Sooner or later we’ll run out of things to do. But not this day. We ended up on a bit of a roll :
- Hung up the sea anchor again to try and remove more of the dampness. After another full day up the mast we came to the conclusion that it really needs a scrub. The best place, we reckon, is in the sea either in NZ or Fiji. I think we’ll repack it as is and clean it in Fijian waters.
- Discussed remaining cleaning work with Peter.
- Removed and cleaned clamshell scoop (and hull underneath) on nacelle.
- Called dive shop to arrange pick up of serviced regulators next Monday.
- Made arrangements for sail fitting.
- Remove grease from serviced winches. I came to the conclusion that I’d put too much grease on the 3 winches serviced so far. Helen got the job of cleaning off the excess.
- Wound up the financial side of our old Llc for the boat.
- Completed the dinghy Inflation and tied on the cover.
- As a result of the tech finishing the work on our prop shafts I was able to :
- Completed the SSB ground plane on the port side
- Replaced proper battery configuration on the starboard side (bar the last two batteries so we can inspect the shaft seal after we launch)
- Installed all the new shaft zincs.
- Tested port motor (starboard motor shaft was covered in polythene sheet at the time)
- As a result of the painting being complete I was able to :
- Installed new ground zinc
- Glue the sea cock onto the new through hull fitting the exhaust hose in position so the glue sets with the valve orientated correctly.
- Our chain chute was returned with an extra curve in it. I performed the reinstallation.
- Reorganized a lot of the boat interior returning many things to their proper places.
- One run to the chandlers for a few bits and pieces.
- One run to the supermarket for provisioning.
- Spent a while on Alison’s / Dennis’ boat (can’t remember name) fixing their navigation software.
From the above you can see two of our paid for projects have been completed. The shaft alignment / shaft seal work was completed allowing me to complete the work dependent on that. The bottom painting was also completed and all the plastic wrap removed from the boat. The bottom looks nice. The windows even better now that we can see them properly. We really are pleased with the results of that project. The chain chute and our anchor guard came back from the stainless steel folks. The guard should go on today.
It’s all looking good. We have time for the remaining work to be finished before we launch and the weather gods continue to cooperate at least until the weekend. Then it looks like we’re going to have a few poor days which may delay our final sail fitting. Very soon, though, we’ll have the unpleasant task of paying for all of the work we’ve had done.
We were quite exhausted by the end of the day but we still had enough energy to visit Karen and Frank on Tahina for the evening. We shared some wine and played a couple of words games. Helen and I had to peel off as we were getting somewhat sleepy.
It’s beginning to look like we’ll have four sets of visitors to the boat during the five to six months we’ll have in Fiji. While this will take a bit of coordination we’re very excited about this. One of the benefits of a catamaran is the ability to have guests aboard and not feel on top of each other – one of the reasons we went for a whole boat rather than half of one. Not long now.
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