More awesome and amazing things are happening! Ha, not really…
We’re still in the yard but launch date is Thursday the 25th! Winds are howling, gusts to 40 during the day, crazy. It’s supposed to calm down Tuesday and Wednesday just in time to pick up again on, you guessed it, Thursday! The high winds are making the heat and humidity bearable. Our friends, anchored in St. George’s, will probably be here to help with the launch. Hope so!
Bottom paint is complete. I put three coats overall, four to five on the leading edges and rudder:
I’ve been toiling away down there trying to get the shaft seal replaced. The shaft seal goes around the propeller shaft and keeps the water on the outside of the boat:
Mess, and the two feet of space I have to position myself while I jam my head and arms down below. Oh, and no matter how hard the wind is blowing, it doesn’t get down here…
Shaft seal is supposed to be replaced every five years, oops. Old one on the left new on the right:
The old anchor rode (middle) has seen better days so I did an end-for-end and spliced in a new stainless thimble (top). I broke down and bought a proper stainless steel anchor snubber and spliced that in as well (bottom):
Installed new zincs on the propeller and shaft and applied Prop-Speed anti-fouling as well:
Our Rocna anchor had a bit of surface rust so I applied some Ospho rust treatment, gave her a good scrub down and applied some galvanizing paint:
We knew we needed new anchor chain, but we were hoping to make it to Martinique where the price of chain is 50% less. Well I opened the chain locker only to find our chain in one big crumbled mess. I spent about an hour flaking the chain, cleaning up the mess, and trying to convince myself that the chain would work…Ugh…We’re buying so much stuff at the chandlery, the lady is giving me 10-12% off our purchases. So there is 150 feet of new chain piled up on the ground:
New chain, new shackles, painted anchor, nice:
Painted and marked every 10 feet:
Barely fits in the locker:
Oh yeah and I took about 7 minutes for lunch today…really, about seven. Great salad, local tomatoes so delicious I could eat them like apples, a little smoked ham, drizzle with vinaigrette, mmmm, heavenly 7 minutes!
Hope these last until Wednesday PM!!!!
Being on a boat, in the yard…is challenging…which is why we have these:
