Today, I finally felt like we were making some progress forward instead of just getting buried deeper in projects.  Some stuff actually started moving forward and we got stuff done.

But first, I have to say how lucky I am that I got a wonderful Valentine’s Day card from Ann with my morning coffee.  I only wish I had been as harumph, er, ah…proactive.  Well, I took us to a nice dinner as my contribution to Valentine’s Day.

So, now that the bobstay project is moving forward and in the machine shop, I decided to move on to a new project.  The lazarette hatches.  These are teak with plywood backing. They have been leaking and I knew they needed work, so I took them off and starting working on them.  I’ll make this long story short and let the pictures show that the plywood backing was rotting and almost all of it had to be scraped and sanded off.  But…the project’s still going well.  I got them down to the last bit of laminate, was able to put two coats of primer on them and tomorrow will patch them up with some putty.  Then I will either fiberglass the backs or epoxy a piece of plywood back on-I’m not sure which at this point, although I have cut some cardboard patterns should I decide to go with the plywood.

This is the top side of the hatch cover

Found some rot in the corners

After scraping some of the bad wood out, I found it was more extensive than I thought

Nice to have my new grinder (Christmas present from Mom and Dad)

Two hatches on the workbench almost ready to prime

On another note: the holes for the bobstay bolts had some "voids" in the fiberglass. We plugged them with dowels and filled them with epoxy. I'll drill them back out in a couple days when the epoxy dries. The new fitting is done and I'm picking it up tomorrow.

In the mean time, the one thing going according to schedule is Ann's work on cleaning and polishing the hull. Just check out the shine...!

Page one: our partial list for the boatyard folks...

Page 2 is the list of stuff we're supposed to do.

So…some progress.  Feels good to get something done other than just grinding away at the same stupid hole looking for the mystery bolt.

Hopefully more progress tomorrow as well and we’ll be working through the weekend hoping to catch up a bit from our slow start.  Would be nice to finish up so we can do some land cruising, but since we’re paying for the boatyard by the day, it’s important that we get all the needed work done so we can “splash” back in the water.  Some of our list can be done later when we’re back in the water, but there’s still a few things that can only be done while on the hard.

Yeah, get used to it.  We’ll likely be here another two weeks.  After six days on the hard we are progressing on some of our projects and not so well on others.  Specifically, Ann is kicking on the boat polishing project.  She is now applying the final carnuba wax coat on the hull and will likely finish tomorrow.  Good progress.  On the other hand, Bob has been working for days on a project that was not even on the project list, so he’s not progressing so well on that.

Major corrosion that would have resulted in a sudden catastrophic failure, resulting in dismasting. Glad we found it, but it's taking time and effort we hadn't planned for. Oh well, welcome to boating.

These are about 1/3 of the tools I "burned up" trying to excavate the bolts for the bobstay fitting. At about $20/tool.

We couldn't get to the heads inside the hull, so finally resorted to having the metal shop guy cut them off with a cut-off wheel. Took about 30 seconds!

Here's one of the bolts showing the head that was cut off. If you click on the picture and look closely, you can also see the bolt had some crevice corrosion going on the left side (which was the outside closest to the water).

I set up a scaffold and am inspecting the entire bowsprit (which is about 12 feet in the air)

OK, so the bobstay wasn’t on the project list, but we’re really glad we found this.  I don’t think the fitting was a lot longer for this world and if this part breaks-so long mast!  I already have a quote for the machine shop to make the new fitting.  About $280 for the fitting and $28/bolt.  However, there is also still some fiberglass work that we need to do which I am looking to the shop to do that will add to the overall cost.  I found some ‘voids’ inside the bolt-holes and underneath the backing plate.  I’m having the fiberglass guys inject epoxy resin inside the holes to strengthen the whole thing.  It’s  a bit more complex than that, but suffice to say I want to make sure it’s solid given the work I’ve put in so far to get this right.

So…now that this project is more or less on a path to a solution, I’m moving on to other projects that are actually on the list.  Next up-the lazarette locker hatches.  When Charisma was originally surveyed (for purchase) the hatches were pointed out as needing reinforcement.  They are finally to the point where I have to agree.  I’ll be removing them, grinding out the plywood backing which has some rot in it and then either/or (I’m not sure yet) epoxying a new plywood backing, or just fiberglassing the inside of the doors.  More to come on this once I get the doors off and have a look.

Ann will be spending tomorrow polishing the rest of Charisma and then will move on to the cabin and cockpit sides.  She is building some fierce muscles.  We both are very impressed with how beautiful Charisma is looking from all the effort.  She’s shining-and I must say, I think I can see her smile from all the attention.

The second bolt that is.  Whew what a job.  Two days of grinding, sawing, drilling and the only thing I have to show for it is that two bolts are now visible in the bow under the anchor locker.  It’s been a very ugly job and I have multiple bruises on my arms from “jamming” myself in through the locker, between the sampson posts in order to reach far enough to dig the damn things out.  Turns out that now I’ve got the bolts exposed, I’m too big to actually get a socket wrench on them and turn it, so tomorrow we have another (smaller) guy coming over to help with that part.

Doesn't look like two days worth of work, does it? But I burned up about $200 worth of saw blades and burr tools cutting through over 1 1/2 inches of fiberglass and epoxy to get at these buggers

Of course Ann kicked butt on her project and moved around to the starboard side. Less than 1/2 boat to go!

But....at the end of the day-THE BEST BBQ CORN EVER!!!!

An amazing boatyard sunset

And, the happy couple after a delightful dinner and a fistful of Tylenol

But, despite bruises and painful shoulders (try polishing a boat all day long as Ann’s been doing) the Tylenol is kicking in, dinner was fantastic and we’re noshing on a few bites of dark chocolate.  Life’s good.  Soon the medicinal rum will be deployed.

After working all day on exhausting projects, we were actually too tired to go out to dinner.  We decided to just BBQ some burgers and corn in the boatyard.  Wow!  We could not have had a better meal.  First off the scenery (see above).  Second, the food was unreal.  I just threw the corn in the husks on the fire, dropped some portobello ‘shrooms and then some ordinary looking “minced meat” (what NZ calls hamburger) on the barbie.  I have to say, all of the above were the best we’ve ever had.  The corn must have been harvested locally as it was so plump and bursting with flavor and the minced meat, er, I mean hamburger was amazing.  What really surprised us was how it didn’t shrink one bit.  I’m used to burgers getting about half as big once they are cooked-these guys didn’t get any smaller-there’s very little fat and fillers.  I’m going to buy less next time now that I know.

OK, so that’s all from the boatyard for today.  Stiff necks, bruised arms, sore shoulders and happy campers signing off for now!

My project for the day...discover where in the world the bobstay bolts are hidden under the fiberglass in the anchor locker. This is the locker, looking downward.

This is where I spent the day. The bobstay fitting was behind the two wooden posts in the background (they are called "Sampson Posts")

My actual "uniform" of the day. Headlamp, earplugs and facemask.

Uh huh. Six hours spent like this and I'm not halfway done...

Yup, that's about all I've got to show for six hours work. One bolt is just showing and the other has been "found" but not yet excavated.

Argh, Ack and Uhhh! were also heard during the day.  When it’s bad, it’s bad.  Not a fun day.  I’m beat.  Not to take all the credit for tough jobs.  Ann’s beat too-but she’s actually showing some progress on her project.  She “rounded” the bow this afternoon and is polishing the way down the starboard side.

The bobstay fitting removal project is turning very ugly.  For several hours I couldn’t even be sure where the second bolt was.  Turned out I was looking in the wrong direction.  I finally drilled a hole right through the bow so I could see where in the heck I was.  Good news, I found out.  Bad news, the second bolt is in the worst possible place.  Right under a bulkhead.  There’s a small “bridge” where it is, so I have some working room, but not much.  The electric saw (Fein Tool) won’t fit under there so I had to buy a Dremel tool with a burr cutter.  That’s tomorrow’s project.

There's a really nice little BBQ area in the yard. We bought some veggies and grass-fed beef at the farmer's market and did us a BBQ this evening

It was a yummy dinner...

The yard at night. That's Charisma on the right. We're living at the top of the ladder

Boatyard mania!  Our first full day in the yard and we’re exhausted.   Ann’s polishing the hull (37 feet down one side and 37 feet back the other) and I spent the day polishing the propeller.  You say; “The whole day!?”  You betcha.  The prop and associated other metal parts that support the prop shaft were covered in barnacle residue (I chip the barnacles off on a monthly basis by diving when we’re in the water) and needed to get all the residue chipped off one-by-one.  Not a fun job.  Standing under the hull with a pick to knock off bits of barnacle and piece of sandpaper to then smooth the surface if very tedious.  I used my new cordless grinder that I got for Christmas (Thanks Mom and Dad!) for the rough work, but then had to use wet and dry sandpaper to progressively polish the prop back to a nice smooth bronze surface.  A lot of work, but looks nice.

For her part, Ann spent the day on a platform rubbing the hull with rubbing compound, then polishing it off with a wax cleaner.  After she goes down one side and back the other, she’ll have to do it all over again with the final wax coat.  Having done it myself a few times, I can sympathize.  It’s not a lot of fun, but the results are worth the effort.  Charisma is going to SHINE.  However, it will take her about four more 8 hour days at least.

OK, we’re pooped.  More tomorrow including some pics of the polished hull and beautiful propeller.  I’m sure you’re all dying to see!     😉

Morning at Ray's Marine just before hauling out

Coming out of the water

All out and ready to move into the yard

Charisma's set on her hardstand and the anchor chain's out in ten foot increments for marking

Rudder straps already ground down and primed, ready for fairing and paint.

We hauled out today and are now living on “the hard”, about 12 feet off the ground.  It’s always a bit harrowing hauling out.  Boats look very awkward out of the water and all I can think of is 28,000 pounds hanging from just two straps under the crane.  Scary.  Anyway, we’re now all set up sitting on the ground.  The bottom has already been sanded, some of the areas where the paint was coming off have been ground down and painted with new primer, the scrapes on the bottom where we ran aground at Aitutaki have been faired and I’ve dropped the anchor and put new depth markings on the chain.  And that’s Day 1!  I’m sure things will slow down, but nice to get a fast start.

One of the things we did today was call a friend we have met who has a machine shop in town and ask if we could use his drill press to resize the holes that the new nav instruments need to fit into.  Antony (no “h”) said; “By all means!  If I’m not there just let yourself in”.  So off we went and when we showed up and he wasn’t there, we let ourselves into his shop and started setting up the drill press.  Then one of his friends showed up and we all introduced ourselves.  Fortunately Ann was there to do the socializing while I was working on setting up the “jig” I made to drill the 3 and 3/8 inch hole for the new instrument.  I started cutting, but the drill press wasn’t quite up to the very hard, thick plastic I had to drill through.  So, I’m cutting away, very slowly to keep the tool from binding (which it was doing anyway), when another of Antony’s friends named Pete showed up.  He was more aggressive about suggesting the drill press wasn’t strong enough and was bound and determined to “help”.  So there I am; two of Antony’s friends and now Antony has shown up, the drill press is jamming and everyone has an opinion (these guys are all amateur custom car builders, so no lack of builder’s opinions-and all in Kiwi accents).  Finally the Pete grabs the jig, and my bag of parts and says; “Come on mate, we’ll get a proper drill press”.  Off we go with a quick wave to Antony who apparently is accustomed to his friend “taking over”.  We charge across the street and into a gas station where Pete walked in the front door, quickly said; “Do ya mind if we use the drill press”, then headed toward the shop while the owner of the shop called; “OK” after him.  We’re just following Pete at this point and wondering where the heck this is all going and what’s going to happen, but Pete has the part the needs to be drilled and he’s on a mission.  He gets in the shop and makes a bee-line to the press, sets up the hole cutter and my part of the jig I made and proceeds to start to cut.  It’s working, so I’m fine just watching.  Anyway, long story a little shorter, Pete cuts all four of the holes, I sweep the floor and we’re done.

As the headline suggests, this was a classic Kiwi moment. Everyone here is so helpful and also very headstrong (lead, follow or get out of the way).  But all in all a lot of fun!

One of the new i70 Instruments and the hole I'm going to need to enlarge to make it fit

Here's where the other three are going to go. More holes to enlarge and new cables to pull

A few of the cables in the nav station that are going to need to be rerouted

Ann getting an early start on the boatwork is polishing the stainless. A punishing, thankless job. Thanks anyway!

Today officially started “Boat Work Week”.  Well actually it will be two weeks if we’re lucky, three if not.  More than that I don’t want to think about.

Anyway, we motored down to Ray Roberts Marine and Boatyard.  I think it’s actually called Riverside Marine, but “Ray’s” sounds better.  Just getting here took a little drama.  Two days ago I realized I had no clue as to where the key to the engine was.  I had a couple hazy memories that I might have hidden it in case of robbers while we were gone (note to self: Don’t do this again)!  Then after searching high and low through all the boat, I thought; “Well, maybe I gave it to Sharon, the marina manager”.  Problem was, that was yesterday which was a holiday in NZ so we couldn’t call Sharon and see if she had it.  No worries we thought, I probably did leave it with her and we’ll just get it in the morning.  Come morning, Ann went over to the Marina office while I met with Roger the Doyle Sails rep who wanted a couple last measurements before cutting the fabric for the new sails.  We got the measurements but No Bueno on the key.  Oh crap!  Our time to go down to the boatyard was past since the tide had changed.  Rats!  So we decided to double down on looking in drawers, under boards, etc, etc.  Each of us went back to drawers we had searched yesterday and dumped everything out on the floor and voila-The Key!  Turns out it was exactly where it should have been, but I outsmarted myself by taping a piece of grey duct tape over it with the words; “No H2O” on it to remind myself that I had closed the raw water through-hull intake while we were gone.  This was to avoid a potential catastrophic leak while we weren’t aboard.  But the grey tape made the key impossible to see in the dark drawer.

Oh well.  We’ve both decided that next year we will write notes about where we store everything and hide them so no burglars will find out where our good stuff is.  That way we’ll be able to find everything…once we find the notes.

On to business!  Now that we’ve found the key and were able to start the engine, we have now relocated to Ray’s.   We’re spending a nice, calm evening on their dock and then will haul out tomorrow.  I always get stressed hauling out.  Boats aren’t meant to be out of the water sitting on the ground.  We’ll be living aboard and will have to climb seven feet up a ladder to get to the deck and in the boat.  We have four pages of projects to complete. The biggies are:  bottom paint, varnish the brightwork, wax and polish the hull (makes it easier to clean as we travel) and install the new electronics (Crappy B&G instruments gave up the ghost.  They were only four years old and the line has been discountinued. No replacements available and they are not repairable-we’re switching to Raymarine which at least is easier to find replacements for). These days software compatibility is the issue and I’ve purchased a converter to allow my old network to talk to the new one (hopefully).  For you techies, we’re going to try and get the older NMEA 0183 standard network to talk to the new NMEA 2000 SeaTalkNG net.  Good luck to me.  More on this as the next couple weeks progress.  In the mean time, I’m drilling new holes for the different size instruments and pulling new wire, since the old cables are not compatible with the new instruments.  Grrrrr.

OK, time for a glass of wine and some sunset.  More pictures later of tomorrow’s haul out.

P.S.  On a more positive note:  We got a knock on the hull and a “Ahoy Charisma” this afternoon.  Turned out Jim Fair from Berkeley Yacht Club is docked right next to us.  He and his wife left Berkeley a year before we did and we’ve heard they were down here.  Funny what a small world.  We’ve agreed we are going to get together in the next couple days to swap lies about our trips.  Yay!