Following our three week break from Bisou,
and once again loaded down with bags, we flew into Aktion (Preveza) airport on
Friday 27th May ready to continue the work on the boat. We had been scheduled to launch on Monday 30th
May but realised, before leaving for the States, that we most probably would
not be ready, and so had postponed the launch until Wednesday 1st
June. In the end, we postponed again
until Friday 3rd June.
The jobs that remained to be completed were
waxing and polishing the upper hulls, antifouling (2 coats) the hulls,
antifouling (with a special spray on paint) the sail drives, re-rigging the
boat (with the sheets, lines and halyards) and of course putting the sails back
up.
The antifouling took pretty much the whole
day – luckily again we had fine weather which was important to allow the paint
to dry. The whole upper deck of the boat
had to be scrubbed clean prior to this as well, as we didn’t want to get the
bottom wet once we had painted. In the
meantime Tad and I worked on waxing and polishing the upper hulls to a fine
shine making Bisou look like a new boat.
Tad is very particular about every piece of
equipment being cleaned and checked before putting it back on the boat, and so
every stainless steel shackle and every piece of rope had to be checked for
wear and cracks/splits before being used again.
As always more parts need to be searched out either in the chandlery or
a hardware store or even online if necessary!
By the time the travel-lift came to collect
us on Friday morning we were ready to be launched! The travel-lift operators at Cleopatra Marina
are extremely professional and reassuring and before we knew it, we were afloat
and heading across the harbour to our anchorage.
Frustratingly, we were waiting for a parcel
being sent from France and containing some important boat parts and pieces of
equipment that Tad had ordered some time before, and so we were destined to
stay in Preveza for another few days (no hardship there and we had plenty still
to do on Bisou to keep us busy) before heading south.
So, for those of you who think that owning
a boat and cruising for 6 months at a time is all sun and cocktails, think
again…it’s a good deal of hard (and often dirty) work at the beginning and end
of the season. Not that we’re
complaining, mind you – we love the feeling of a clean, well-put-together boat!
The travel lift takes us into the water
Tad doing some of the polishing with the machine (most of it was done by hand!)
All ready for antifouling
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