The art of waiting

Boat ownership has, so far, been an exercise in patience. Actually from what ‘little’ I know of it, boating should always be such an exercise. There is apparently a cruiser’s saying that goes “The most dangerous thing in cruising is a schedule.” This refers to the fact that heading out on a day with iffy conditions or leaving dock with a boat that is ill-prepared just because you have to “be somewhere” is likely the worst decision you will ever make on a boat.  So I guess the last couple of weeks have been good practice.

The issue is basically the time of year. I have a fairly hefty bit of work to do on the boat—most of it to be paid for by the PO (previous owner) and a bunch of it necessitating hauling the boat. Now since the PO is paying for the lift and storage (upwards of $700) it makes sense to schedule the work I am paying for at the same time in order to save a few  dollars. And therein lies the rub. It’s springtime on the west coast and every dog and his brother wants his work done and his boat in the water.  Now, if not sooner.

And since we have our Vancouver Island circumnavigation booked for mid-May, it makes sense to wait to have the work done since we can’t use the boat anyway. It all makes sense. The only downside is we might be paying two moorage fees since moving the boat away from Granville not only costs money, but may delay the work if they have to move it back, and we have already reserved a spot in Mosquito Creek to keep the boat until we are ready to go.

But all that means I have to wait.

In case you are wondering what kind of things need to be done to boat that I just bought, here is a list of what was decided should be done and approximate costs. As far as I can tell they are in no way unusual or extraordinary:

• lift & store 5 days—$700
• repitch prop—$450
• rebed (replace) strut bolts—$200
• repair chainplate crack—$475
• keel hull joint crack—$475
• hull damage—$1300 (up to $9000 if there is core damage)
• replace/repair galvanic isolator—$650
• Webasto heater repair—$1100
• rigging repair (misc)—$1500
• engine repairs (misc)—$2000
• *engine service & upgrades (misc)—$2000
• winch service—$500
• hot water tank repair/replace—$1300
• *repaint hull—$700
• *polish hull—$800

• items marked with an asterisk are not paid for by the PO

The galvanic isolator is the panel on the bottom. Actually that’s just its (non-functioning) panel but I have no idea what the isolator itself looks like.

The hull damage on the port side that needs to be repaired (hopefully not to the tune of $9000)

I also want to investigate the cost of tying in the water heater to the Webasto and upgrading the alternator to 100 amps. The first will give us hot water without having to fire up the main engine while away from dock since the Webasto hydronic heating system is basically a mini boiler. The second just reduces the amount of time it will take to recharge the batteries using the engine; important if we intend to stay in one place for more than a day and cheaper than installing solar panels or buying a generator.

Hopefully I will have a schedule in the next day or two for all this work. Right about now, all I really know is Lawrence wants us to go to Specialty Yacht’s Hunter Rendezvous on Thetis Island in late June so the boat has to be ready for then. We aren’t scheduled to take off on our grand adventure until July so I guess that’s ok. Even if it means waiting…