It's a rainy afternoon. Nice to sit in the cockpit and write while snacking on popcorn, comfort food. (Not really skinny girl - just small package.)
View from the cockpit.
Yesterday was a sunny, calm, perfect day for taking 3 sails down (jib, main and stay) and wrapping them up. No wind to blow them off the cabin top where we lay them out to fold, roll, tie, and push into the enormous sail bags.
We pulled down the main and wrestled with it to get it to fold. It's not really cloth. It's kind of a loud, plasticky material that doesn't fold easily. They are dacron but very stiff, with a UV protective coating and a very tight weave to slow down deterioration. Sail makers have special looms to create high strength and lightweight sails - similar to ripstop nylon. With constant sun and flapping in the wind sail makers have constantly improved the fabric to reduce replacement of sails. The first set lasted us until 2013. They were extra strong and heavy. We replaced them after 14 years of use before our first trip south.
Sail folded on deck
We need to undo the super tight knots in the lines holding the sails. They've been pulled tight by 800 to 2500 pounds of wind against the sails (Drew looked it up). We found Dawn, once again, helps make this job much, much easier. We soaked the knot in Dawn. [Someone should do an article on all the things Dawn can do.] He also uses a rigging knife with a marlin spike to open it up.
The rigging knife has a marlin spike, a knife blade with a hole to make it easier to pull it out, and a shackle key to open shackles with, of course, a bottle opener - we know that's an essential part of almost any tool of this sort.
Here's the reason we're taking them down for repair -- the wear and tear from flogging, flapping, luffing, coming about, and jibbing as we sailed over the last 3 years.
Doing three sails takes almost the whole day.
Folded and ready for the sail bag.
Drew is wearing a kerchief because the sweat was just dripping into his eyes continuously in the heat.
We rewarded ourselves with dinner at Harbor Cove Restaurant, the one we went to the first night here. Live music is there nightly, and we danced. Really busy, fun vibe from the hard working wait staff. No mall walking here. Great service from a group that like working here. Colorful, fun spot.
Then we ended the night sitting at the fire pit, sharing a glass of Tia Maria on ice.
The three, silent, ever present screens at the bar showed a football game, a soccer game, and the 60 Minutes Trump interview with no captions. We'll pick it up on cbs.com Monday night since our TV antenna is not picking up local CBS.
The Tia Maria and fire were a nice ending to a productive day. We walked home in the light of the moon.
The day before the super moon: so named because it's the closest it's been to earth in 70 years; last time was 1946.
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Today, Monday, is cloudy, but before the rain I took advantage of the warmth, 80 degrees and went swimming in the triangular pool. I swam about 12 little laps. It was the first time that Mazu had seen me jump in a pool and swim. She was sort of shocked and curious. The pool doesn't have the greatest ambiance - pool with boats on one side and parked cars on the other - no trees. The rest of the day I spent on work for the New Hampshire Master Gardeners Association and the Piscataqua Garden Club.
Drew walked up to the Whiticar Boat Yard Office in the pouring rain to have the important conversation about the long list of what we want them to do while we're gone.
I'm hanging here.
OH! For some reason the movie of Mazu at the beach came through. She had such a good time and ran for about 20 minutes. A happy dog : )
1 comment:
Hey, Drew in a hippie head band looks all right. : )
and Dawn is used at The Marine Mammal Center in Sausalito(and other places) to safely clean oil from spills off shorebirds and marine mammals. It works the best and isn't toxic to these sea beings.
Good luck getting all the chores done.
love, Sara S
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