Saturday 1 Jun, MD day 7: Day of lay-up jobs, in Herrington Harbour North Marina.
Very busy day ahead of us, which starts with a visit to Canvas Connect where we drop the spray-hood for a zipper replacement. It is ready in no time, with a price tag of $45. Ok, that’s it, we are definitely going to buy a sewing machine. What we paid so far for canvas orders or repairs would’ve paid for three sewing machines! No more of wasting money like that.
On that note we ask for a quote on a new spray-hood, which turns out to be double the price of an original one direct from Hallberg Rassy. So one is added to our summer shopping list from Sweden, and also a new bimini. Both our bimini and spray-hood still have some life left in them, but we doubt they will see us around the world. So we will buy spares while shipping to the USA is easy.
Then we carry on with the task of washing the ropes…paddling pools full of them. And by the end of the evening we still haven’t finished them all, the halyards are yet to get their treatment.
Today’s biggest job was taking off the Furlex electric motors (we want to send them for servicing). At first they were stubborn to come undone, as some of the securing screws had quite a bit of corrosion built on them. But nothing that the trusty WD40 wouldn’t fix. So after a couple of hours of leaving them soaked in WD40 they come undone.
And then the difficult part, of removing the hydraulic hoses, which came off very easy this time compared to last October. The grease and the heat-shrink helped protecting them from getting lots of salt inside. Surprisingly, once removed, the tiny hydraulic motors look quite good, only the inner forestay one had some corrosion around the lid. The most challenging motor to remove was the one on the mast, it felt like the mast had been built around the Furlex! But by the end of the afternoon all three are ready to be packed.
And today’s social activity is meeting new people. Ken, a fellow Hallberg Rassy owner from the nearby Herrington Harbour South, has invited us to dinner at his marina. He bought his HR46 a year ago and is eager with lots of questions about our experiences. At first glance, South marina looks even nicer than North – with more trees around the docks, an even more popular restaurant and a large swimming pool. Very nice atmosphere.
As we sit through dinner chatting, it feels a bit odd with Ken and Ray both knowing inside-out what we have done on Cloudy Bay in the last 18 months. And we realise that there are few other hundreds avid blog readers out there, just the same! Our lives are open books! Well, if it helps inspiring people…
We have a wonderful evening, nice conversation and delicious food (thanks Ken for inviting us) and looking forward to visit again when we return in October.