Working, Working, Working

Alot has been going on aboard Island Queen. The bottom of the boat is nearly done. The rudder has been modified and will be back in tomorrow. We replaced the cutless bearings and started installing the drive shaft today. It should also be finished tomorrow. It seems that everything I do opens another can of worms, but hopefully we are just about out of new cans.My brother Scott and my friend John came down. They were supposed to stay a week. John had to go back to Indiana after three days for a family issue. Scott ended up staying two weeks and helped with alot of fiberglass work and painting. It was a big help. He glassed in the bow thruster tube and did alot of other needed repairs.

It will be three weeks tomorrow that we have been out of the water. We have gotten so much done, but there is still alot to do. I am not sure we will get it done in our 4 week time goal. We desperately want to get done and get out of here. A boatyard is not a fun place to be, but this one is really bad. They do not have pump out service here so we have to use the boatyard bathroom. It is about the worst I have ever seen and I once lived in a third world country and traveled to others. It is gross beyond description. The owners do not take care of it. Sharon and I spent about two hours cleaning it when we first got here. Other tenants help clean it as well. There is no hot water for the shower. I finally got our water heater hooked back up yesterday and had my first hot shower in nearly three weeks. Soon though we will be done and this will only be a bad memory.

Metal cut and ready to be welded to the rudder. 

Scott fiberglassing the tube.

Bow thruster tube from inside the boat.

Scott gettin ready to mis up some more epoxy.

Me grinding off 37 years of paint.

Progress Report

We have been working on the boat for three days now and are making real progress. I started sanding the hull. I want to take it all the way down to the Gelcoat. 37 years of paint is a lot of paint. I started at the bow so I would be ready to put the bow thruster in when my brother Scott got here. He arrives tomorrow along with my friend John. I will try to work them like dogs but don't know how much luck I will have with that. I talked to a welder yesterday about modifying the rudder. I made a temporary extension last year and put it on while the boat was in the water. Now that she is out of the water I removed the rudder and ordered the steel today.

Today I cut in the bow thruster tunnel and removed all the through hulls except one which is under the water heater. I will tackle that one tomorrow. Through hulls are openings with shut off valves below the waterline. They feed various things like the engine, generator, toilets and A/C units. We had seven. When I am finished we will only have one. It will feed the engine and A/C unit. I do not like having holes in the bottom of the boat.

The sanding begins.

Bow sanded to prepare for the bow thruster.

In the hold detaching the rudder.

Success, the rudder is off.

Prepping the inside for the bow thruster. It's going to be a tight working space.

I marked and drilled a pilot hole one each side of the bow and then ran a piece of allthread through.

I then bent the allthread and taped a pencil to it to mark my holes.

Port side cut out.

Cutouts complete and tube inserted to mark where it needs to be cut.

Inside the Vee berth.

Haulout Time

We had Island Queen hauled out of the water and set on stands so we could install a bow thruster and do some much needed hull maintenance. She has not been out of the water since 2004, so it was well past due. I will have lots of posts coming up on working on the boat so prepare yourself to be bored or tune out.

Sometimes when you live on a boat it starts to seem small. You forget just how big it is until you get her out of the water.

I think our boat is big enough for us.

Anchored at Boca Chica

We had a good trip from Boot Key Harbor to Boca Chica today. It was about 40 nautical miles. We left about 7 am and dropped the hook about 2:30 pm. We had nice seas and a slight breeze the whole way. We have an appointment at 11:00 am on Friday to have the boat pulled. We are only about an hour away from the haul out location. I think we will just chill here till it is time to go. The following is a video that I took underway today.   Also, we used the Spot for the first time in years!  Look at the link in the header that says "click here to see where we are" for our track today.