Boat Projects

Well fast forward three weeks and we are floating again and the issue with our stern tube alignment is
all fixed! Yahoo. We spent 2 weeks on the hard, living on the boat and working non stop. We found out that in 2019 the stern tube had a leak that the previous owners had addressed and when the folks who repaired it took it out they put it back in upside down leading to the misalignment. I guess it is easy to do. Anyway we are both so happy to have it in the right way and Graham made a few other things awesome with the new installation. He even bought a flexible coupling called a “SigmaDrive” which allows for a bit of flex with the prop shaft if there is any slight alignment differences…..which there aren’t but I’m ok with overkill ;-). 

We also had our washing machine arrive while we were on the hard. It was pretty cool to watch the fellows in the yard use their crane to we hoist  it up and set it in our cockpit. Graham then rigged up a halyard (basically a long rope that comes from the top of the mast) and we used this to hoist the washing machine from the cockpit to our salon floor. We decided to convert a cabinet in our main salon which housed boat parts previously to our new washing machine home. Graham got to work organizing and relocating everything. Next was removing all the shelves and building a very secure level base…..again I think he overkilled it but he wanted to be very sure that there is no risk of the machine moving as we heel during sailing. He also made a drawer front for the space below the washer so we don’t lose any storage. Our first load of laundry onboard was seriously momentous. We both reflected on all the time and money we have spent over the years washing by hand or finding a laundromat and transporting laundry. What will we do with all our free time ;-)?

While Graham was in the aft cabin fixing the stern tube I was in the  salon sewing our new dodger. It is massive and has three huge panes of heavy duty vinyl. It was truly insane trying to maneuver this thing thru the machine. A dodger (which is basically our windshield) also has so many curves and angles…..oiy. This was such a challenge and there were plenty of times I wished I could escape this project. I had to test fit it so many times and in the heat with such a huge piece, trying to put it on and take it off and mark adjustments….ugh. so glad this is in my rear view mirror now! I finally finished and it looks pretty good. It is passable! Of course there will be a few things that I see…that hopefully no one else spends too much time looking at. Graham loves it, so that makes me happy. Such a good feeling to create something like this. 

Our pallet of groceries, a carpet for the main salon and our bow thruster motor also arrived while we were hauled out. I was shocked how quickly Graham and another fellow had 19 boxes and a carpet sitting on our back deck! Now the fun began with finding a new home for everything in amongst all our chaos. We have 5 areas below our floor boards that we are using for most of our food storage. Basically cans, jars, condiments, dried goods and baking stuff is how I separated the 5 areas. I still have to divide up and vacuum seal a bunch of stuff but man it was nice to have everything put away. This boat sucked up all the food like crazy! So much storage. I think we are well provisioned for many many months. 

Graham also got the bow thruster motor installed which I can’t wait to try. The bow thruster is a little propeller at the very front of the boat that in theory should help to move the boat to the left or right via a joy stick I have at the helm. There are so many times when I just want to move the front of the boat a little bit but without the bow thruster this means I need a lot of momentum and water moving over my rear rudder to make this happen. Now I should be able to just push this lil joy stick and voila…..so if I’m just a bit off from the mooring ball I just give it a nudge. Man I hope this works well. We’ve heard that with full keel boats it doesn’t work as good as advertised. I’ll let you know. 

I also spent some time while on the hard preparing all our life saving emergency items for our ocean passages. I organized and packed our “ditch bag’….basically a bag that we have handy when we sail and if we ever had to abandon ship we would just grab this bag and get into life raft. I reviewed so many lists online of what to pack in it. I even ordered an enema kit as many folks say this is a good idea. Good lord I hope I never have to use this! I also had our life raft re-certified. The company that did this inflates it and makes sure everything is working well and repacks it with updated water and supplies within. The company also had us come over to see how it inflates and to overview what’s inside etc. It was super informative and very helpful. I feel so much better having a refresher. 

Needless to say the two weeks went by in a blur. We did managed to have daily happy hours with our new friend Jim. It became my favorite time of day ;-). We are now back on the water and finishing a few more jobs before we leave Grenada in a week or so……OMG!!! I am busy making a new Bimini for our cockpit. We had a new arch made for the back of the cockpit …basically a mini version of our back deck arch and then we reconfigured the stainless steel tubing to allow for open access the winches and for getting in and out of the cockpit. Unfortunately, this means that the old canvas no longer fits, soooo another sewing project. We need this cover to protect us from the sun before we sail. I also managed to cut our new carpet to fit our salon and sewed binding on all the edges. You haven’t lived until you have tried to move a 8*6 carpet through a sewing machine in your boat ;-).  I am IN LOVE with this carpet though. Feels so good on the toes. Boat feels so homey. Graham is now working on installing our Iridium Go. Its basically like a satellite phone that allows us to make phone calls and texts and do weather downloads while we are out at sea. 

And the last thing we need to do before we leave next week is rename our boat!!! Stay tuned for our renaming ceremony. I need to do some research as there are lots of superstitions about it and all the rituals you need to do. I am looking forward to putting out new name on the hull and feeling like the Salty Gingers again ;-).