I spent all day Saturday on the boat, sailing around White Rock. It was eye-opening; a lot of the things that I’ve been taking for granted will need a re-think.
For instance, there was a lot more mildew than I remembered. Mostly this was because there was a lot more *water* than I remembered, due in part to the massive snowfalls of the past two months. I think a lot of the mildew will be easily taken care of with Tilex and some elbow grease, but it’s certainly changed my plans with regards to what can and what can’t immediately move aboard! I’ve packed all my sci-fi novels (well, “all” meaning “those that have survived the massive culling”) into a cardboard box, assuming that I would be moving the books aboard, unpacking them, and getting rid of the cardboard box. As it is, I’ll definitely want to keep the books in some kind of plastic tub for at least the first little while, while I track down and eradicate the leaks in the roof.
Frankly there was a lot more water than I expected – I know, that doesn’t seem like rocket science, but seriously – under one of the bunks there was a good two inches of water pooled up! That’s just not acceptable – at least the water is coming in from the roof, and not from the hull, but with Vancouver’s weather patterns I get to look forward to living in a state of perpetual damp for the next few months. Part of my original plan involved bringing my main synthesizer onto the boat, but now that I’ve seen the reality of the water situation, the synth’s soft nylon travel case seems woefully inadequate.
There’s certainly a lot of little fixes she needs – the fiberglass is cracked in quite a few places on the deck, and each place will need to be ground out and new fiberglass laid in and epoxied into place, then sanded and eventually painted. Bill, the current owner, assures me that the work is easy, just time consuming, and that she’ll be a beautiful vessel once the work is complete.
All that being said, sailing was glorious! She’s a huge boat, but she’s in no way unweildy – she’s fast and agile. I’d go so far as to call her downright nimble! We hit eight knots in just over twelve knots of wind; almost unheard of for a monohull, but no problem for my trimaran. The best part was leaving my coffee cup on the cabin roof while we hit eight knots, with no problem – a monohull would have been heeled over at four knots, spilling the coffee, but she stayed perfectly level the entire day. 😀
Tomorrow it’s back out to White Rock to spend another full day banging away at her; hopefully we’ll get some of the fiberglass repairs attended to, but I’ll be happy just to learn more about her systems and get her better ready to be my new home.