Life On The Hard 2017 - Aches and Pains

Dec 2017

I have told you before about life on the hard…..that it is hard.  It is painful too. 

The ladder – The boat is out of the water on jackstands.  We have a steel ladder propped up against the stern and tied off so it won’t go anywhere.  The rungs are round steel, hot in the tropical sun and uncomfortable in shoes and barefeet.  We climb up and down it each time we want to get in and out of the boat – something like 10-20 times a day…up and down the ladder.  By the second day I am feeling my “ladder climbing muscles.”

There is also scraping, sanding, compounding, waxing muscles screaming hello.

There are other pains as well.  Each of us has smacked our head more than a couple of times under the boat as we work.  The other day I was purposely keep my head down so I wouldn’t smack it and ran head first and face first right into the scaffolding board.  Bam!  I now have a huge pop-knot on my forehead that hurts like a @#&$*!  It’s big too.  It could probably have its own zip code.  So much for not smacking my head!  Yes, grace in action....that is me!  

The workstations – Each boat sets up a ground workstation of some sort.  Usually it consists of table or workbench where working tools of the day are kept.  Ours was simple – two big wood blocks to hold up a wood plank.  We keep ours under the boat.  Our German friend Peter set up his workstation in front of his boat along the fence line.  He had a tarp for shade and a work cabinet.  He had two broken down chairs – one for him and another for visiting friends.  He even painted his boat name sv Tranquillo on his workstation in a fit of silliness.  

The filth - The yard is dirty, dusty and then muddy when it rains.  Our tasks are dirty jobs;  scraping and sanding the bottom, compounding, waxing, polishing, painting, etc….  Bottom paint is toxic and gets ….everywhere.  We wear protection but even still.  My nails are shredded.  Our hands are rough as the 60 grit sandpaper we are using.  Try as we might, all this gets drug up the ladder on our shoes and clothes and into the jumbled cockpit and even below. 

WARNING – Rant coming

To add injury to insult, Coral Cove has been having “water challenges” as in no water at times.  We knew this going in but decided to roll the dice.  We gambled wrong.  So wrong.  Silly us.  The water issues popped up again while we were on the hard.  We needed water to work – sanding, compounding, etc….plus to clean up.  Nothing worse than being covered in a mix of toxic dust and your own sweat and no water for the showers.  NONE!  To say I was pissed off would be the understatement of the year.  Even when we did have water, the pressure was mild to low.  Again, not good for working on your boat on the hard.  One evening after a tough day and little to no water, I was fuming and determined to storm the office in the morning to voice my displeasure.  Another cruising friend on FB talked me down.  “I thought you were keeping your cool in case something goes wrong and you need the yard to help you get an extension?”  See, our 90 days visas were coming up in a couple of weeks.  We plan to sail out before then but if we ran into an unexpected issue (what could go wrong on a boat – ha!) with the boat, we would need an extension and the yard/office would need to supply the necessary paperwork to get one.  Yes, I needed to chill.  I am SO glad my friend (Thank you Willie) talked me down.  Another cruiser didn’t have a friend to talk her down.  She let the cruising world in Chaguaramas know Coral Cove didn’t have water and how unhappy she was about it on the morning net.  She was promptly called into the office and told they were launching her boat immediately and she could go elsewhere!  Of course her boat was not ready for launch.  She ended up apologizing on the radio for her comments (even though they were 100% correct) so they wouldn’t kick her out.  That is some bad joo joo my friends.  So I kept my mouth shut and we struggled through the water issues. 

Each day we clicked off the TO DO WHILE IN THE YARD list.  One week later we splashed.  Free!  Whew!  No, I did not march up the office then either.  We still needed to get some items completed.  Instead, I kept my mouth shut and we focused on the last items so we could sail away.

I am pretty proud of our 7 day turn around.  A few have done it in less but most take longer in the yard.  Coming up next – Life on the Hard  - yard life.