Monday, March 28, 2005
Finally the boat is beached!
Well after all this time the boat is safetly in the yard on her cradle. The bottom cleaning and antifouling is about to be completed and the small amount of interior work needed I will commence on Thursday. Consists mainly of replacing a couple of "skin fittings" wiring a heavy duty Earth wire from the aft annodes to those fittings that have electronically degraded (Bad job Princess! for not doing it in the first place). I may have to replace a couple of anodes too. I am also about to fit an electronic programmer in the forward state room so that the central heating can be operated without getting out of bed (great for cold mornings when you need to turn up the heat) I looked at a lovely Oyster 48 in London the other day! I am truly very tempted now to go back to sail. I really fancy a long oceanic trip again! the boat deliveries have deminished ( I haven`t been making the effort really!since the owner of one of the companies that used me retired) ) so its up too me to get on with it and start to plan. I fancy Scandinavia and the Baltic in early summer, and the Caribb for Christmas :o)) maybe next year? who knows.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
NICE! NICE!NICE!en't you
Aren't you a bit afraid of an oceanic trip? because I certainly would be. Scandinavia is wonderful as far as I visited it.Expecially Norway has a indescribable magic...
Hi Yvonne! I think that afraid isnt quite the word I would use. Yes you can be frightened or fearfull at times and the sea must be respected, much in the same way as you would respect a road when you are crossing it. You take all the precautions possible and then you go for it.
I just love the vastness of an ocean, the enormity of the wild life, just imagine lying on the deck of a boat with the steering on auto pilot and the radar alarm operational (always wakes me up before I can even see any other ship) and all of a sudden you are awoken from your day dreams by a loud sound like the whistle of a passing jet aircraft only to be soaked in a fine sea spray. you quickly look over to where the sound is coming from on the starboard beam and you look straight into the eyes of a hump back whale that is keeping you company as you go on your journey.
This happened to me about two hundred miles off the coast of Portugal a couple of years ago. the whale spent about an hour close to the boat, I spent some time speaking to it! it looked at me, swimming, turned slightly to one side, with one eye and obviously there was no sign that it was afraid and it seened to like listening to me talking. On another occasion I was sitting in the Bowsprit net of a seventy foot cutter (the horizontal mast that protrudes out on the bow of a cutter ) when a whole Pod of twenty dolphins spent about thirty minutes playing in the pressure wave that the boat was creating, only to dissapear as soon as they had arrived. I just love the sea and its inhabitants.I like the freedom that it can give us. I just love entering a strange anchorage and spending some time getting to know the locals. Im rambling on sorry! Ive never been to Norway and would love to sail there. Once again I think I will like the enormity and isolation of the fjords, the cleanliness of the seas the purity of the surroundings, the friendliness of its people. What do you think?
Bless her!te he! Francesco will rule the roost (if you let him :o))you will have to share watches on passage so you will be "commanding the vessel" during your watch. only if you want too that is :o))
Post a Comment