Grace Notes

The only remaining task was to pack up our home by 5pm Thursday evening. It was a big job as we have accumulated a lot of stuff over the last 8 months. There are big items, like the spare sails, bikes, towels and bed linen to consider, as well as smaller but very important spares and tools. It was hard to throw things away as most items have some kind of memory attached to them. Phil was definitely in charge of organising the storage on the boat. He made everything fit and ensured that it all stays as dry as possible. Stef and Mark from Sail in Turkey were really helpful in finding solutions and sympathetic to our alternately quiet and then stressed moods. They have offered Phil's chilli plants a good home, where they can join a small family of other chillies and peppers. By Thursday lunchtime it was all done and so a final boozy meal helped to see us through to departure time.

The new alternator arrived on this morning's first ferry. Look at the shiny-shiny: I had to swap the pulley for one the right size, but otherwise its all fine. - Phil

Things I did today: Went running at crap o'clock, sun came over the hill as we climbed back on board. Re-installed the old alternator to double check it was kaput. Yup - no output. Re-re-installed the good alternator. Asked around in Paros, and discovered Νίκος Καστανιάς, an alternator doctor. Walked up the hill, talked to Nikos. He took the back off  the old one and placed his money on in needing re-winding. Unfortunately, that means shipping it back to Athens, and there's no guarantee fixing it would be cheaper than a new one. So I ordered a new one - and was promised it will come on a ferry tomorrow (will be stunned if it does). There's one a little cheaper on e-bay, but that would take a few weeks before we could get our hands on it. Wired up our smart charger properly.   The "smart" charger has been bugging me for months. Its a magic box that provides the appropriate charging regimes for the domestic and engine batteries. The charger is effective at ...

At the start of the week, we moored in the crater of an extinct volcano, wondering what to right about on the blog.... Setting off, Grace provided the material. Our alternator went phut (smelt a bit, and stopped producing the juice). Now I have it on good authority from Nigel Calder (who writes books on the subject) that "alternators are virtually maintenance and trouble free". Knowing this not to be true, since we've been up the creek without an alternator before, we paid out big bucks for a rebuilt spare before we left Nidri. Half an hour later, Team Grace had replaced the alternator and we were on our way again. Now we just have to find another spare.

After Greek logistics had stretched our patience to breaking point, the new vibration damper finally arrived. Miraculously, its the right one. Nugget and I spent a few sweaty hours in the aft cabins fitting it, and convincing the engine back together. The new damper has made things better, but there's still a noticeable vibration at cruising speed. Maybe the engine mountings are tired, maybe the prop is a little off, maybe it needs to bed in, maybe I need to stop worrying about it and sail more. Fortunately, the Meltemi is full on at the moment. Of course, the wind is from the wrong direction, but one can't have everything. Martin and Zoe have joined us for a week. We're on the hook off the bottom of Aigina tonight, and on our eastwards tomorrow.

So..... Clearly I couldn't ignore a wobbly engine, so we hot tailed it around Porto Khelli (our second home) to meet up with "Nugget", an engineer who works for Neilson and was recommended by Pedro with a view to replacing the propeller. On our way, we passed through Poros, where Vangellis at Vikos Marine amazingly managed to fish out a slightly encrusted but functional matching prop from the back of a cupboard. What's more, he lent it to us on a "sale or return" basis - amazing service. Today, Nugget swapped the propeller three times, duck diving under the boat. We tried the second hand one, a re-conned one out of his workshop, and both made the problem worse, so we put the original back. After consultation with the Nidri Engineering Underground, the conclusion was that it was likely the vibration damper. Worn out ones look a little like this (look at the little bits of rubber, poking out where they shouldn't). New ones from Volvo are ver...

I suffer terribly from engine paranoia. Over the years, we've had marine engines stop on us, overheat, fail to charge my batteries, or generally mess us about. There's always something to worry about. Good care and feeding helps, but won't prevent prop wraps and other bad luck. In the latest episode, we're experiencing some excessive vibration when cruising at 2000rpm. During yet another duck diving drip underneath, I found the rubber fairing around the saildrive leg had come loose. This is a common problem . The fairing smooths the water flow around the saildrive leg, but is mostly cosmetic. After a quick call to Mr Pedro, I cut it off. The vibration is still there. There's a chunk of paint missing off the propeller boss, but the shaft is clear and it all looks good. The engine runs sweetly out of gear. Gear box oil is clear. Conclusion: the prop is a little out of alignment. Its not serious enough to be worth the time, expense, and hassle of lifting th...

As the weather is warming up the insect life is also springing into action. One bite each was enough to motivate me into starting the mosquito nets. The design is essentially using the outside rim of the hatches to hook elastic all the way around. So a simple job of cutting to size, hemming all the edges and inserting elastic. The first one took 3 1/2 hours of hand stitching with the lowest quality, most tangle prone cotton in the world. Since then I have got quicker and the size of hatches have got smaller. I am trying to ensure that I complete one everyday. Currently I have the two hatches for the stern cabins yet to do. Then I need to decide on a design for the side hatches, which have no outer rim. I need to decide between the design I thought of and the idea Phil suggested. The jury is still out. I am particularly proud of the design for the companion way, which works as a curtain as well as a mosquito net. A triumph for GCSE textiles!

Grace is sitting pretty in Porto Kheli for a couple of days, enjoying sunshine (1.5-2A, measured by the solar panel), and restful nights thanks to the lack of swell. Finally, a real chandlers! We've upgraded our mooring warps, added re-enforced eye splices, and a couple of rubber surge protectors. (I'll not publish the colloquial name for the surge protector, you'll have to visit us if you want to know). We've also cured the "final" leaking hatch, fixed the seal around the galley sink, and Mrs Goo has been hard at work fixing our sugar scoop following the Ieraka misadventure.

While Sara did the washing, I produced eight splices: a new bridle for the tender, and a rope for the new fender.

They say that cruising is "fixing boats in beautiful places". I commemorated our visit to Kiparissa, our first new place of the trip, by deciding to fix the leaks in the heads fresh water. Last month I found that Rubberweld tape, no matter how many layers are applied, is useless for fixing leaks in a pressured water system. The same holds true this month. Having confirmed that, Sara and I set out at siesta time to find some rubber washers. We returned empty handed (well, we did buy some rubber gloves, just in case), but with a couple of ideas about fashioning our own from fuel pipe or the dinghy repair kit. Sara was enlisted as "Washer Woman", and found the dinghy kit to be a winner. The leaks are fixed. It really is beautiful here.

Time for a Picture Round:   Top tip for girls: if you can't find the varnish, pink nail polish works too. We're leaving Nidri quay tomorrow, but we'll be back.

"Stainless Phil" of Steel Marine has produced a work of art... Hmmm, I think a backing plate may be needed.

We are very nearly there. We have been ticking off the jobs on the job sheet and we are close to completing all the major ones. Phil has been hard at it all week fixing leaks and doing more wiring. The wiring never seems to end. We just have the passerelle to fit tomorrow so I am sending Phil up the mast today. I ran out of useful jobs that I could do on the boat, having finished the drainage in th e lower field. Please look at the pictures of this as I am rather proud of the results. So to keep myself busy I have been polishing boats down the boat yard. It is hard work and you do feel like the Karate Kid "Wax on! Wax off!" But it is good for the bat wings. We have been confirmed as average at the Vlicho Yacht Club quiz. For achieving the average score you win a bottle of wine. We were helped to this result by Simon & Maria, fellow Nisos owners and considering the amount of wine drunk I was rather pleased with the position. We have also been for a lovely l...

On Friday, Greece celebrated Independence Day and the Feast of the Assumption. We had great weather, and the Nidri quay front was the centre of the local action. Panos opened the Cafe Di Paris for the season. It looks smart in its new "ice cream" pink and green colours. Needless to say, we were working on Grace. Following experiments earlier in the week, Sara covered her fridge with polyester spot filler and gel coat filler around the edge. I was wiring - I'll be happy if I never see another cable tie or crimp another connector.

We have moved on to Grace.  It is lovely to be living aboard her, as we will for the next 7 months.  We have finally unpacked after 2 weeks living out of our bags.  It feels good to be able to settle in a bit.  We currently have shore power and so have heating and everything we need for the power tools.  Grace is our workshop in the day and home in the evening. So to the jobs:- we have mounted the smart charger, but this still needs wiring up, sorted out all the anchors and anchor chain, so we are now using our new chain and Rocna , put in our two new hatches and filled in our leaking hinge on the main hatch, making us water tight, sanded all the glue off the fridge and filled in the drill holes that we did not need, installed Phil's reading light and put up the coat hooks in the saloon, mended the bathroom cabinet switch, installed a new bathroom fluorescent, put the wiring in for the solar panel, put on a new gas regulator and probably much more.  We ha...

Yesterday Grace got wet. Four boats went in yesterday: Cloud 9, Iona, Gabriella, and Grace of Lefkas. All were launched using a traditional method involving smoking, hammers, occasional shouting, and impressive skill. Kyriakos, who runs the operation, knows the dimensions of all the boats in his yard and adjusts the launch sledge by eye. Launch Day! Considering the amount of standing around, it was an exciting and exhausting day.

What could you do with three cans of green gunk, a tub of Vaseline, gaffer tape, some cling film, bin bags, cardboard, and a power drill? We insulated our fridge. Right now, it looks like a Complete Bloody Mess. Today we learned that Bavaria insulate the sides and the bottoms of the fridge boxes with similar polyurethane gunk. Who'd have thought? Of course, we'd removed the compressor and drilled a couple of holes before we discovered this. Anyway, we're now convinced that the heat mostly was escaping through the wafer-thin top of the fridge, which makes sense as there's often sunlight directly onto the dark work surface. Tomorrow, Sara will attack the gunk with a bread knife and some sandpaper and it should come up nicely.

To give you an idea of what we're up to, this is what we've done since last Thursday: Check hull fittings and rigging. Mouse all shackles. Grease the Genoa reefer and replace furling line. Replace main outhaul. Remove the additional radio battery and supply splitter (a requirement for Greek charter boats we consider not to be anywhere near worth the space it takes). Fix the chart plotter cable and deck mount the GPS aerial (several hours of soldering coax connectors). Replace the cooker top with a less rusty spare and clean up. Swap outboard bracket to other side (so the tender doesn't fill with exhaust water when we are taking it off on on) Discover battery charger has died, and use it to salvage another "dead" spare (a piece of pure Pedro genius customised its surface mount blade fuse into a neat fuse holder, saving hours). Add a mirror in the forepeak (the bracket works nicely, thanks Dad). Meanwhile, our Nisos friends have anti-fouled the hull, and Sue has ...