The varnish goes on..and on...and on...

Between other jobs we have been varnishing the interior of the boat. It has taken the best part of the year, and it's not done yet. Apart from the main salon there is not a huge sense of urgency. It's just another one of those jobs that is way easier to do now than later. Living in the boat at the same time doesn't help. Things get moved, lost, misplaced and found again. The main salon area got done last spring while we were house sitting for friends. That was easy. We were off the boat and could strip things down and leave them lying around without having to clamber over everything. Once we got back on the boat we sanded and varnished the main part of both hulls: the nav(igation) station and the galley.

                  

Nav. Station during

 Nav. Station after

The shelves in both areas looked like they had spent all their lives in a builder's workshop. Scratched, scraped, mounds of dried epoxy, glue, unknown icky things were smeared and bonded to them. Lots of high intensity sanding, then varnishing, turned them into lovely pieces of wood that should be on display instead of hiding behind doors. The public sides of the nav. station and galley had the same treatment, with the galley getting a new stove and counter tops as well! The old stove worked, in a fashion, but we could not use the oven. The new stove has a working oven AND grill (!), with a nifty oven door that tucks under the body of the stove when you open it. Our fuel is propane.

   

 Space left by the old stove

 

 New stove, still with it's protective plastic cover

 

 The door tucks under the oven when open

 

 It even provides a romantic ambiance!

 

 Cupboards during

 Cupboards after (though we still need to find the door hinges!)

Late summer brought another sister ship into Deltaville. George and Doris of sv Grace
got hauled out in a neighbouring boatyard to replace their rigging and a few other jobs. We met George and Doris last year and liked them right away so we were happy to get a chance to spend some time with them. Their boat is two hull numbers away from ours so for a brief time there were 3 Prout Snowgoose 37s in Deltaville, with only 10 hull numbers between them. A historic event! George and Doris have some amazingly inventive ideas for their boat, and she looks wonderful.

sv Grace

There is another Prout sharing the yard with George and Doris, but a 34 foot. She belongs to Michael, who single hands down to the Bahamas every winter, and lives on his boat at anchor here in Deltaville the balance of the time. Michael is in his ealy 80s! A survivor of childhood polio Michael is living proof that attitude and outlook help to keep you enjoying life. While here Michael hosts weekly sessions for interested cruisers on routes to the Bahamas, best anchorages, check-in and -out requirements and anything else you wish to know. A super nice guy.

The car is just about hanging in there. We now have to keep one of the fuses out permanently, which means no interior lighting or opening windows. The air stopped working a couple of years ago. It's fine now that it's colder here, but it was pretty brutal in the hot weather. Just a little longer, little car..