Boat maintenance continues

In my previous post I mentioned that The Owner (i.e. The Blog Mistress), had flown back to Perth while the maintenance was being done. It would be totally unacceptable for The Owner to get her hands dirty and heaven forbid that she should pick up a paint brush. Had she have been here today, pick up a paint brush she most certainly would have. Today was painting day!

After a most enjoyable evening with dear friends Chris and John Sandow, I was delivered back to the boat to start painting. Now for the uninitiated in the art of boat maintenance this does not mean whacking on a coat of any old cheap paint. No, this is a boat so the paint will cost upwards of $200 per 4litre can. Did I mention that this process is expensive? It is a special paint that is supposed to prevent hitchhikers, in the form of algae and molluscs by wearing away as we sail along. So today I painted the boat with expensive paint that is designed to fall off! All sorts of apparatus are required to complete this job including masking tape to define the region to be painted, rollers, brushes, paint trays, more rollers, rags and roller handles. These are disposable items, to be used once then thrown away, and are of course expensive!

Painting commenced. Old blue paint being covered with new black paint

In the past this painting exercise was simple because we were just painting over the region, that is the bottom of the boat, that had previously been painted. On this occasion, however, the region to be painted had to be increased. You may be wondering why.  Well, The Owner has accumulated a few more toys along the way and refuses to discard anything just in case it might useful at some future time. Why we are carrying upwards of 3000 plastic containers is beyond my simple powers of comprehension. The Owner's actions have resulted in the boat siting lower in the water. This encourages hitchhikers by exposing parts of the boat that they find very attractive. So we needed to paint more of the bottom of the boat. I have termed this raising the 'Scum line' and it involved Mark, using expensive tape, marking out a new line and sanding, filling and sealing the region with yet more expensive products. I then covered all this good work with other expensive paint, designed to fall off, and Hey Presto the bottom of the boat is painted. The 'Scum line' is raised and the hitchhikers given the flick.

Job done tape removed and 'Scum line' raised

So today I painted the bottom of the boat, while The Owner had coffee with some of the family. 

Picture sent by owner of my Mum, Vivian and daughter having coffee with the 'Owner'

Thus the world is balanced and  Zofia is looking better each day.