Friday, October 14, 2022

Hilton Head Island: reberthed and rebuttoned


 

I biked down to GANNET this morning to a triple pleasure and a minor disappointment.

The first of the pleasures was the approach on the dock, looking out onto openness and the sun shining on Skull Creek rather than the rusting wall of the abominable ferry boat.  In time this will become normal and be forgotten, but for now it is continued delight.

The second was opening the hatch and stepping below and finding the Great Cabin organized, when for the past week or so it has not been.

I do not by nature like clutter.  It happened that I wrote to Kent about how well organized his work shop is.

watch

He replied that is so he can find things.  

I understand and agree.

If you go to sea long enough there will be instants when you have to find objects in the dark while living at a severe angle.  When I see a boat with all kinds of clutter on deck, I expect there is all kinds of clutter below deck and the person is an incompetent sailor.

Even ashore, with my vision, which I estimate is about one-third normal, if I have to start hunting for something, it is likely to be a long hunt.  So everything has its place, except when as recently almost everything was out of place. That made me uneasy.  GANNET is again organized and I am easier.

The third pleasure was that today was perfect.  Sunny.  Relatively low humidity after the front passed.  And a temperature of 70F/21C when I was working.  I didn't even break into a sweat.

I got the port berth lee cloth laced into place.  I will not likely need it in the near future, but I want GANNET to be seaworthy.

I reglued a piece of wood that acts as an attachment point for one of the stowage bags.

I cleaned a lot of loose paint flakes that had made their way into the bilge.

I have more painting to do.  

In the photo above only the side of the hull has been painted.  Not the overhead or the strip above the companionway bulkhead.  I consider sanding down that bulkhead and painting it off-white.  I don't know if I will.

The remaining painting will be in two or three stages.  The hull and overhead of the starboard pipe berth.  The v-berth hull and overhead.  And the areas around the counters aft of the main bulkhead.  The two or three depends on whether I do those on the same day I do the starboard pipe berth.

The minor disappointment was to discover that relatively small birds as demonstrated by their relatively small droppings are roosting on GANNET's boom sail cover.  I like birds.  If I were not a human, I would like to be a Wandering Albatross.  I might even have rather been a Wandering Albatross than a human, but was not given the choice.  None of us are.  This was easy to clean up.  But I wish they had better manners.



Of the rebuttoned, I have become so fat that a button popped off my shorts.  Actually I am at my desired 153 pounds/69.39 kg and the button on an old pair of shorts just popped off.  So I ordered a $7 sewing kit from Amazon which arrived yesterday and sewed the button back on today.  The hardest part for one of my age and vision was threading the needle.  Long ago on my first circumnavigation I sewed dozens of feet of sail repairs.  By the time I reached New Zealand waters the mainsail was unusable below the first reef.  Younger then and bigger needles.

I later learned from a sailmaker to make repairs at sea using contact cement rather than stitching.

I am on the screened porch.  The sun is lowering over Pickney Island.  A bird is kawking.

Be well.



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