In Which Our Heroes Meet For The First Time

The time has come to put plans into action, antifouling paint on bottoms,shoulders to wheels, noses to grindstones(ouch) etc. etc. Heading northwards with the fabulously expensive antifouling paint and an armed escort I arrived late on a Monday morning enthusiasm bursting from my elderly seams and raring to attack a list of jobs as long as the proverbial arm. Problem number one arose even before I reached Dave's house. I had forgotten my carefully crafted list of things to check on the boat. This seems par for the course for the pre-Alzheimer's generation so, undaunted and after a swift cup coffee we began to inspect Missy Moto and her mysterious contents.

The first thing I found on going below decks was a wine glass, glass mind you, not plastic, standing proudly on the table undisturbed by it's fifty mile trailer trip from Lydney. We both hope this augurs well for smooth sailing in the future. Further unloading revealed a veritable treasure trove of odds and sods the function of most of which was immediately obvious - life jackets, man-overboard kit, anchors(two), a gas cylinder (sitting on some foul smelling water in a dedicated spot in the aft port locker), a fuel tank (seen better days) and all the usual bits and pieces associated with boats and boating. The kitchen equipment, including various condiments of somewhat indeterminate age, was all taken out and the lockers, drawers, nooks and crannies were all vacuumed in a masculine sort of way i.e. not very well but, hey, it's the thought that counts init?
Meanwhile Dave is T-cutting the hull sections that are original gel coat and inspecting the lower parts of the hull which are due to be anti-fouled shortly. We have contacted John, who is on a short break in Gloucestershire reminding him a) that he hasn't yet set eyes on his third of the purchase and b) that we've drawn lots and he lost and has to T-cut the white bits and that he should get his arse up here and view the vessel. Like all of us John has other calls on his time and is feeling knackered after a glitch in his daily grind which has already delayed his departure but he promises to put in an appearance on Wednesday if only to see what his money's been spent on. Meanwhile Dave and I, having given a reasonable facsimile of two men hard at work finish our evening with a well-deserved Italian meal in the salubrious surrounds of Malvern. And so to bed.

Tuesday sees yet more scrubbing and scraping and general tidying up and at no point have we detected anything horrendous on this beautiful little boat. There are jobs to be done without a doubt but nothing insurmountable. Luckily Dave is a master at fabrication, mechanics and all that is practical so the reinforcement of the bow section which has had some struggles, presumably with a relentless tide or wave action, and is in need of attention before we moor in Swanage Bay, can be left in his expert hands. We end Tuesday with a barbecue and significant quantities of alcohol which ensures deep sleep.
Wednesday and the foul anti-fouling can be put off no longer. I don coveralls and not much else, latex gloves and attack the hull having masked down to the waterline. As always I initially load the brush with far too much liquid gold and splatter copious quantities over anything in close proximity but eventually get the hang of it and, surprisingly, the job progresses hitch free for the most part. There's a fresh breeze, no rain and intermittent cloud so perfect weather for the job. John & Penny arrive in the late morning and, after the guided tour, John gets stuck in to his white bit with determination and persistence.

Dave's Used Car Lot

There are now three motorhomes, a tiger-striped pick-up truck, a car and a boat on Dave's drive and it's looking more like a used car lot than a residential home. We had already been offered a price for a Land Rover that had been parked there temporarily on Tuesday so this opinion is not just fanciful. I finally finish the anti-fouling about mid-afternoon and Dave and I decide to try and figure the arcane business of rigging the junk rig but on the ground first before we attempt it on the water. Lucky we did because it proves more difficult than it looks which you'd hardly think possible but we're viewing the floating attempt with some trepidation. No doubt we'll survive! Having fiddled impressively with the rig, we roll it up again and somehow squeeze it into Ulrica, the green goddess, so I can transport it to Swanage in style and lighten Dave's not inconsiderable load when he tows the boat southwards. Everything is loaded up and all three of us are ready for an early start on Thursday morning - well as early a start as three sexagenarians are ever likely to make.

Titanic Impression - Dave As Kate Winslet

Thursday morning and all three of us head in our respective directions having gone about two thirds of the way towards the launch.
It's all looking frighteningly good. It can't last. Can it?

Pretty Tough, Ain't She

Progress Progresses Progressively

So the boat has been dragged kicking and screaming from it's nice warm haven in Lydney Harbour and towed to Dave's home near Malvern almost without incident. This is not to say that there was not a deal of gentle persuasion with judicious use of WD40 and some lump hammer semaphore which finally persuaded the brakes that there was, in fact, two states of being, on and off. Once this had been established, Dave being something of a machine whisperer, and the wheel bearings inspected for signs of impending disintegration, Missy Moto was hitched up to Pete's Land Rover Discovery and hauled reluctantly to the tidal streams of the Malvern Hills with two sets of ears akimbo for sounds of metal or worse grinding off tarmac. As it turned out boat and trailer behaved impeccably and our purchase is now Dave's latest in a long line of inappropriate garden decoration which his long-suffering wife, Pat, simply accepts with a resigned shrug. (No doubt she has some serious shopping penance in store for him when he least expects it).

Now it begins. The endless list making. The discovery of dire inadequacies of seaworthiness. The dreams of installing navigation equipment worth more than we paid for the boat. The cat's cradle of the rigging which seems to involve thousands of metres of rope of varying thicknesses, lengths and braids in fact the only uniform thing about all this string is the expense of it.

We need some antifouling. Our experienced sailing friend who is well-connected to scientific boffins who've done the research on this stuff advises us to use Compound A. Off I trot to a Poole based chandlers who, when I mention Compound A, gives vent to the longest, sharpest intake of breath I've heard since one of my uncle's farm tractor got a not-so-slow puncture in a tyre, you know, one of the big knobbly one on the back wheels. 'It's veeery expensive. How much do you need?' '2.5 - 3 litres,' says I all innocence and ignorance. 'That'll be £200,' he says. 'What! I only want to anitfoul it, not gild it. Isn't there anything cheaper.' 'Of course there is. This is £90 for 2.5l and this £70 for 3l but I wouldn't recommend it.'

So off I trudge, ninety quid lighter and beginning to realise that the old adage about a hole in the water surround by GRP into which you pour money is all too accurate except that the actual saying involves being surrounded by wood in which case you'll need all the resources of the Federal Reserve but they seem to be broke now too, so maybe George Bush owns a boat.

I have also acquired a tender, spotted for me by a neighbour whose hobby seems to be dumpster diving or whatever is the British equivalent. This he persuaded me was 'a good buy' and would probably be cheap which indeed it did turn out to be though not quite as cheap as I'd hoped. He's promised to repair the mild damage to the engine mount and so he joins the long line of people seemingly put on the planet to make me look inadequate and yes, it is all about me!

We now have a) a boat, b) a mooring and c) a tender plus engine(another of Stig's acquisitions from the aforementioned dump - it's astonishing what people throw away) It's all shaping up rather well.

Meanwhile John hasn't even seen what he's sinking his money into, I have had only the briefest of glances at the little beast and Dave is sitting on our investment wondering where and when to start the Augean stable thing. Ho hum and all's well with the world.
Watch this space, it's surrounded by water.