Just a quickie update. We’re FINALLY wrapping up all the projects on Smartini at the Cracker Boy Boat Works boat yard, in Fort Pierce, FL. The final painting of all the small repaired areas is almost finished. Most of the hand rails that came off for refinishing the caprail are back on. The rudder is back on and filled with propylene glycol (don’t ask). Eleventy-seven other projects, big and small, have already been completed.
In these two pictures, you see how we put 14 gallons of anti-freeze back in the engine yesterday, in no time flat! The fill hole is about eye level, and too close to the ceiling of the engine room to just pour it in. So we used a handy little pump that’s turned by a drill. Well under a minute to pump each gallon.
We expect to be ready to be back in the water before a short visit to Fort Collins, CO and Houston, TX, coming up on the 25th. When we return on June 5, we should be no more than a day or two away from splashing!
Full Speed Ahead you two. I’m sure you are looking forward to more adventures on Smartini. Have a terrific time! Love, Love
Seriously? This is the best update you could muster? Anti-freeze?
El Guapo is unsubscribing.
Please, el Guapo, give me another chance! (And be glad I didn’t post about re-mounting the rudder. That would have made the anti-freeze update seems like Tolstoy.)
Wow, that is a clean engine room! The one in my ex’s old wooden monster was just plain scary. And anti-freeze can be exciting, particularly if there isn’t any in the engine. I’m so glad that you have a splash date in mind, and while I’m sure you’ve enjoyed every minute at Cracker Boy you’ll be sailing off to more scenic locales. Can’t wait to read the next post about emptying the bilge, or do you even do that in that fancy vessel of yours? So good to see that you are “putting things back together”.
Liz, how did you know I was going to write about our bilge? 😉 Seriously – I wasn’t planning on writing about it, but I have been thinking about it, since reading (just two days ago) about trawler acquaintances of ours who are currently cruising from Rhode Island to Ireland, and who had a 10-hour session of dealing with way, way more water in their bilge than they had ever seen before. Scary! Of course, we have no desire to make crossings like that (many days in open ocean), and won’t even plan a one-day crossing without nice weather and calm seas.
Any updates on the antifreeze or the bilge? Things are a little slow here.
No, but we installed windows today! (Us boat people call them “portholes”, but I don’t want to sound like some kind of snob.) Four of the eight. Two more tomorrow. And our bow and stern thruster props, and hull zincs. And I’ll be finished in The Pit of Despair! Things are about to get real, as the kids say.