“I feel like I’m not making progress when I have to keep ripping things out!”
He was sitting at the kitchen table telling me about the mess on the boat when he said that…well, at least he’s not ripping out his own work and redoing it, that would be worse -I know, been there, done that.
This weekend was spent soaking up the oily bilge water and getting out the old bilge pump which was inexplicably bolted to the bottom…anyone think that’s normal? It was a nasty business, but the marina provides oil sponges for free (to help keep boaters from messing up the water), so it’s just a matter of time and energy to do it.
Rick also bought yards and yards of wire in various colors so he can rewire the entire boat. He popped off some panel and was horrified at the clueless splicing job previous owners have subjected the boat to. I guess they didn’t have the money to pay someone to do it right but didn’t have the experience themselves.
This is where it helps having a husband who is not only handy, but a licensed General Contractor who has remodeled 5 houses of our own. Nothing was labeled, just a big fat pile of spaghetti. He ripped it all out and tossed it in the trash.
The wiring will also be nice and neatly labeled and wrapped. He’s taking the time to do it right and doing an electrical layout – think about it – there are things that run on the battery – like your car does – and things that run on electricity when we’re plugged in at a marina AND things get charged up and electricity converted in various ways. So all those cables go to panels and switches and should be done in order and with common-sense.
Austin went up with Rick on Saturday to help feed wires around and about. Rick had purchased 2 batteries and wanted to get them hooked up.
Without an inboard engine, there is so much space! Sailboats don’t have a lot of storage; they have nooks and crannies everywhere. Some people make up Excel spreadsheets with all their supplies listed and the cranny each item is stashed in or else they can’t find it when they need it! Especially if they are cruising for awhile. We’ll be weekend cruisers so we won’t have quite the amount of stuff stashed in hidey-holes as they would.
Rick squeezed himself into the quarter-berth in order to get access to some wiring. As he’s telling me about it, I started feeling claustrophobic, my chest got heavy and I had to take deep breaths. The quarter-berth is more of a, um, dime-berth, ugh.
A side cabinet covers about 1/3 of the opening to the berth! I don’t think too many people use it as an actual berth; it’s where they stick the bags of sails!
If there wasn’t a cabinet in the way, you could, theoretically get in there, but you’d have to be a gymnast. You can go in head-first but then you’re stuck backing out and if you go in feet-first, there’s nothing to hold onto to help maneuver in OR out! That sounds like a nightmare to me.
I’ve never been fond of sleeping bags, either, and don’t get me started on mummy-bags, I couldn’t even THINK of getting in one of those 😉
Our Budget Yacht 