Day 310, Year 7: Lots of Prep–A Little Varnishing
Date: Thursday, September 13, 2012
Weather: Another Gorgeous September Day
Location: Eel Pond, Woods Hole, Massachusetts
Today I sanded and varnished the cockpit coaming. You might ask, “What is a
cockpit?” It can be defined as a sunken well in the main deck where the
helm (steering wheel) and seating is located. It is the area where you sit
while sailing. Okay. Now what is cockpit coaming? It is sometimes defined
as a low vertical lip or raised section around the cockpit to keep water
out. On our boat the coaming is capped with teak. Technically the teak is
just a cap, not the coaming, but it gets referred to as such. The teak
serves no function other than being pretty, so today was all about keeping
it looking good. On Windbird, the stainless structure that supports the
canvas that covers the cockpit is screwed down to the teak cap on the
coaming. In order to do a good job of varnishing, the canvas has to come
off and then the stainless structure removed. Then the teak has to be
sanded and the inside and outside of the coaming abutting the teak has to be
taped off. All of this prep work has to be done before the varnishing can
happen. It virtually took most of the day to do this prep and then it only
took about 20 minutes to do the actual varnishing. Tomorrow afternoon I
will sand and varnish again. And if weather and time permits, I’ll do this
again on Saturday. I’d like to do five coats of varnish, but that is just
not going to happen right now. I figure I can do this again next March when
we are in the Bahamas. But I do have to remove the six Dorade boxes and
sand and varnish those. If I have the time, I’ll do it tomorrow, but more
than likely that job will happen next week. Little by little, I’ll get it
done.
Mark started his morning looking for a leak in the fresh water system.
Overnight, we heard the water pump run a couple of times and it shouldn’t do
that if no one is running water. Sure enough, there was a loose hose clamp
under the aft head sink. Mark tightened it and that took care of that
problem. Then he made about four runs to the town dock to get water. It is
quite a job to do this alone, but I was way too busy sanding to help. Mark
just figures that it is good exercise, so he slowly but surely filled the
port water tank. In the middle of the day we took a break and headed into
Falmouth. I needed to go to the Thursday Farmer’s Market and we needed foam
brushes from West Marine so I could do my varnishing. And besides, Heather
was coming to the market with Oliver and Jonah, so heading in around noon
was a good bet that we would see them. Jonah and I raced and placed Hide ‘n
Seek on the library lawn while Granddad held Oliver and Heather shopped.
Then Heather took over with Jonah while I shopped. We got our shopping done
and we got some time with Oliver and Jonah. It was a good deal all around.
I take Mark to work at West Marine at 11 am tomorrow and then I return to
Windbird to do the second round of sanding and varnishing. Jed leaves for a
four-day conference in Maine tomorrow, so late in the day, I will pick Jonah
up from the day care here in Woods Hole, drive into Falmouth to pick Mark up
at the end of his work day, and then we will head to Heather’s for dinner
and to help get the boys to bed. But after dinner we get to walk up to the
neighborhood ice cream shop. Teachers from Sam’s school will be scooping
the ice cream tomorrow night and taking a share of the profits for school
projects. And we certainly want to eat our share of ice cream to be
supportive!
