Tying Up Loose Ends

Our family took this week off for some much needed rest. Of course, rest for me means being able to work on Shan Skailyn and playing with the kids and hanging with my woman. I actually didn't accomplish much work on the boat that is readily visible. I spent most of the time I had literally tying up loose ends. After working with the rigging over and over again to gain confidence in the different things I'd need to be able to do, I was able to better determine where to cut some of that all too precious rope with confidence that I wasn't making some stupid mistake that I'd regret. All ropes cut to length, whipped, ends fused, etc. Made up the proper lengths of braided inner tube lashings for the polas, and more of that kind of stuff.

I was sure to practice reefing and un-reefing the sail at least once each day. I'm really happy with how smooth the whole thing works. Now we'll have to see how it works out at sea, likely with at least some wind to fight against. One thing I realized is that it would be really easy to ignore the fact that the boom can give me a pounding not soon to be forgotten while reefing!

Finally I was able to rig up the harness by which the helicopter can safely sling Shan Skailyn down to the coast in not quite eight weeks time now. It's good to work out little details like that ahead of time. I'm regretting not having taken a picture of the thing all harnessed up. What was I thinking?

I've been working with Sesi too, teaching him some of the more important things about the boat and what he'd need to do in an emergency, like if Kyle and I both got knocked off the boat. For example, he needs to know how to depower the sail. Obviously there's so much more, but I don't want to bore you with too much detail, which I may have done already.

I've been very anxiously awaiting a package that I had mailed to me back in early October with all the last little tidbits that are needed to finish the boat as well as some essentials for the trip. This package has taken an unusually long time to arrive and my last chance to get it is coming up in just two days. I'll find out on Monday when the helicopter does our next supply run if the package is here. Gonna have to improvise on some things if it hasn't.

Shan Skailyn has been assembled in our yard all week and it's quite a hit for our friends passing by. During my week off it was fun to hang out around the boat and explain how it works. Most have never seen a sailboat before. "Where's the motor?" they keep asking. They can't believe that the wind alone is supposed to make Shan Skailyn move. It's a crazy thing this whiteskin is doing up here on the mountain!