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!