Irie getting hauled out of the water, a once a year event. This time, however, she needed to be transported onto and with this narrow - built for monohulls - device pulled by a fork lift. A bit scary and definitely not our most favorite part of the process...
Irie on her way to the "picturesque" work boat yard area, via the potholed "road". One time, we saw this trailer being stuck in a big hole, unable to get out by itself, and the day after, one of its wheels rolled off after getting stuck in the same hole. Both times, there was a sailboat on the trailer!
Step one (after the pressure wash): scraping all the white barnacle deposits (hundreds) off
Step two: scrubbing and cleaning the waterline and underside of the bridge deck with a very strong and unhealthy product
Step three: sanding the whole bottom; me by hand, and Mark the worst spots with a machine - with "home made" glue on sanding disks (unavailable in Panama)
Five minute break for me, under our home. We threw our boat yard chairs out after barely using them this time and wanting to create more space inside the boat.
Mark preparing to take the saildrive out of the boat, for the first of two times
Painting the props and cones - part of our saildrives
We removed the starboard saildrive out of the boat one to many times and created a rip in the boot. Mark is surgically stitching the rip up...
Stitched up saildrive boot! (Approved by our surgeon neighbor John)
Fixing a "cut" at the back of one of our hulls, and covering it up for the rain. This stand is un-strategically placed by the boat yard workers.
Big project number umpteen: removing all the anti-slip material of all six bottom steps, cleaning the surfaces, taping the surfaces - in the meantime doing some gelcoat repairs that need drying out - and ... waiting for the anti-slip paint to show up, while keeping the area dry!
Greg, the fridge and engine specialist - and rare expert at Shelter Bay - fixes our fridge problem in a timely and professional manner; he comes highly recommended!
The most fun part during a boat yard stay: removing the tape after the painting (2.5 coats) is done!
We bought our three gallons of paint from Arturo (Marine Warehouse) in Panama City. Two gallons were four (!) years old and the third one was a year old... The tint of blue has changed over the years, so Irie's bottom looks a bit funny... Nothing we could do about it; it was the only paint he had and it is extremely expensive.
Our surgeon (and helpful) neighbor John from "Sara Jane" after dry sanding his boat's bottom
With all our back steps slippery - and later covered in wet paint - we needed to get on board a different way, via a longer ladder... Careful, Mark!!!
Better safe than sorry and needed during all the rainstorms: tarps to cover the steps and to work underneath. When the Kiwi Grip paint - ordered through Marine Warehouse - finally arrived, the rain did as well.
Irie's back yard. We had a tough time with it. Luckily it was not windy at all (which of course also meant a hot boat and many bugs)
The "end of the world" party corresponded with our last night in the boat yard. We were splashing the next day, when the world would end - according to the Mayan calendar. Should we not have gone through all the trouble??
Having drinks with Red from "Shiver" and Sue and John from "Five Islands", our helpers and friends.
The first smiles since being in the boat yard - trying not to think about all the heavy rain seeping into possible tarp and bag holes that night... Everything stayed dry!
Irie on her way to get back in the water. The beautiful days in Panama are far and few in between.
This is where she belongs... in the water!
The new look of our back steps: anti-slip paint. We are still getting used to it.
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