The last week has been a dusty week on Dorade. It had reached the time where the old girl deserved a bit of a face lift after so much sailing over the last 10 months. The plan is to build up several coats on deck to get the nice shine back and offer some more protection. I have been trying to keep up with the damage that occurs when you sail a wooden boat as much as we do but at some point a line is always going to find its way over the side and burn through to the wood of the cap rail. All the patching up generally leads to a boat looking like a patch work quilt so it is nice to be doing the entire boat and getting her looking even again. A couple of places needed stripping back to the wood to get them to match again and with a little stain she is starting to look like new again.
Bush and his team have varnished Dorade about 10 times now so they know the boat well and have a good system for getting the job done quickly.
Bellow decks we are giving her a coat of two of varnish, some areas are much worse than others so may need a little more especially in the working areas and companion ways. To top it off we are going to add a fresh coat of paint inside and then paint the waterways on deck.
Once we have finished she should look like new again.
Max the apprentice started back with us for the summer this week and it is good to have him back. Max is going to be learning more about the systems on board and taking responsibility for the routing maintenance of them. I think the black tank and its pump need servicing first!
Hopefully another 10 days and we will be well and truly finished with painting and varnishing and we can start to get the boat back together for training next month. I would like to get a fresh coat of bottom paint on before that to allow it to get nice and hard before we wet sand before the trans pac race.
I’m working on a few other little up grades and logistics for later in the year but at the moment there isn’t a lot else I can do as there is always wet paint to step on and I always seem to find it.
Ben