We decided to shoot down to Pleinair and have a pottering day, even tho we knew we needed to be home tonight.
So, a steady drive of 2.5 hrs and we were sat in West Wick Yacht Club having breakfast just after 10.
This done I then introduced Shelagh to the boat she’s only seen in pictures before getting on with the task of removing the sails from the mast which has been laying alongside Pleinair for just under a week. I also discovered how easy it is to remove the mainsail when you release the correct halyard. Why we were using the wrong one I shall never know, but for the whole delivery trip, both of us had it in our heads that the main halyard was the green line running to the cockpit starboard side. Interestingly, when I released this particular halyard I was able to drop the Genoa with no hassle at all. Hmm.
Anyways, sails safely stowed out the way for now I got on with clearing all the barnacles from the underneath while Shelagh spent some time investigating below deck. I am happy to report that Pleinair is now “barnacle free”. Also the log now spins freely, unlike last week when we had the occasional reading of 0.1 knots through the water.
Today I also took the opportunity to drop the anchor and examine the chain. It’s going to need replacing at some point, and definitely needs a length of warp added to it. Total length appears to be around 80 feet. Not enough in my opinion.
The new electric kettle was christened today,and after a coffee I moved in on the keels. It’s my intention that the keels will be stripped back to bare metal, reprimed and re anti fouled this will certainly reduce the amount of work that’s going to need doing when it’s cold and wet outside. The main hull however will probably only receive a superficial smoothing and anti foul to see us to the end of the season. The picture above actually doesn’t look good but be assured that the outside of the port keel is surprisingly smooth although I’m still debating how mad to go with it.
All in all I’m quite pleased with today’s efforts both mine and Shelaghs, I shall be having another go next weekend on my own so we’ll see what happens.
