It’s been raining off and on for the last 7 days. Today was steady rain, heavy at times, till sundown. Ugh. I left the boat only once, to do to the restroom, and donned my foul weather gear to get there. Now, after 10pm it is quiet, with the tentative promise of better weather tomorrow. Nice to be inside in a dry boat when that heavy rain is coming down.

So today I spent the day measuring for new vinyl sheet to cover the floor of the main salon after clearing out the salon. I’m not sure whether I will use the craft paper to create a template or transfer my measurements, taken to the millimetre, directly to the final sheet for cutting. But now I am only a few minutes more work from being ready to go to the flooring store and start cutting if I do the latter.

And more good news. Today my new battery charging and management electronic came in, and the new batteries themselves have arrived in-country. So that should all go in by this weekend. I’m still waiting on word about the hydraulic steering.

In the last couple of days I have finished installing all the white panels to cover the wall fibreglassing reinforcements I had done. Next flooring, then wall carpet over the lower wall repairs, and done.

I also rigged an inner forestay for a smaller jib and its halyard partner (a jib sail is a triangular sail hoisted in front of the mast. Offshore boats usually carry several different size jibs). This will give me a way to rig a jib suitable for higher winds without having to fully unroll and extend a larger roller furling jib, slide it down out of its foil slot, manhandle it to the deck and secure it, and install a smaller jib in its place, all difficult in higher winds. With an inner forestay the smaller jib can be already hanked on and ready to go (hanks are strong brass clips on the leading edge of the sail that slide on the forestay, which is the wire going from the bow to a point high up on the mast). Furl (roll up) the larger jib by pulling on one line and hoist the smaller jib by pulling on another. Done.

Smaller jibs could include a “working jib”, a yet smaller jib for even higher winds, and a storm jib for even higher winds. There is also a very large one called a “Genoa”. As a practical matter one very seldom encounters actual storm conditions requiring a storm jib, years could go by without encountering one at sea. One likes to plan one’s trip to avoid them. But prudence requires paying attention to means to deal with higher winds, or for that matter other unexpected events and situations. All in hand.

In fact in three years passage-making and many more years cruising and crossings I have never had to deploy my storm jib, though I did deploy a storm anchor once.

Speaking of man overboard. Ships over 300 tonnes worldwide are now required to carry Automatic Identification System (AIS) transceivers, which automatically transmit position, course, speed, size, origin, destination, status, identity. Each vessel then shows up on every other vessel’s chart plotter with a label and if necessary a warning regarding any possible pending close approach. This arose out of the Safety Of Life At Sea (SOLAS) international convention. I have one of these tranceivers on this vessel. The neat thing is that you can now buy a little wearable one of these for each crew member, which if he goes overboard, will broadcast his exact position and place a special mark on everyone’s chart as a MOB at this spot. Good idea. You can also get similar personal devices that report an alarm and exact GPS position via satellite. But the newer AIS MOB beacon means all nearby vessels will see it rather than an emergency centre thousands of miles away, who in turn must find the nearest vessel to go rescue. These didn’t exist when I cruised earlier. Neat!

We use a lifeline on board to which we shackle ourselves so that we are tied on board if/when that is necessary.

In a related matter, redundancy and backup systems and methods are the name of the game in passage-making. I’ll talk about that in another installment.

The picture is of the cleared out main salon floor of the boat so I can take flooring measurements.