It's time to clean the hull

  Warren decided to clean the hull himself, you can hire someone to do this, but he wants to give it a  try. During the winter the water was clear, now that its warm its clouded up and algae is growing like crazy. Once we get  moving and in the Bahamas we won't have this problem, moving is the secret. We are wiring the windless and waiting on climbing gear so we can go up the mast and install the radar, so why not do some cleaning while we have time:)

Wood Work before & after

We had the winches rechromed, and the wood work took three weeks with 9 coats of varanish. We still have more to do:)

A Visit to Sarasota

Well, this weekend we traveled to a bead show for Kathy to stock up on beads and semi-precious stones. The prices are great so Sandy (Warren's sister) wanted us to get some for her too. The bead show was in Sarasota so we figured that we would say something about this nice town. It has beautiful beaches, water front hotels and marinas. Also this big statue of a sailor kissing a nurse(Victory) in celebration of the end of World War II. What follows here is an excerpt from Sarasota's history:

In 1885, Sarasota was promoted in Scotland. Many families sailed to America expecting fields of vegetables, housing, and citrus groves. They found only a stump-filled Main Street and most of the colonists left.
Scottish influence remains evident through the annual Sarasota Highland Games and Festival and the Riverview High Kiltie band, which wears authentic kilts and features bagpipers and Highland dancers. Sarasota began attracting wealthy Americans in the 1910's as it does today. John Ringling, of Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus fame, made a mark on the community of Sarasota in various ways. In the 1920s, he and his wife, Mable, built a magnificent Venetian-style estate on Sarasota Bay named Cà d' Zan. Then they built an art museum for their collection of works by Peter Paul Rubens and other 17th-century Italian and Flemish art. http://www.canvasreplicas.com/  In addition, John used his circus elephants to help build the first bridge from the mainland to St. Armands Key, which he developed as a commercial and residential center. The circus' winter quarters were moved to Sarasota in 1927, thus creating a new identity for Sarasota as a "circus town." Now Sarasota is known as the "Circus Capitol of the World" and is home to many circuses.

The Windless

With the Taj Mahal of mounting blocks finally finished, an inch of fiberglass laid up over the wood and a gel coat over it, then another inch and a half of fiberglass added to five square feet of the underside of the forepeak to level the area for aluminum backing plates, special bolts ordered twice. The windlass is finally mounted.

What an ordeal. Oh I forgot, the 3M 5200 that seals out water, it's a permanent adhesive and a royal MESS to work with when things don't go as planned.(I have a new name for it) We knew that the required amount of 5200 would be large in places. So I figured these out and applied the goop from Hades. In areas where so much wasn't needed I went light, I thought. After putting down the windlass, putting up the metal plates from the bottom, slipping the bolts through their proper places we started tightening the bolts. Kathy up on top of the deck and me under lying on a board facing up. Well, it kinda reminds me of a time when a fuel flow transmitter from a jet engine hit me in the head while changing it from the bottom. Only this time I expected a little. What I got was pretty much a rain fall of white death (my new name for 5200) None dropped on me but the board caught enough and then got in my hair, on my ears, neck and wherever else it wanted to go. Lucky for me I still use hairspray so it just washed out, but I went through about a quart of acetone to clean the rest of me. And I still missed some. Oh well, "all's well that ends well." Now the cables! Oh, what fun!!:)

We have shade!!!

We have been working on the dodger on and off for 3 weeks and I'm glad it's finally done. Now we don't get to wet nor to hot. Warren is going to put some LED lights under it so we have light.  Here are some pic's of us working on it.