We got the boat wet today...and none too soon, I say! Living in a boat yard is not as romantic as it sounds!! :-)

Yesterday I had to put on the 2nd coat of paint for the boot stripe. This is "high tech", marine, 1-part, ployurethane, high gloss paint. This isn't some latex piece of crap you can just lay on there.

So yesterday morning I check a couple/three weather forecasts and get a good forecast. It was just like what everyone was saying around the marina -- no wind. You don't want wind with this paint because it will start drying on you and make spreading it difficult.

So after checking the forecasts I trudged downstairs (our boat was 7' off the ground) and started prepping to paint. The wind was light and it was a beautiful day, so I got into it and started painting the boot stripe.

I had not gotten even half way up the first side when the wind start coming up...and coming up...and coming up. It just got stronger and stronger! I couldn't believe it! And it was coming right on our bow, so there wasn't a protected side.

At that point there wasn't much I could do, so I just started working as quickly as I could. The wind blew hard the whole day! It was unbelievable. Of course, one side of my paint job looks like crap. The port side looks good, and the starboard side aft (where I could use the boat as a windbreak) looks good. But the bow of the starboard side has runs in it. I could just die. But, that is what I was dealt with, and I will just have to live with it. The fact is that the stripe is near the water line and 99.9% of the people won't even see any difference. But I will...and it bugs the living daylights out of me!!!

So today dawned without a whisper of wind! A great day for painting...and launching a boat. The boat went in without too much fanfare. I checked all the through hulls and none of them leaked. Oh! There's a good one!

On Sat. Tony (who owns a sister ship) came by and mentioned he likes to work and oil the through hulls. I had time to kill on Sat. and I figured "What the heck." So I get out some grease and WD-40 and get Will to start working the handles to the ball valves from the inside while I am outside lubing the business end as best I can.

And then one of the through hulls freezes! I couldn't believe it! I ran to the plumbing store, got a new valve, and after a couple of hours of cussing and a ton of groaning (it was a really, really hard change out!!), I got the new valve in. I am sooooo glad I checked those valves one more time. Imagine if I had waited till we were in the water?!!

And then there is the MaxProp story. I wanted/needed to regrease the prop and I could either do it the easy way (with a grease nipple/zerk) or the hard way (tear it apart and grease it by hand). Graham and Rick had warned me about tearing it apart. (Thanks, guys, for the stern warning.) I remember trying to install one with Ron on the Beneteau and it took 8 hands between the two of us!!

Sat. morning I saw Jani. He is a really nice guy who speaks about 6 languages and owns a few Jeanneaus here he charters out. I asked Jani about the zerk. He comes over to the boat, inspects the boat and then brings the local outboard motor guy over to do the same. After some discussion in Greek, the outboard motor guy gets on the phone and locates a zerk.

Jani gets on his motorbike and takes off across town for the zerk. I get on my sandals and take off for a liquor store to get Jani a bottle of Ouzo! Jani comes back with the zerk, borrows a grease gun from the outboard motor guy, and regreases my prop while I stand and watch! Is that service or what! As it turns out, the prop took a lot more grease than I expected, so it was good I got it greased up. Thanks Jani and thanks outboard motor guy!!!

So now we are tied up at the marina. We are going to take a couple of days and rent a car and see the island. Then we have to wait for a weather window to cross over to mainland Greece. Friday looks like it might be the day. It will take us 4-5 days to get to the western tip of Crete. Then it is another 45 miles to a big island off the mainland. Hopefully we won't have to fight any northerlies or westerlies. We'll see.