http://sailbirds.blogspot.com: Will This Haul-out Ever END?

Jan 20.

Rene paints topcoat on the forward section of deck. I tape up more areas for him to paint around. Rene nearly passes out from the heat of working in the sun on deck. I feed him lots of water, 100plus and food. I get a ride in Tasha's car to check out getting a new name sticker made. Rene sands back the Penguard and the cockpit. He has to rewire the sander and gives himself an electric shock. Handwashing. After sunset (7.30pm) we walk over to Annwn to have catch-up beers. They generously give us a Bintang all the way from Indonesia and it tastes like good times. Lightning flashes all night.

Ren's bandages from wearing the gas mask so much.

Ren painting topcoat

Jan 21.

We get up before sunrise (doesn't really rise above the mountain before 7.20) and tape up the holes on the topsides that Rene made when grinding away the rust / old paint. I feel depressed about how long we've been here and how it feels as though we'll never finish but help him anyway. We use some left-over Kossan Kofill filler that our friends from Tasha D.M left behind when they splashed back in the water. It turned out to be a great solution! Rene filled up the worst of the holes and sanded them back ready for priming tomorrow. I wrote lists, tidied up, tried to get rid of useless stuff and painted the inside of the dorade vents bright red. I managed to also paint my hair - I'll have to cut the top off now! Rene painted some more Penguard and then some topcoat in the late afternoon. I worked on my TESOL course but am not enjoying it - I'm finding the coursework very tedious and not very helpful. I managed to procrastinate a lot by reading friends blogs and helping Rene.

Magic stuff

Ren applies Kofill

Jan 22.

My glamorous laundry

Heavy rain lashed at Anima all night and then continued well into today. Not good weather for painting. Rene had a terrible time trying to remove the masking tape we'd applied yesterday to mark the areas he needed to fill in. I looked up solvents for masking tape and discovered WD-40 and Acetone are commonly used. Ren stuck with it for hours and eventually removed enough so he could sand back the surface to a smooth finish. He really regrets surrounding the areas with masking tape as it was extremely frustrating to remove it all afterwards. I shared a car trip to Giant and Tesco with some other yachties to stock up on groceries. We are eating in a lot more often here because the marina is quite a distance from any good, affordable restaurants. I painted the second coat of red enamel paint inside the dorade vents - it is a real pleasure to paint such a rich, bright colour. I also was finally able to start the process of reinstalling deck stuff. Today it was the rope spool that lives under the bench at the stern. Rene painted the last of the Penguard and is disappointed that we didn't order more earlier on as he would have liked to build up more layers. More handwashing at sunset before a cold beer while we looked over our progress.

The re-installed rope spool

Freshly painted dorades

Jan 23.
Kung Hei Fat Choi!!! or Happy New Year! Today is the Chinese New Year and is now the year of the Dragon. We heard fireworks throughout the night and things in the shipyard were pretty quiet during the day. Rene painted the second coat of Hardtop on deck - a big moment!! It took ages of course - he painted all day and only managed to do half of the deck. I finished another TESOL unit - this time on the future tense. Once the paint had dried, I was able to embark upon the process of removing the tape I'd layed down along the edges of all of the areas requiring Hardtop. As with all boat work, this task is seemingly simple in theory yet laborious and difficult in reality. The tape only sometimes lifts up in one piece, often it tears into tiny fragments which have to be painstakingly picked by hand. The most annoying part is that it has left a sticky residue that I'm hoping will wipe off with thinners. If not, it's going to add days to our time here. Rene kept at painting until dark. I made the most amazing burgers for lunch. I'm so impressed with how tasty they are (it's a recipe I've been perfecting for over a year now) that I'm going to share it in a separate post. After sundown we visited Annwn who had invited us over to help them drink a bottle of Champagne they'd hidden away in a locker. I'm always happy to help!! We had a nice evening chatting under their red lantern lights before heading back through the yard to Anima.

Robyn and Wal from Annwn

New Year mandarins from the marina.

Jan 24.
I continued to work at removing the tape from areas on deck that have been painted. In particular, I was finally able to cut free the tape from the butterfly hatch glass panes. They've been covered since we arrived and are finally pretty much completed. Ren moved the huge old air conditioner (bought in JB) to said butterfly hatch and then we had to deal with the rust spots that had been hiding out under it all this time. I helped out sanding and identifying rust spots until Ren

Ren painting and painting and painting topcoat

Jan 25.
Ren started today by applying a second coat of Jotamastic to the areas that received a first coat yesterday. He then lightly sanded and cleaned the port side topside before we worked together to tape a new waterline. After our experiences cruising through Indonesia and getting the topsides all dirty with slime, we're lifting the waterline up by about 2 inches. The stern was a little tricky to measure - the old waterline (that we stuffed up last time) was too low and we had to figure out a new one. I worked at cleaning the tacky stuff (left after removing the tape) off the back deck using a variety of products. I tried Kerosene, Turpentine, Eucalyptus Oil and Citronella Oil. The most effective are Kero and Turps - though the turps keeps on disintegrating my gloves so I'm a little worried about the toxicity. More hand washing. More TESOL work. More painting. I kept working till late tonight - we've run out of alcohol and it's my ritual (while on the hardstand) to have a drink at the end of the day. Eventually I realised we had some rum in a hip flask stashed away. It's empty now too. I wish alcohol was more affordable in Malaysia!!

Working at removing the stickiness

Ren taping up our new waterline

Jan 26.
Happy Australia Day! It didn't feel like a typical 'Straya Day' as I stepped around deflated Chinese Lanterns that had fallen in the boat yard. We had to keep working on the boat - no time for lazing around drinking and playing backyard cricket!! I borrowed Tasha's car and did a Tesco / Post Office run before embarking upon taping up the green non-slip sections on the aft deck. It took ages!! By the end of the day I was finally able to paint in these areas. We're using Emerclad that came with the boat. When I opened it, there was an old paint scooper (rusty tin) and block of wood inside! Whoever used it last, did not pack away properly. Rene painted topcoat all day. He did the final coat on most of the top decks, including the cockpit which now looks very nice and shiny! After sundown, we joined the other yachties at the boat shed for a BBQ. I was most impressed with Mary's meat pies which she miraculously baked in her Weber BBQ!

Painting new non-slip green paint on the aft deck

Mary with her homemade meat pies!

Progress shot. She's starting to come together finally!

Jan 27.

I got up early and only did a few sun salutes before starting work on deck. Now that the topcoat is finally done, today I had to remove all of the masking tape that I'd previously stuck down to protect anything not requiring topcoat. We have learnt that masking tape is not friendly. If it isn't removed within 2 days, it can behave in one of two evil ways: firstly, it can leave all of its stickiness on deck which needs to be removed with lots of elbow grease and thinners; secondly, it can dry onto the deck so that it needs to be painstakingly scraped off with a Stanley knife and my fingers. I did the latter for 12 hours today. My fingers ache. My brain feels weird. What a strange thing to think about all day!
Rene painted all day. He firstly did a few touch-ups on deck and then continued with the topsides. We're exhausted. I'm worried about the Emerclad paint I applied yesterday - it was quite sticky and tacky and hasn't quite set yet. I hope it does soon. All of this working in the sun means I'm getting my "tan", my freckles are all getting quite dark!