Aleria's Adventures

Alex installing a winch The first visit was to explore and start the bottom, sanding it and painting. During the second visit, we finished painting all except the area by the boot stripe and I scraped the peeling varnish and cleaned the aft deck and cockpit. On the third visit, Alex reinstalled the serviced winches while I sanded the prop clean which had been left with a crusty residue from barnacles. Then I continued with cleaning the foredeck.  We had expected to wash the hull, but we didn't make it. It had taken Alex all day to install the winches and check the batteries and main through-hull. The starter battery was dead as the wire to the electricity had fallen off. We're hoping it will recharge. If not, a new battery is not a big deal. But everything is taking so much longer because we haven't done it in two years and have forgotten how with most things.  Simon was able to empty the holding tank, thank goodness. That was a plus. We were originally going to launch her ...

  While Alex taped the boot stripe, moved the supports and finished painting the remaining spots on the bottom, I scraped the varnish. There is not much left. I am going to try to remove the rest and treat the wood with mold killer as I believe that was what caused the problems to begin with.  We washed scum off the after deck and the cockpit, but were too exhausted to finish the forward section of deck and the hull. That we can do after launching anyway. At least now she is ready to drop in. Still have to clean the prop.  And I am now fully vaccinated. Yippee!

  After a year and a half of not being allowed to travel out of Mayo, most of which was no more than 5 km from home, we were allowed to go to Aleria in Kilrush on the Shannon River. We expected the worst. What was there was not nearly as bad in some ways, but awful in others.  Yes, she is dirty and we need to clean her up, but there was no mould below. Yahoo! The dehumidifier worked. The brightwork took a beating so I will be stripping it down, which it needed anyway. The first day we managed to get half the bottom sanded and painted. On day 2, we sanded and painted the other half except for the top along the boot stripe. That we plan to do tomorrow.  I think we got lucky in that we had taken everything off so there was excellent air circulation below and nothing to rot. People we know had to discard so many things after leaving a boat for that long. They need TLC. So back to Kilrush tomorrow. Let's see if we can get her home. It's been way too long.  Our nephew, Cor...

For a week, we've been watching the super container ship 'Ever Given' lodged across the Suez Canal blocking billions in cargo traffic stuck behind her in both directions. Tugs tried to push her, diggers tried to dig her out. Yesterday, the Egyptian President ordered her unloaded which would take about a week. The memes were relentless.  The 'Ever Given' is one of the largest ships permitted to transit the Suez Canal. According to BBC, "The Ever Given is 400m long (1,312ft) and weighs 200,000 tonnes, with a maximum capacity of 20,000 containers. It is currently carrying 18,300 containers. The ship is operated by Taiwanese transport company Evergreen Marine and is one of the world's largest container vessels." Had they unloaded her cargo, it would have been done ecologically and culturally appropriate... Meanwhile, some ships took off around the bottom of Africa while others dropped anchor and counted the losses . Estimates are that Egypt alone is losing...

Photograph courtesy of US Sailing .  What a great editorial in Scuttlebutt today *. I have often written about youth sailing programs being unfit for purpose. Yet I never thought about the fact that most race committees choose the most experienced, and hence often oldest, club members to populate race committee posts. That effectively does several things to disadvantage both the race committee and the youths.  Without experience on RC, young people don't understand how decisions are made. So they feel like decisions may be made against them unfairly. When they serve on RC, they get a deeper understanding of the rules and interpretation of them. They also gain the training to populate the next cadre of RC members.  A succession plan for effective RC management makes perfect sense, involves the kids at a decision-making level, passes on skills from one generation to the next, and could possibly prevent a Moosehead  from being awarded.  *Jamie Jones (Area Race Offi...

  Today's New York Times cover page...each dot in the graphic represents a life lost.   Almost 29M infected in the US, and 510K deaths. Globally 112M confirmed and 2.5M dead.  In Ireland, we will be on lockdown until the end of April. God help us. Pandemic blues

I first heard about Lisa Blair after news of her dismasting in the Southern Ocean some 1000 miles from anywhere in a furious storm. I was so moved by her story of courage and survival instinct that I nominated her for the OCC Seamanship Award, which she won. As the person responsible for the OCC PR effort, I then had the pleasure of corresponding with her to get information and photos I needed for press contacts. I was mightily impressed and inspired.  Imagine how thrilled I was when I learned a couple of years later that she was writing a book about her experience and she had joined the Women Who Sail Who Write group. I asked Lisa for an advance review copy which she gladly sent to me during lockdown from Australia (at great expense I noticed -- sorry about that Lisa -- next time pdf).  I have since devoured Facing Fear in two consecutive days. I couldn't put it down. She had me hooked from the first page. The first woman to circumnavigate Antarctica, she had intended to do ...