One of the Facebooks groups that I follow is the Airfix Modelling Club. If you don’t know, Airfix is one of the companies that makes plastic kits of aircraft, military equipment, car, ships etc etc. I spent a lot of my teenage years building models of Spitfires, tanks and other assorted war machinery plus naval vessels and sailing ships. One of the predominant themes in the Facebook group is “The Stash”. Some of these guys are serious modellers and constantly…
Brian and Karen, Drake Paragon, Jamie and Liz, Dan and Kika, Nike, Barry, Johan and Malin, Troy and Pascale, Shaun and Julia, Dylan Winter. These names, and the fact that this is a sailing blog, the chances are high that you will know who these people are, or have watched some of their YouTube videos. Yes, they are the people that appear in Sailing channels and are some of the ones that we watch on a regular basis. Of course…
As soon as one major project is finished, the next one is champing at the bit to get started, or recommenced, or finished, or something. We have known for some time that the batteries were just about dead. The main house battery hasn’t been holding a charge for some time and the smaller starting battery is probably near the end of its life also. The designations for which battery is the house and which is the starter are purely mine. …
Watch out seagulls! La Mouette now has an engine that works, however, as we all know, it’s not enough for a diesel engine to just go suck, squeeze, bang, blow. It also has to propel the said vessel through the water to destinations with palm trees. Well at least to get the boat out of the marina to where the sails can take over, and then go to destinations with palm trees. But I am getting ahead of myself here…
The world of Facebook is a weird place and I sometimes wonder why I even have an account. As much as we all complain about it, we are nonetheless compelled to continually check it out and inevitably winge and grumble at all the crap we see on there. At the moment, people are having a complete meltdown about some of Donald Trump’s policies, however, Facebook is one of those things that at any one time, someone is having a complete…
The range of skills you need to have to successfully maintain your boat is really quite broad. You need to be a rigger, an electrician, a carpenter, diesel mechanic, painter, sewer/seamstress, fibreglasser (or whatever a fibreglassing expert is called). These are just the basic skills – then there are some specialist skills such as welder/boilermaker, fitter and/or machinist. The mind boggles – how do you learn all this stuff? A lot of books on the cruising lifestyle suggest you go…
What started out as a dodgy gearbox in the Yanmar soon escalated. As previously described, we removed the engine from the Gull and dropped it off at the diesel workshop, Minards Diesel up in Newcastle. I had a really good chat with Neil, the guy who would be working on the old clunker and he really knew his stuff. Neil also recommended getting some head work done. Apparently you have to change the head gasket every five years or so,…
The last blog was about time and how it seems to slip through our fingers like sand, or alternatively, there isn’t enough of it to hold in your hand. But we seem to be through the tunnel and are now able to devote weekends to La Mouette. After a hectic couple of months with work commitments, a holiday, Pipeband stuff, Deb’s Mother being in hospital as well as moving out of my flat, things have stabilised somewhat and we can…