Escape to Abersoch 1

It’s alright going away for 4 months and having a fantastic adventure but coming home you find there are lots and lots of things to do. One of these ‘things’ is our old fishing boat Modoc which we have had for 8 years and which takes a lot of maintaining. This is the boat when we bought her.

The owner had changed the name to Nautical Lady (this is considered bad luck) so we changed her back to her original name of Modoc which is the name of an American Indian Tribe from Oklahoma!! Perfect for a pair of cowboys like us…..

We normally have the boat in the water by the beginning of May but this year she is looking very tatty and needs attention. Chris does all the maintenance of the engine which has been in and out a couple of times and most other boaty things and I am just labour and general dogsbody. I know my place.

As we plan to spend winters away from December to Easter this is going to be an ongoing problem so we have decided to spruce her up and repaint with a view to selling the boat. The engine is in good nick and working well but the woodwork and hull needs sorting and generally just making pretty.

We have had a great deal of fun and friends aboard the boat, lots of beers and skittles!!! Lots of good memories and fish caught.

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Now we need something that doesn’t need craning in and out of the water, winter storage and a lot of time and effort throwing at it. We want something that will move on a trailer and live in the garden, easy peasy. We can launch something smaller ourselves with the trusty quad bike.

We started by sanding off all the paint above the waterline, 2 coats and this took us 3 weekends. We both looked like Smurf’s at the end of the day much to the amusement of the guys who work in the boatyard.

Lots of aching arms, swearing and used sanding pads later we had removed the paint. Then it had an intense jet washing moment before we set to on the woodwork which we sanded and oiled. Now it’s beginning to look better.

We have now given the boat a coat of undercoat, looking better all the time. Another weekend of filling and its second coat of undercoat and looking forward to putting the top coat on. Woo hoo.

Before that we have to paint another waterline, this time in white rather than red along with painting the cabin roof. The final coat will be anti foul paint on the bottom and then she will be ship shape and ready to go. We will then photograph her and get the advert out and maybe have a few days out on her before she hopefully goes to her new owner.

The story continues……..