Sunday 27 Oct, HHN day 16: Sunday? Pffff, no day of rest for us! Painting the engine room and visit Fawcett.
Not a good sleep last night for either of us. Wind and rain kept us alert, plus our brains going.
Due to the rain, it’s going to be an indoor jobs morning. So Glen sets his painting workshop and starts the “beautification of the engine room” process. First, one coating of InterProtect to seal all the surfaces where we mounted the new backing plates for the skin-fittings. And also paints some of the old fittings which he wired-brushed the other day and now they need a face lift.
Meanwhile, I keep busy cleaning the companionway steps and hatch (now everything is thoroughly cleaned from mast to stern). And secretly think some varnishing is needed… but that would be a project for another time.
Since it’s Sunday and raining we go for our weekend drive to Fawcett in Annapolis with a short shopping list. Mostly to investigate on hoses and a new line for the main sheet. As usual, we end up spending a fair bit of time there and find lots of goodies.
At checkout we are told that if we bought a boat at the show we can get a commercial account valid for 30 days which will grant us significant discounts. Well, what do you know, we did buy a dinghy at the show, and apparently that counts! So we fill in a form and now wait for the account to become active. We walk out with only two hoses (for the cockpit drains and the engine inlet). But we left behind for keeping a box full of other items (engine exhaust hose, new toilet for mid-cabin, toilet seat hinges, spinlock clutch, main sheet, sea strainer) which we will collect tomorrow once the account is set up. And it better be significant discounts!
Once the rain stopped it got really warm, what a beautiful autumn afternoon. In fact, it rose to 28DegC (82F). As we drive back we admire the colors in the trees and comment how pretty this countryside area is. It must be lovely to live here.
Back at Cloudy Bay at tea time, we plan to start with a break. But Glen goes straight into the engine room to admire the morning’s paint job and to remove the engine exhaust hose. This old one had a tiny kink in it and could still do for a while. But since a new one of exact length was staring us in the face by the checkout it Fawcett, we decided to change it.
Taking advantage of the last hour of daylight and the warmth, he then goes outside to mount the bow thruster propellers. The bars will have to wait another day, as we need new screws. Plus, the mosquitoes are vicious. One warm day and they are back.
The early evening is dedicated to beautification of the engine room part two, applying the light-gray paint over the InterProtect. Plus on some fittings, stains and scratches, till Glen finishes the paint pot. Maybe he could’ve painted some more, if he didn’t paint himself so much on the legs and arms 🙂 More paint is needed to finish the room with a fresh coat all-around. Quite happy with the progress so far. After all the arduous preparation, it looks like we are now ready to install the skin-fittings and the hoses.
Then time for our own beautification and we head off to the showers for a well-deserved clean-up.
Back onboard we treat ourselves with a nice caipirinha (now that the saloon is slightly tidier, we could dig out the bottle of cachaca). Rest of the evening is spent with admin tasks on the internet: eBay to sell more stuff, emails, search for parts, track parcels, etc
It was a good week and it feels we have achieved quite a lot. Still lots of jobs to do, and we are ready to start yet another week of maintenance.
