Tuesday, August 12, 2014

Even the boat projects have boat projects...

Terrapin is an old lady. She's a 36 year old lady to be exact. We did not buy her as a "project boat" per se, but with her age naturally come a myriad of never-ending projects. She used to have beautiful teak decks, but her previous owner ripped them out and laid down white fiberglass.  We can live with this since these will be easier to live with in the tropics (cooler on the feet, good traction, low maintenance).  The only remaining teak on the boat was the toe rail which the PO decided to cover in fiberglass and paint green. A hideous green. After a few years of neglect the hideous green painted fiberglass was blistering and peeling.  We couldn't even sit with our bare legs over the rail or we would be itching for the next two days with fiberglass splinters.


Teak can be a bit of a pain in the rear to maintain. But when there's only a teak rail to "love" why would you cover it up?  





Hideous green blistering fiberglass, meet the sander. 
                              


After two solid, itchy weekends of  tediously sanding off all of the fiberglass, the beautiful original teak was revealed. A quick acetone wash and two coats of teak oil was all this rail needed to shine again.  Apparently this process must be repeated every 2 or 3 months to keep the teak sealed and looking pretty, but the oil goes on very easily with a rag and it only took about 30 minutes.


What a huge difference it made! 



Each weekend we compile a list of items that need to be purchased, scour the internet for the best deals and make our purchase. By Thursday or Friday our items show up just in time for a project filed weekend. Sorta like Christmas each week. 

The cabins received new fans, the salon received new lights, a new "throne" was installed in the master head, 


One of the bigger projects was putting our netting up. Boats that cruise with netting are indicative of cruisers with either A) children on board, B) animals on board, C) clumsy parents,  or in our case D) all of the above.  We had to wait until the toe rail was finished to start this project, but this was actually much easier than we expected.  We had some help from a great video that Sailrite put out.  The most difficult part is putting up the netting on the gates that open and close.  We are still working on this part...  Click below the see the video from sailrite.



What's one of the best ways to deal with the never ending boat projects? Taking a break and sailing with friends on their boat. Sometimes it is good NOT to be the captain.  You might remember Dave. He served as first mate during the maiden voyage down the California coast.  We went out on a great sunset cruise with Dave and family on his beautiful 34 Catalina.





Boat kids.




The girls were sporting their new Coolibar hats. Complete with chin straps, the girls can sit on the bow with their feet over the rail, dodging waves and they'll never lose their hats.

What a great way to end a productive and fun weekend!  

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