New Site.... New Boat

Since there is a new boat there is a new site for the Hans Christian for those wanting to follow-on.  The new blog-spot is svcarolmarie.blogspot.com.

see you there.... Sla'n

Terry

NISE is up for sale....

I am excited and nervous because we just bought a Hans Christian 38 MKII, and we are selling the NiSe

http://www.yachtworld.com/boats/1985/Catalina-30-2503371/Portland/OR/United-States

We will be sad to see her go.  Her new rudder gives over 0.5 knots of extra speed.

Back in the water!!!

On last Thursday I received a call from Schooner Creek Boatworks, "Terry, your new rudder just walked in."  

I immediately replied, "Wow you guys are good, you can put legs on a rudder and have it walk around."

"No," they replied, "a guy in a brown suit was carrying it."

Eric over at Schooner creek assured me that I would be in the water by Friday afternoon.   He kept his promise, and the whole thing was under budget too.

I managed to get there in time to see her being test fitted and splashing into the water.

Here's the rudder being test fitted

Once the test fitting was done the rudder was hung and bolted on.  Here's a side and rear view of the rudder while still on the jacks.

Rear view of the rudder

Side view of the rudder

With the rudder hung, the tractor lift moved in and dropped her back into the river.

S/V NiSe making her splash back into the river

Hanging on with the new rudder

One last step was to mount the new flag halyard, which was done by a fellow Irish American....

New flag halyard installation

On Saturday we took her out under spinnaker, with about 6 knots of wind. The winds were out of the northwest, with a westerly current of 1.5 knots.  After the spinnaker when up my wife when down to take a nap in the cabin.  The new rudder was perfectly balanced.  Running against the current with a wind 15 degrees off to the starboard side of the transom, I lifted my hands off the wheel, and she sailed perfectly straight for 35 minutes before I had to jibe, running out of river on the Washington side of the Columbia.  No weather helm whatsoever.  

I noticed too the boat turned much easier than before so coming into the slip was so much easier.   Of all the things I have replaced on the boat, the new rudder by Rudder Craft certainly made the biggest performance improvement.

While waiting for the rudder....

It seems like the boat has been in the yard forever.  The skeg has now been repaired, see the photos below.

And of course the new rub rail installed......

The grey looks nice with the black color scheme and the red trim lines.  But we've gotten bored so we decided to take to the water in smaller craft.  We loaded our paddle boards on the roof and went out last night going about 1/2 a mile around the marina.

 Charing took off, standing and moving fast.  I was too scared of falling off into the Columbia's murky water so stayed on my knees the entire time.

Here she is standing running around the marina.

But her smile is what gets me every time....

So while we wait, we've been paddling around leaving behind nothing but wake (albeit really small).

Showing off the updates over the last year...

Over the last year I have made a lot of updates to the boat.   We purchased her a year ago this week, and I wanted to show off the progress over the year.

Here's the picture of her on the first day we got her.

One of the first things we did was clean out the hull, and all the garbage. We pulled two large garbage bags of trash from the port-side lazerette and another three from the cabin.  Beer cans, old rope, old canvas, molded life jackets, papers, and general trash were found all over. We cleaned the cushions and scrubbed the interior.

Hung a picture from Hawaii (my wife's homeland), and mounted the flat panel TV on a rotating arm.

Then we updated her interior lights. Every light inside the boat was replaced with the new teak rimmed interior lights.

Replaced the cubby rings in the cockpit....

Next we updated her speakers and stereo for tunes....

next we changed out all the running rigging (yes all of it), new dodger, cockpit cover, life-ring, docklines, fenders, cockpit table, boat pole with mount, flag pole, and did all the brightwork....

We added her name to the stern....

We also added a companion way cover...

In the same picture you can see the line holders that I made to replace to the older ones.

We fixed the Catalina smile this spring, putting in a new shaft, PSS, and self-feather prop.

we added the GPS and the navigation table light....

then we added bungees to the bookshelf to retain the books while heeling.

Of course the new mainsail and the new jib....

And finally the new life lines, hull waxed twice, and hatch cover.....

She looks completely different, faster, lively, and prettier....  That was a lot work in a year.  I didn't mention the new anchor bags, solar vents, and shore power chord.... but that's mostly all of it.  A least the boat is keeping me off the streets,

not part of NiSe but it gets me to her.... on sunny days anyway.  As the rudder is still missing, I am missing just being out there. 

Added the new rub rail....

With the boat up on jacks I am getting a few of the little things done that I have been putting off.  This week we put the new rub rail on.  The new vent covers I will tackle tonight.   Still waiting for the delivery date of the new rudder.

Meanwhile happy sailing.... at least in the day dreams....

Sometimes You Just Watch

Last weekend I took my grandson to the marina and taught him to kayak.  It was great to watch him explore the marina on his own, and it felt good to teach again.

We also took the dinghy for a ride around the marina.  He steered the craft all over the place, and we had a ball.


We are still waiting for the boat to be repaired.