Hi all:
We have been “Under Construction” since last Sunday... Greg is doing a major in the aft cabin: attacking the rust and scale in the gray water holding tank and bilge areas with a vengeance. His forearms and ribs are bruised from leaning into these cavernous pits of crap and crud... scraping and chipping away rust and sucking up the residue out with our shop vac. He finished yesterday and then gave it all a good coating with “Rust Bullet”, a silver anti-corrosive that when applied, is supposed to seal the metal and prevent rust from forming again. We will be using lots of it on our boat! The only down-side is the smell, so we sealed off the aft cabin doorway with plastic last night. Greg slept in Dylan’s bunk, I slept on the salon bench and Dylan on the salon floor. Dylan and I didn’t get much sleep but the end result will be worth it. Oh, did I mention that the bilge areas were filled with 10 lb. Lead weights (about 640 lbs. In total, used for ballast) that Brett and Dylan lugged onto the deck and pressure washed??? Quite a project, to say the least! Greg also has the aft head ripped apart, more cleaning, scraping and rust bullet in the shower, and he finally managed to unclog the aft head, so it will be operational again. Thank goodness we have two, the forward head has been problem free thank goodness. Except of course for the fact that we can’t let any gray water drain into the holding tank, so I have been doing dishes in a bucket in the sink and throwing the water overboard for three days....
We are dreaming of the Bahamas and how nice it will be to have this all done, basking in the sun aboard our spotless ship. The weather has been cool and windy lately, a great time to attack these projects. We are also meeting so many great people: Fran who sails a 40 ft. Sailboat, sometimes single handed, she just flew home to Florida for Thanksgiving and gave us all her fridge and freezer food, and has also given us a lot of helpful advice; Lane and Marilyn, who are retired and live on their 36 ft. sailboat, who flew back home to New York to take care of business for a month and spend Thanksgiving with their kids, we are watching their boat for them, he is the one who showed us how to use a heat gun and metal scraper to strip the varnish off the dash and helm instead of using stinky and messy chemical; and Roger and and Danielle, a couple from Montreal, who own a 40 ft. Catamaran and are doing exactly what we are doing, sold everything and taking a few years off, we hope to meet up with them in the Bahamas when we leave here, they sold us a brand new folding Schwinn bicycle for $50 because they are too tall for it. The boys have been having a blast riding up and down the docks with it. Danielle gave me some great advice for organizing the V-berth using flat plastic see thru storage containers. Of course we meet lots of characters too, which just makes life interesting!
Dylan checked his crab trap yesterday and now has 7 good size crab, so it will be steak and crab for supper tonight. The chicken legs seem to be a hit with the crab. Oh and we all got really short "wash and go" haircuts... Greg has a “George Clooney” haircut and is so incredibly sexy I can hardly stand it! After Greg and I had our haircuts, we did some shopping (this was in Walmart) so after we left Brett teasingly told the girl to give Dylan a brush cut, and she did! So short you can see his scalp. He was not impressed, so the deal is payback, Brett gets a brush cut next time. My hair is super short, just a few stubs on the top, and the back clippered. Perfect, I love it! The boys continue to plug away at their school work and are getting caught up. Brett has one more math module to finish and then I think we will try to arrange for him to write his mid term here in Charleston. It's funny... I thought Dylan would be the diligent one at his school work, but it is totally the other way around. He is very easily distracted. Brett works away and gets pissed off at Dylan for distracting him! I keep telling Brett what a good role model he is for Dylan... you can just see that Dylan keeps looking out the window and is just itching to get back outside...
Great to hear from all of you, keep those emails coming!
Lots of love from the tired, sore but very, very happy Dutch Dreamers
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