Arrived home at 0700 this morning after another 900 mile slog that started at 1845 on Monday after a full day packing up the gear and polishing the bigest panels on the topsides before bringing the polisher home (not enough room on the boat!). I drove until 0130 to get 300 miles done and leave an easy 380 for the whole of Tuesday. It would have been more but I accidently got into the centre of Lyon and was trapped for over an hour as all the exits towards Paris seemed to be closed off.
The car has been faultless for the whole 1800M except that I must have killed off the (15 year old) original Toyota battery the other day with the laptop, and it slowly got worse & worse as the trip went on. It struggled to start even after stopping for fuel (which I have to do three times - four if you count the automatic serve & pay yourself pump that I couldn't get anything out of!).
I slept in some services on the comfy bed in the back as I'm bringing the mattress from the spare cabin home and set off at 0730 on Tuesday. I arrived at Dunkerque at 1600 and went into a lorry park to reverse the back end up a bit of buldozed barrier which was the only unlevel ground I could find for miles. I thought I might just get enough height to bump it off - if the crunching of the glasss as I went up hadn't flattened the tyres - I'd already changed a flat on the front before I'd got out of the boatyard.
I laid on my bed for 7hours watching the illegal immigrants trying to sneak into the lorries and wondering if all the lorry drivers thought I was the worst driver ever for parking the back end of my car on the only uneven ground anywhere in sight.
At 2300 I rolled off the hill and struck it up without the starter, and drove through customs to the proper waiting area hoping that I could get just one more start out of it at 0145. I didn't care if it didn't start at Dover as it's all downhill from the top car decks, just a bit dodgy getting your leg in and the door shut before you get to the narrow sloping bit after you've pushed off.

I downloaded a grib file last night to check the weather instead of the usual sites I’ve been trying. It showed today - Wednesday - quite nice, so I planned to finally finish sanding & polishing the hulls. It was already blowing a gale & raining when I woke up so I cursed the stupid web site and decided to stay inside & wire in the solar panels, our new (second hand) cool box in the spare cabin that will strike up when the batteries are full and a permanent stern light. It’s taken all day and about 60m of cable somehow? Luckily I had a reel spare from rewiring the engine which was just enough.
The ends of the cable are coiled at the stern until I come back next time with the welded frame and drill the exit hole, but just to test it I connected one panel resting on the spare bed, mostly in shadow, behind a tinted window at 1830 and it all lit up and started charging. Getting on for £900 for just 128W of power, now I’ve had to redesign the frame and buy another 12 metres of 25mm tube & fittings was starting to seem like a bad idea but it all seems worthwhile now, especially as the frame also doubles to cradle the dingy and permanently mount the stern light (which I usually forget to put out). I think I might even add an ammeter just for that final bit of novelty value, I mean so I can see exactly how well it’s working.
The panels finally stopped charging at about 2000, but luckily as I’m plugged into the mains, the immersion heater & 2KW fan heater still keep going and when I turned the laptop on to have a look at this weather grib for tomorrow, I realised it’s Thursday not Wednesday and the forcast has been right all day.

Finally got through enough of my job lists to book the ferry back next Wednesday (23rd), sailing from Dunkerque at 0201. After spending three weeks of ten hour days doing all the minor jobs I’m pleased I didn’t buy a boat that was a project!
As the wind was a bit calmer today my neighbours Wilfred, Sabina & Don the minature shnauser on Wisa left on their journey East which means no more invites for dinner or homemade burgers being brought around. I just caught a glimpse of Don running past with his little life jacket on as I was in the shower this morning - which is a good thing as he fell in and had to be rescued yesterday. It’s strange how friendly neighbours on boats are - I still haven’t spoken to some in Nottingham after 7 months. The low wind also meant I was pestered for the first time (this time!) by the big fat mosquitos which Navy service seems to be famous for.
I finished blobing on the last gel coat at 1720 tonight ready for more sanding tomorrow and took my first walk around the boat yard to meet another German guy who came to see me the other day. We’re so lucky that our space at the bottom of the yard was taken and we were put where we are now instead, as it’s just a field next to some gas holders. In this prime spot as I type now - in bed - I can just see past our next door neighbour “La Bette Noir” thirty metres to the water . It’s only the channel that leads out into the med, but it’s nicer to watch the barges & ships going up & down than gas holders and mosquitos. Directly opposite me are five big cats. The owners drive underneath and use them as car ports. I wonder if any of them look back across at my push bike that’s just low enough to park under Janix?
I gave a lift into Port St Louis the other day to a couple of guys who had just delivered a 42ft motor boat from Lefkas - which is where we’re heading. As I was the taxi, they bought the food & drink but I only had the one beer as alcohol and driving on the wrong side don’t mix, even though I‘d been practising earlier in the day driving back from the chandlery with two 6m long stainless tubes on the roof. It was nice just to hear a proper Yorkshire accent for a change, but they also gave me some good advice on the routes to Greece. I got the tour of the boat when we got back. They said it was older and smaller than the stuff they usually deliver, but the master bedroom had an ensuite with bath! I saw it on the back of an English lorry today with the sun roof and radar arch cut off to fit under the bridges back to England.

Todays lesson

What I like about sailing is how you’re always learning. Last night I learned that if you drive to the Capitanerie and talk through your laptop for two hours without the engine running, the car battery will be flat. I also learned that the best place to keep the jump leads isn’t under the spare bunk when it has all the sails, tools, cushions & clothes on top of it and how difficult it is climbing down a ladder in 40kts of wind with a car battery under one arm and how it pays to always take the car keys with you to get into a locked car.

The wind died down to a nice gentle breeze today and I polished another side of the boat in the sun, and finally put the rudder back on.

Finally finished the rudder tonight, although by tomorrow the four coats of copper coat that I’ve just put on might be blasted back to fibreglass again as the winds a constant 40kts, gusting 62kts. It’s causing a sandstorm that’s making it difficult to do anything. Still it’s better than being in the water even though the boat (and the car) is shaking about just as much.
The mods that I made to the fridge seem to have worked as a tin I tried to get from the bottom this morning was stuck down with ice.
I took my first drive to the supermarket this morning to stock up with water, bread & chocolate as the bottled water ran out two days ago and the milkshakes running low. I’m sure the water was ok last year, but maybe it’s one of my three hose pipes that I’ve got connected together that’s causing a really bad taste this time?
The wind is supposed to end at 0300 tomorrow so hopefully back to polishing with a t shirt instead of a fleece & hat.

01.04.08

Decided on Saturday to sort out the small gel coat crack on the seam of the port rudder. It happened when we hit a barge on the canal. It looked easier to remove the whole thing to get at it. As the brackets came off that squeeze the rudder together, the two halves started to open up until there was a big gap. The grinder came out for the afternoon to make it even bigger and check the damage. Luckily as we’ve been out of the water for seven months, the inside was dry, so I brought it in to be warm and packed the hole solid with csm soaked in resin, then sanded it, then did it again to bring the surface flush with the existing, then applied a gel coat. On Monday it sat outside waiting to be sanded again but as it was raining I did inside jobs, fitting the new duct & fan on the fridge, connected the radar cables back together and cutting a gap in the fiddle on the table. The new hatch window that I fitted the other day passed its first driving rain leak test.
This morning was still grim outside so I fitted the Navtex which took until after dinner as it meant also sorting the gps & chart plotter that had never been secured properly since we bought the boat. I put the vhf on to see what was going on and followed two mayday calls with people struggling in the high wind which kept me entertained while I worked. The wind has been constant for the last few weeks, dropping for half an hour now & again and then going back to full force. Although it’s 27’C it’s still hat and fleece weather. It was at 30kts this morning which dried my washing in no time although I had to use all the pegs for about six things and is stronger now. As I type the boats shaking around on its wooden blocks. I went out this afternoon for more sanding and finished with another gel coat.