Friday Funny 09/16 (Romance of bottom-job)

Time for the Anti-Foul paint job

For my "landlubber" friends and family a bit of an explanation. Boats that live their lives in sea water, (versus fresh water, lakes etc), need a bottom paint job, about every three years. A special paint, one that has some kind of biocide, is applied, and this helps keep growth off of the bottom, (that part that is underwater). Ocean environments are rich in all kinds of biological life, some you can see, and some you can't. Things like weeds, barnacles, and aquatic organisms like to attach themselves to the boat, and this can significantly affect your speed in the water, as well as in some cases degrade your hull.

This job is in our immediate future, which means that we must employ a boat lift, take Denali Rose out of the water, set her on the "hard", and work on the undersides. The cartoon above shows a rather small boat, here is a reminder of how large our underwater area is. These are photos prior to our ownership, as part of the purchasing process, we look at the undersides.

Denali Rose coming out of the water.

This is the gentleman who did our "survey" of the boat, much like an engineer's report when purchasing a house. He is tapping for soft spots, or for areas that water has made it's way into the hull. He didn't find any.

Notice the size of the man next to the rudder.

Some people, who have their boats in warm climes, just dive in the water and periodically scrape off the growth. They need to think about sharks.....  and they still need a periodic paint job. We had a diver the summer of 2015, dive on our boat in the Wrangell harbor, (he had a full wet suit, and air tank), he scraped our boat, and did some maintenance, but it's time for the full job.

Ah, the romance of wearing a protective suit, sanding, scraping, and then painting, while we are upside down underneath the hull. I can hardly wait.....