Don’t try this at home

Nice weather. No tides in the Baltic. Reasonable depth. And two anchors out.

Back

Just back from some weeks of summer sailing in Sweden and Åland. Lot’s of interesting experiences and even some images to be published.

New video: Sailing from the inside

It’s not that tidy. But here is a small video from the interior of Linnea. While sailing. As you can see, the final finish of the inside is not there yet. But it works fine for some weeks of summer sailing. The reefed sail is badly set. We will try to do something about it.

Now, we are here

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About.

Slow progress – dust and disorder collects quickly

Some days are slow, like today. Anyway, see our navigation table tell tale Lyth compass:

Lyth compass

As you also can see, dust and disorder collects quickly.

We also worked on the head tank.

I mounted the discharge pump upside down three times. Did I say today was slow?

Head tank in the aft cabin

Also mounted the VHF and the aft navigation light.

(I got the new video. I don’t know if I have the tiime to upload it before going to Skåne tomorrow…)

Lights, compass and scratches

We will use LED navigation lights from Lopolight. Expensive, but seems to be worth it. 2.1 W power consumption, waterproof, works for 50.000 hours, certified for ships up to 50 meters long.

This is what they look like:

Lopolight navigation lights

And this is how the sidelights will be mounted:

Lopolight mount.

Tomorrow we will connect the electrics to see if they work.

We also mounted the compass today:

Compass.

We mounted it on the port side, instead of the more comme il faut place at the starboard side. I suppose that you mount compasses on the starboard side because you sit on the starboard side while on a starboard tack. And that is, of cource, the right way to go. But on a chinese junk rig,  all the lines comes down on the starboard side as well, since it is comme il faut to let the sail fly the port side of the mast. And since the Chinese invented the compass, we let the Chinese decide thist time.

We made some ugly scratches in the polycarbonate windows today… Guess that happens quite easily. Is it possible to polish the windows? Ordinary boat polish?

Gone sailing

It was a bit nervous. The first sail of the year is bound to be bad. I remember one special year with an old boat of ours. Disaster. Rosehip soup all over the brand new main sheet. That stain does not go away! So the first sail, you want the wind to be perfect, everything double checked, some strong people on board. The kids stay on the jetty. Let’s just say we did the opposite this year. A bunch of relatives joined us, we were eleven people on board, some with quite dubious sailing experience.

So, what happened? Shipwreck? Disaster? Wounded limbs? No. The whole event was… uneventful in a good way. The only demanding maneuver was dropping two people off at the steam ship quay with a lot of swell involved.

So, here are the pictures:

Sailing

Ida in her berth. No mattress yet.

Interior, cleaned a bit.

Steering station from the inside. Impossible to get a good camera view.

Starboard view.

Navigation table.

Ida at the bow.

Idas new favorite spot.

(R. I have the goods.)

Is that a mast?

OK, just so you understand why people are intimidated when they ask if the bamboo is a mast and we answer that we use it for battens. Ida got this offcut for making mugs of. But it says something about the size.

Batten waste

Some picture progress

Today I snapped some pictures of the progress.

The Deck with sail and dinghy.

Steering station portlights

Bow roller and sail.

We haven’t adjusted the lazy jacks yet, so the yard and sail bundle has a little drooping angle. Notice the new thick bamboo. We put it only on one side of the sail, used no keep battens. Let’s see how that works out.

Tomorrow we are aiming for a trial sail. A bit nervous about that.

Fun with the new battens

My hands are oh so sore. Tying battens to a junksail (actually with these battens it’s the other way around, you tie the sail to the battens) is bloody business. If you can stand the swollen fingers it is great fun to walk around with the bamboo, thicker than my over arm, until someone asks “what is that? a mast?” Then you say, “no, it’s a batten”, and they think you are making fun of them and walk away quietly.

Hoisting the red sail is a lot better.  People were actually shouting over the bay how beutiful she was.

I took the camera, but had no time to take pictures.

Tomorrow we will rig the lazy jacks, sheet, etc. Will we sail on friday? It would be fun.