Kaimusailing

John the dockworker was down on the docks complaining about his back. He had lifted something heavy over his head and now couldn't stand straight. He had a lot of advice for me about how to install the mast.
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I had no plan yet, no schedule of work. I began by pulling old wire out of the mast. After finding that maybe there was some conduit that would be difficult to come out, I quit for the day. The next day I came down with a cold and was too sick to work for a few days. While recuperating I searched for a picture of the old mast and the forward stays. It had to be a shot from the side. I wanted to measure the angles of the stays to the mast so that I could ensure that the stay attachments would fit. One end of the stay attachment is bolted through the mast, the other end is bolted through the eye in the stay. The attachment is a strap of heavy stainless steel. The forestays on the original mast were terminated in special custom fittings to the wood mast.
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I found the photo, printed it, and used a protractor to find the angles of the stays. I marked them on the photo. The next day I was feeling better and brought the photo down to the docks and determined the stainless straps were long enough.
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The broken solar panel was removed from over the galley hatch and sent to recycling. There is a small patch of the cabin top that is delaminated that will have to be repaired. The portable solar panels will be cannibalized to rebuild the galley hatch panel.
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My plan to replace the Aqua Signal series 40 anchor lamp with a series 25 lens, although saving an expensive LED lamp, looked like too much bother when an LED lamp for series 25 costs only $10.85 on eBay. The original incandescent bulb is rated at 8 candlepower. The LED lamp will put out over 20 at only about 2.4 watts power draw. I can give away or sell the series 40 lamp, it still works and is certainly bright enough.
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I promised my daughter I would pay a visit upstate New York when the weather improved, so that's what I did. Of course the weather up there isn't quite the same. Snow is mostly gone on the South side of hills, but things are frozen solid in the morning.
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We paid a visit to Peebles Island located where the Mohawk River flows into the Hudson. There is a former textile factory there that has been converted into a restoration workshop for the state park system. A path circles the old factory counterclockwise and leads onto the island. It isn't a long hike to go all the way around the island and the views are of cliffs, a large whirlpool, rapids, and natural habitat for deer and waterfowl. Of course we were there when it was pretty much still looking like part of the last Ice Age, but here is a shot of the path.