I was working on hoisting the staysail this morning when I heard some commotion, the gentleman opposite me on my stern was being evicted by the new marina manager, he had become a bit of a hoarder, much worse than me, he had hoarded so much on his yacht, it was barely possible to see the yacht. Apparently he had been told to clean up or leave. I recorded this video of him motoring out, I was amazed he had any propulsion, or steering, as his boat has been there for quite a few years.
He is now anchored outside the marina, but I expect he will be moved on from there, I hope he finds somewhere to moor up.
I got the staysail up, it was difficult as well, I think the sheave at the head of the sail may be damaged, a trip up the mast will reveal all. The sail looks to have a reasonable shape, but is very dirty, and it’s hard to tell how it performs without going out in a bit of wind. So far I havent seen any decent wind here yet.
Next I got stuck into cleaning the head, got a bit done, then I had to go down to the post office, the Marina used to take cash payments, but now they will only accept postal/money orders from the post office, and wont accept more than a fortnights payment, very odd. Erik needed to pay as well, so he drove me down to the mall where there is a little post office tucked away in a little alley. Again, to get the postal order they had to photocopy my passport, and fill in lots of forms. I’m not looking forward to doing this every fortnight. On my return I finished cleaning the head, it’s lovely now, smells very fresh and is functioning 100%.
Tomorrow I will get the mainsail bent on, this is complicated because it has 6 full length battens, long fiberglass rods that are inserted into pockets in the sail to stiffen it, they are actually bolted into their pockets. Also there is a stackpak system to allow you to drop the sail quickly without it going everywhere, in theory it drops into a convenient bag. Can’t say I’m a fan, but the bag acts as a sail cover and I need that here with all the UV kicking around. I also plan to clean the main part of the main cabin, then I just have the quarter berth to tidy and the inside is done.
Paul C.