Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Big Girl

Swashbuckler got some leave from work and is signed on to crew the sailing vessel Claudia IV, a Swan 68. This boat is beautiful and fully equipped with every modern day convenience, minus email. Myself and three others will be delivering the boat from Honolulu to Vancouver. We hope to depart today provided some extra parts arrive in the mail. Looking forward to a good passage on an amazing boat with some very talented sailors. JC

Friday, June 04, 2010

Puzzle Pieces

The last piece of the puzzle was finally fabricated Thursday. The Headstay chainplate, the most critical piece to the standing rigging, was made by a guy named Brendan at Universal Metals. It's taken just over a year to get this piece. It started with one guy saying he would build it, but took nearly 9 months, then a collaborator came along, did great work, took it back to the welder who measured from the wrong end during the welding process, rendering it useless despite the perfect welds. At this point it was time to pay the big bucks to the professionals. A template needed to be made of the bow as well as a wood model to give to the professionals to draw. Well, the template and model were cherry, but the professionals seemed to have a hard time at following directions. It took them three times to get it right, but they finally got it, and it fits like Cinderella's slipper.