Pirates

I just read about the British couple who'd been held for over a year by Somali pirates. Evidently, they were finally ransomed this weekend. I guess there are dangers all over they place, and you shouldn't let fear of the unknown stop you from pursuing your dreams. However, sailing anywhere near Somalia just isn't prudent.

For the record, if by chance I'm ever taken by pirates, do not, under any circumstances, pay a ransom or risk anyone's life to save me. But of course, I don't plan to go anywhere near Somalia. If I ever do attempt a circumnavigation, I'll take the five capes route, similar to the Vendée Globe -- the canals are cheating.

Again, don't worry about me. I don't plan on doing anything stupid, and if I do get into trouble, I'll find my own way out.

Boat watch:

Today should be another beautiful day, so I hope I can make a lot of progress. It got up to almost 70 under the cover yesterday, which was perfect. I worked in bare feet and a t-shirt all afternoon.

I was able to get the traveler in place, but didn't have enough light left to attempt to tape and caulk it. I had to clean and straighten a bunch of the bolts, so that took a little longer. I also mixed up some epoxy and filled the 2 holes I'd drilled out in 2 of the large aluminum porthole frames. I'll let them set for a couple days before I try to put them back together. They are hanging up in the cabin right now to keep them warm while the epoxy cures.

I scrapped the keel on a pile of rocks off the Barden's dock while I was in Marion, so I'd planned to use the extra epoxy to fill them. However, after cleaning off the flaked bottom paint, I realized it wasn't really very bad, and decided that touching up the bottom paint was sufficient, so that's what I did. I also attached the servo rudder to the wind vane and gave it a coat of bottom paint too.

With the traveler ready to remount, I hope I can completely finish the cockpit today -- or at least get it close. In addition to the traveler, I have my main aft cleat, a few small covers, the cockpit locker hinges, bilge pump, shore power plug, and winches left. I'll install the wind vane hardware needed to control the wheel later, but I'm not sure if I'll reinstall the cleats that went with the winches.

I replaced the original winches with self tailers, so the cleats are no longer needed. Additional cleats are always good to have, so I may add them later, but will wait to see how things go first. I know that once I've sailed her a bit, I'll start making changes anyway, so I don't want to get ahead of myself.

Once the cockpit's done, I'll only have the portholes, coach roof winch and deck organizer, and the vents left to do. The vents are plastic, as is the bilge pump, so I'll probably do those all at once since I have to use a different type of caulk -- the regular stuff will eat up the plastic.

I still need to fix the opening portholes, but since that may take a long time, I'm not going to worry about it too much right now. Basically, there's a 'u' shaped groove that contains a gasket which is pressed against a rim that pushes into the gasket to make a seal. The problem is that they are aluminum and the rim has been eaten away in a few places on several of them due to corrosion. I have new gasket material, but don't want to use it until I can fix the rims. I'm planning on using gray epoxy putty to build them up. How long will that take? Who's John Galt? (okay, couldn't resist...)

Zoe watch:

She's such a social girl, that I feel a little bad about isolating her on board a boat for long periods of time, so I've been thinking about getting her a friend. Although she loves people, that might not be practical, so I was thinking of a kitten. I don't really like cats that much, but they are better on boats, and if it's raised by Zoe, maybe it will turn out to be more like a dog. After all, kitty is her second favorite word, preceded only by bunny, and followed closely by puppy and pony, in that order.