The Toll, The Droll, The Wallet Hole.

 So, you started out by saying "Gee whillikers, I think I should go sailing" Then you say "I cannot do this without the perfect boat". Then you say "I'll build it myself and save money" and you step off the legendary slippery slope and away you go. The only bottom you hit is the bottom of your wallet. The perfect boat concept disappeared a few years back, replaced by the pretty nice boat, replaced by the good enough boat, replaced by the aw, hell, finish it boat. The only water you see is the 17 glasses full you drink each day in the gawdawful Tejas sun. Hopefully that slippery slope terminates at some body of water.

For, you see, the perfect boat would take another ten years, The pretty nice boat would take another five years. The good enough boat would take another 3½ years. We can get the aw hell boat in the water in a couple months. Time is the toll you pay for this endeavor. How much can you spend of the latter half of your life? And.............. you could have purchased the aw hell boat in the first place years ago. I guess you must go through the process. Awwwww, hell!

With the boat yard goal set, the only problem is the dead of summer heat. Ya can't work in the sun. Ya can't work long in the hulls that are baked by the sun. Ya feel guilty for squandering the spring, but I think we did something back then. but my memory fogs, baked by the 103° heat. The only consolation I have is that I started out half baked with this project ...................who says "whillikers"????

First, the important: bird update. This is the adventurous one, the Vasco Da Gama of the group. Are those burgeoning flight feathers?

I lashed (laced?) the swim ladder, whut gets attached to the aft beam and provides access to the boat when in the water. which we cannot install right now because the steps are the way.

So here's the lashing process. It's more weaving than lashing. I fed rope through to provide the parallel lines of rope. we fed the rope through all the holes, then tied a knot at the end. Then we pulled the rope back through to pull the rope taught. At the end, which was really the beginning, we cut the rope and tied a tight stopper  knot.

Now the weaving part. I started feeding the line. I know that I will need a lot, so 40' away, I'm pulling the loop- that's 40' out and 40' back. I start weaving using the shuttle I made. It proved unwieldy so I switched to weaving it by hand: over, under, over, under,over, under, over, over, under, over, under, over, dammit, back up, back up, back up, back up, back up. under, over, under, over,,,,,,, until you reach the hole, then thread through the hole, move over, thread through the hole then over, under, over..............  Halfway through, I run out of line, so I have to feed more line through the same route I fed the original weave, again pulling it 40' away. Hopefully it's enough,

Finally I reach the last hole and tie a stopper knot, done,,,,,,,,,nope! Now I have to tighten it Using the rope key I cobbled together, stolen from a video on tightening rope beds from traditional historical craftsmen. So, I work backwards twisting each weft tight with the rope key and holding it with the clamp. I do not know how long it took to do this, because I worked this off and on in short periods until I overheated or went bonkers, or both. I can say that it is tight, like me after three beers!

There's nothing but side projects. The deadline is still in the hot season, and bruddah, it's hot.

The motors. First, they are heavy, very heavy. Each motor weighs 220 lbs. We are extremely careful handling these motors. This was another dreaded project. We were not sure they would fit. They barely fit. I had put in extra cross bracing to handle the torque. We had to cut them out. We discussed everything and finally decided that we would fix the motor boxes in place and only tilt the motors. They would clear the water while sailing. We will rig a tilt rope  to the lower part of the motor. Don't ask, it's complex. I barely have the concept.

Budge worked on the steering.

We did a dry run (wet run????) on the water tanks to make sure they won't leak. We had to tighten the plumbing a bit. 

So you work hard to make the hulls watertight. Then you drill a hole in it. Two holes, to be more accurate. The second hole aligned perfectly with the support cradle. The position of the cradle is important, especially later when we reassemble the hulls in the boat yard. Budge had to cut out a portion of the cradle to insert the through-hull. Another simple task made complex!

Budge commenced on the plumbing. We will use pex and push fittings. It involves the saltwater system and the freshwater system, four pumps, the water bladder, and those water tanks, all to be tucked away in the nooks and crannies. I was tasked with the purchase of supplies. Holey Wallet! A couple hundred here, a couple hundred there and................ I'm poor!

Three old beat up plastic milk crates, three cans of spray paint and the custom propane tank holders are done. 

All this done in the heat of Texas!

The Music♪: Little Richard "Slippin And Slidin"

Slope.