BIG JOB CHECKED OFF THE LIST

MARCH 22, 2014

CLEANING THE BOTTOM

On Wednesday we pulled the dinghy out of the water and put her on the foredeck.  Quite a job, the 11.5ft dinghy fills the space between the main mast and the anchor windlass.  We began by attaching the main sheet halyard to her and wrapping the line around the anchor windlass.  With the push of a button she was out of the water hanging precariously over the side of It's Perfect.  Getting her turned around and lowered to the deck was a little harder than it had looked but soon the entire foredeck was covered by our very large dinghy.  Because we leave it in the water while at anchor, the bottom quickly becomes covered with marine growth.  Our answer to that is bottom paint.

Rod began by cleaning the bottom and repairing a hole in the hard bottom left from a pad eye gone bad.  Thursday another round of cleaning and then sanding the hard bottom in preparation of the moisture barrier. 

MOISTURE BARRIER AND NO
MORE HOLES.

FRESH BOTTOM PAINT

Friday morning this project was getting old and Rod had an nice sunburn to make things a little more uncomfortable.  The moisture barrier went on and you cannot even see the repair job he did on the two holes from the pad eye.  Now this is progress.  Late that afternoon he taped off the waterline and applied two coats of bottom paint which we had left over from the bottom job on It's Perfect.

 

This morning we hoisted the dinghy up once again with the main sheet halyard and splash we are back in the water once again.  It feels great!  We are now no longer marooned on It's Perfect.  Another big job is now checked off our continuous list!

TIME FOR A LAND BREAK