meanwhile, Cap'n Dave labors on. His work isn't as easy to appreciate as new varnish, but it much more important in terms of actually being out and sailing.

He installed a galvanic isolator, which required several hours of work in a hot boat (all the electric had to be turned off), and then a long shower and a nap to recover. That was it for that Saturday. The galvanic isolator should make our zincs last longer and keep us safe(r) from weird wiring at questionable docks.

This stern light cost David several days of work. "All" he did was move it from the stanchion (where it blinded us at night and was blocked by the wind vane) to the back of the wind vane. This involved creating a new bracket (multiple trips to store, storage, etc.), wresting the rusted screws out of the old bracket, disconnecting and reconnecting the various wires, repairing those that were UV-cracked, and resisting the urge to whack it with a large hammer. In other words, a week of evening effort.

Slow and steady wins the day (and drives me nuts)

 [Hilde's log]

This is our cockpit floor (looking forward toward the bow of the boat), with the new hatch rim laid out for size. It's a substantial hatch, made of cast aluminum, and quite heavy. When installed (which involves cutting a hole in the cockpit floor), it will be flush with the floor. Using this hatch, David will be able to access the back of the engine.

View looking forward to the V-berth. David was helping me sand prior to the second coat of varnish. You can see the contrast between the port and starboard sides and also glimpse the mess below. He's standing in front of the V-berth, which is jammed with cushions and boxes and who knows what.

The thing about boat projects is the time they take. 

It's maddening, for those of us used to computer quickness. It reminds me of my impatience, years ago, when the office got its first laser jet printer. Realize that I am of the generation that saw long legal documents hand-typed, when changes were typed on a separate piece of paper and then carefully cut and pasted into the original document. When the laser jet arrived at the office it was light years faster than the dot-matrix printer (which was the huge improvement over cutting and pasting and MAG cards). I caught myself standing at the laser printer saying “Oh, come ON” to documents that printed about 1 page per 2 seconds. 

All of which is to admit that wanting stuff done fairly quickly is a weak link for me. Now that we have an actual exit date, I am rarin' to go and am blocked by all the stuff that has to get done first.

Waiting is part of what you do when you do anything on a boat. Every last task takes doing a bit and waiting, doing a bit and waiting. The teak refinishing is 2-3 hours action and 2-3 days waiting, and you can't do anything else while waiting for it to dry because any mess will end up stuck to the sticky finish. Installing the hatch means ordering it and waiting two weeks for it to arrive and then waiting for good weather and time off for the installation.

Then there is chore reshuffle – when you discover you can't finish chore number 1 because chore number 26 has just muscled its way to the top of the list. Case in point: turning the boat around in the slip so David could more easily access the wind vane (he is moving the stern light to the back of the wind vane - formerly chore #2) and realizing the teak on deck is so awful it has to be moved up to chore #2, right after the hatch, lest we get kicked out of the marina for ugly boat trespass. We had it far down on the list because it wasn't necessary for us to get back aboard and because we didn't really have to look at it, but now we have to get presentable both to prevent issues with the marina and to salvage our pride. But it means that putting the stern light on just has to wait (again, no sawing, etc. around wet varnish).

The most common block to getting anything done is the "where the hell is the ___" syndrome. That is when you are all set up to do something that requires this, that, or the other tool and one of them is awol. It's either in storage, at the rig, hasn't been purchased, or (my favorite) it's right there on the boat but you can't see it because other project bits and pieces have covered it up.

Chores for this week: hatch install, sand and put on the 3^rd coat of varnish below, and, now, bleaching the gunnels to begin the deck teak refurb. Unless of course, something else comes up.

So we do a little bit and go home. Do a little bit and go home. Slow and steady. Oh, come ON.

Eleven months to go....

[Hilde's Log]

OMG. We are actually prepping the boat.

We've been living off the boat in an RV (so much ROOOOOOM) for about 2 ½ years now, and she's suffered. Boats like to be used, lived on, and loved, and we've done none of those things.

Do you remember how hard your last year of anything was? Senior years at high school and college come to mind. Last month of any pregnancy? Time just seems to stretch to the horizon. It takes virtual decades to get to the end and then (*SNAP* like a rubber band) you're there.

We're in the molasses stage of ending our work careers. We thought we'd done that back in 2006, but then got mangled in the Great Recession of 2008 and had to claw our way back to solvency. Almost there….11 months to go….

So we are prepping the boat.

I know, I feel a bit like the girl who cried wolf. But this is different. Really. David and I are about to reach the Golden Retirement Age(s) and we've crunched numbers. It's doable. Before, when we were ready to pull our hair out and leave, it just wasn't. We added and added and came up with needing to die at 73. Or 80. And die after a decade or so of absolutely no health-related issues. We couldn't afford health issues. I still can't afford health-related issues; David was recently excited to receive Medicare benefits for his one dermatologist appointment.

But now, after eight very long years of working and not touching our savings...we can do it. Next May.

This is me applying the first coat of varnish down below. You can see the contrast of the sanded surface to the new glossy varnish! Like getting your nails done. I am doing all the woodwork below, except for the starboard side of the salon, which David did last fall. It's looking great!

What you can't see are the boxes and bits and rags and tools and crap all over the place, the v-berth stuffed with everything we took out of the salon, the utter turmoil of house remodeling. Be glad you can't.

This is the port side, behind the settee. The top piece of wood is newly varnished. The bulkhead to the right is ready to be varnished as soon as the top piece has all the coats applied. The horizontal slats don't need an upgrade (thank goodness). Because this is not a strip to the bone situation, just a re-do, we're talking 3-4 coats, not 6-10. It takes two full days for the stuff to dry, so it can be a lengthy process.

David is plugging away at all the upgrades and fixes and repairs that need doing. His next project is a hatch in the cockpit so he can access the engine, etc. without having to be Gumby and slide down inside the very skinny and claustrophobic lazarettes.

So think of us and send us some energy on Wednesday evenings and every Saturday and Sunday as we move forward.

.

On the hook at Beaufort, SC 12-15-07

[Hilde's log]

And what does one do on the hook in a strange harbor? Depends entirely on the day! Our first full day here, yesterday, was sunny and warm, so we took advantage of the weather to enjoy a walk along the waterfront and through the small downtown to stretch our legs and Schnitzel’s. We peeked into the shops lining the downtown, peered at a few gorgeously preserved Southern mansions, and sat on a bench watching a big traffic jam on the Lady Island Bridge. Then back to the boat. We knew bad weather was coming, so we decided to do some overdue work on deck while the temperatures were mild and the sun was out.

My first chore was to swab the deck with a bucket of water and a brush, dislodging the mud that trickles into the cracks and crannies from the anchor and chain whenever we drop anchor in a muddy spot. So far, I can count on one hand the number of anchorages that have not been muddy, so swabbing is a recurring sport. I even wiped off the deck with a wet rag, and it looked great until Schnitzel came trotting down the side to admire my efforts and left little doggy footprints everywhere.

Swabbing complete, I started in to strip teak. I began stripping teak the first week we were at the dock in New Bern, in October, 2006, and I’m still stripping it. I finished the port handrail, bowsprit, the “eyebrows” (the little strips of wood down the cabin roof over the portholes), and most of the port and starboard toe rails before winter showed up in 2006. In the month or so before we left November 30, I stripped the rest of the toe rails, the stern, and the cockpit combings. As I finish any area of wood, David follows along behind me with teak wash and brightener, and then once the wood is dry we brush on several coats of teak oil and sit back to admire the result. It’s beautiful!! It is my dearest wish never to strip another inch of wood, so let’s hope the teak oil stands up. So far, two weeks into the trip, it has done just fine.

I have no idea how to spell “combings” and neither does Microsoft – sailing words are often spelled completely differently from the way they sound, such as “gunwales” which is pronounced “gunnels”. So pronounce “combing” and you will know what the word is, if not how to spell it.

Yesterday I stripped the starboard handrail, and this morning, before the rain blew in, I stripped the sides of the sliding hatch pocket (the raised bit on the coach roof that the hatch slides into when you push it open). We are going to take a slip at the marina for the three days of forecast cold weather, having had quite enough of freezing our little tushies off at Pipeline Creek. We will have access to fresh water, so David can clean, brighten, and oil the teak I just stripped. When we’re done, we’ll have renewed all the wood but the winch blocks, the Dorade vent blocks, and the companionway.

While I was hacking away at the teak (I started out last year worrying so about the grain of the wood and was I pushing too hard, etc., and have ended up whacking at it and yelling “come OFF!” to the leprous old varnish), David was polishing the stanchions with Collinite, which is, hands down, the best stainless polish we have come across. Raven must feel as though she has been to the spa. The old girl looks like she’s just had a dye job and a manicure!

Chores done, we cleaned up (which is the thing you do after everything – get up, clean up, make tea, clean up, eat, clean up, do a chore, clean up…) and dinghied into shore with Schnitzel for the evening run and then enjoyed a couple of beers and a can of nuts while reading our latest Sue Grafton mystery to each other. Then dinner (clean up) and I am embarrassed to admit I was in bed at 8:30 p.m. Which is how I see all those sunrises.

And thus passes the day on the hook, for those of you who were wondering.