STEP OR UNSTEP? TRAVEL PLANS
Bahia de Caraquez, Ecuador, Thursday, 26 October 2006

Step or unstep?

I am not really a very decisive person. Presented with a complex problem, I tend to poke at it with a stick and turn it over with the point of my shoe for a while. A long while even. Especially if my “knowledge base”, as one says in the business corporations is insufficient and even more especially if the consequences of one’s decisions, the potential for an unhappy ending, are large.

I hate indecision! Caught on the horns of a dilemma, one says so appropriately. Even in restaurants, I don’t spend a lot of time perusing the menu. I pick something out fairly rapidly and move on to the conversation. Back in my banking days, the colleagues who suffered the most were the ones trapped in some situation, private of professional, that they felt to be bad but were unable to change. Maybe it was a boss who was grinding them down. Perhaps there was constant stress at home that they were unable to alleviate. They suffered, in any case. (One colleague at the German bank I worked for once told me that he hated his job and wanted to quit. But his wife would never accept that. He was trapped. “Sometimes,” he told me over lunch in the cafeteria, “I wish I would have a heart attack and die or at least be an invalid just so I wouldn’t have to come into the bank.” Here was a man who really needed to make some decisions, to cut the Gordian knot!)

On the boat, due to my inexperience especially in matters technical, I have often been stymied by some technical question and fret that I may be doing something that will actually cause more damage than it fixes. I would worry the problem for days, poking it with a mental stick or turning it over carefully with the toe of my cerebral shoe. Asking other cruisers for advice or going on the web can be useful in times like this. But, I have noticed that, if I ask five people for advice I wind up with six solutions and I am left alone with my problem. If you are short of cash you had better be doing most of the boat work yourself.

After over five years aboard Vilisar, of course, I have built up a little experience, and I notice now that certain problems tend to reappear. Or at least whatever the new situation, it may require materials, tools, procedures or processes similar to what I have already encountered. Acquiring skills is therefore one way to reduce Indecision Factor with its attendant depressing tension.


Of course, sometimes the whole ‘problem’ turns out to be a complete let-down. I think back to the trepidation we felt as we crossed the Straits of Juan de Fuca from Port Townsend, Washington, to Watmuugh Bay, at the bottom of Lopez Island in the San Juan Islands, on 09 September 2001 on our very first “cruise” aboard Vilisar. Quite aside from the historical significance of the date (we had learned of the attack on the World Trade Centre form TV early that morning in Port Hadlock Marina), after reading the cruising guide about the strait, we were psyched about passing Point Wilson and crossing this famously threatening body of water. Aboard were also Kathleen’s parents – also their first yacht voyage -, which increased my sense of anxiety and the awareness of increased responsibility. I was nervous and irritable for days beforehand. We buddy-boated with our new friends, Bob and Rita Valine, who had returned several months earlier from a dozen or so years in Central America, had just completed the refit of their beautiful custom-built steel gaff-rigged ketch, “Ritana”, and were heading back up to British Columbia and home. In the end the crossing was totally uneventful: dead calm and we motored the whole way. One friend has a T-shirt that says, “Worry works! 99% of the things I worry about never happen!”

Knowing in advance how to deal with something certainly reduces the tension. Crossing Juan de Fuca that day was an event because it was our first crossing of anything except Port Townsend Bay. Now we have somewhere between 10,000 and 15,000 Nm and five years of living aboard Vilisar behind us. We have confronted a lot of “issues” both of a sailing nature and of a repair and maintenance nature; now, if a problem comes up again, we likely have the skills and even the materials and tools necessary to deal with them relatively efficiently. But, if our ditty-bag of tricks contains something for a serious problem, a problem with far-reaching consequences, the tension goes up again. Captain Ronnie starts fussing and worrying at the problem again.

My worry this time is the spot of rot at the masthead. The first time I encountered a small piece of wood rot on Vilisar I nearly died of apoplexy. But rot no longer worries me over-much now. It’s kind of a fact of life on a wooden boat; you keep inspecting for it, and you fix it as soon as you can. As one shipwright told me, “It’s a wood boat. Expect to replace the whole thing in stages over the next one hundred years.”

But I am under tension in this case. Just how serious is it, and what can I do in the time available? My worries are certainly not decreased by the fact that we are running out of time here: Our Ecuadorian visas expire soon, and we are actually leaving this weekend for Venezuela. My inspection up the mast a few days ago indicates that the starboard side of the mast is rotten down for a distance of about 12-15 inches, i.e., to well below the throughbolt that holds the masthead corona (helmet) in place. That bolt is also the axis around which the mainsail-halyard sheave turns so I cannot pull it out without first setting a padeye and moving the tackle to that. I certainly don’t at the moment trust the strength of the wood up there enough to hang my life on it! I think that the mast could well be rotten right up under the steel corona at the top of the wooden mast. The port side is probably still sound, I hope. I suppose that rainwater or condensation has worked its way either down through a leak in the corona; maybe it has gained entry around the throughbolt or even around the little screws holding the VHF antenna to the outside of the mast.

But what to do? For a couple of days I seriously consider trying to effect the repairs in situ. I discuss a number of alternatives with some knowledgeable cruisers and research things on the worldwide web. Maybe I can clean out the rotten wood, soak the remaining timbers in something and then fill the hole with something else. The more I think about it though, the more I realize that to have piece of mind when we cross the Pacific in the future, the mast needs first to be unstepped, laid out on sawhorses on shore (or even, I suppose, laid lengthwise on deck) and worked upon properly.

That said, quite apart from the fact that we have no time left, Bahia de Caraquez does not have any real facilities for yachts. There is no boatyard, few skilled workers. I ask Mr. Chavez over at the auto-parts store if there is perhaps a truck with a crane on it in Bahia. “No, I don’t know of one. It would have to come from Puerto Viejo. That’s going to be pretty expensive!” I had thought that, if they could back the crane into the yacht club driveway, and I anchored Vilisar down just off their launching ramp, the crane could pick the stick out of the boat with a sling around the spreader plates and lay it out on the ground for me. Alternatively, the big wooden fishing boat anchored off Puerto Amistad has some promising looking heavy lifting gear on it. But it has also upped anchor and left for sea. But, there’s no time for any of this now.

So after days of postponing a decision (and rising tension) while I work on alternatives and discuss what to do, I finally come to a decision. Yesterday, Bill of S/V Que Onde comes over once again to give me a hand. At the masthead again in the bosuns chair (I have been up so often now that it is beginning to seem easy!), I sound out everything by tapping with small ball-peen hammer. It all seems to be on the starboard side. I start digging out all the rot I can get at with wood chisels, scattering a cloud of powdery red-brown dust into the wind and down to the decks. The broken chunks of wood are feather-light and have absolutely no strength to them. You can snap them off easily between your fingers. After 45 minutes, I am down to the hard/healthy wood, the chisel is knocking emptily upwards on the bare metal of the corona and horizontally through to the metal sheave. The throughbolt is laid bare and the cavity is about the size of two fists.

Because it is a little oily, I might not ordinarily use wood preservative if I am going to follow up with epoxy (my long-term plan). But I reckon I shall give the gaping hole a good soaking of something toxic for fungus and leave it exposed until we get back in May next year. I try applying the preservative with a turkey-baster but wind up getting more on me than on the wood. Too much, too fast! So I pour out some liquid into the plastic bucket that is holding the tools and start applying preservative with a small paint brush. That works. After finishing I go over the rest of the masthead, tapping with the little hammer but find no other obvious rotten spots. As Bill lets me down slowly, I inspect everything again, paying especially close attention around the new spreader plates. But everything else looks and sounds healthy.

By the time I reach the deck I know pretty much what I shall be doing to repair the mast. That metal corona has to come off and I shall take the opportunity to have a new one fabricated out of galvanised steel. Of what I can see up there (I cannot really view the top of the mast itself) the welded attachments at the masthead look pretty good. But it’s the same waterpipe metal that failed us in the spreader plates and, once removed and available as a model, it should be no big deal to make a new one. I will sleep better at night when I have more confidence in the rig. With the helmet off, I can also more easily rebuild the masthead by scarfing in hardwood pieces and gluing them with epoxy. The mast should then be as strong as new. The repairs completed, the mast r-stepped and supported by our rejuvenated shrouds and stays, we should have a really strong rig again, one that will carry us across to the Seven Seas and beyond.

I am satisfied that I have done what I can for the moment. With a further six months visa-time after arriving back next summer, I can either find a way to unstep the mast locally and do the work here, or spend the time and money and sail down to Salinas to the marina/boatyard. The first alternative is my ideal if I can do it: it seems more “self-sufficient” and will give me a bigger sense of achievement. And, of course, we shall save nearly a thousand bucks too by doing it here! And, after all, that’s half the price of a new cruising mainsail! At the Club de Yate I shall have also have Victor, the bosun, to help me at a reasonable price and will be situated right in town to get supplies.

In the afternoon, I start cleaning up the mess from several weeks of boat work. I also get in the dinghy at slack tide and spend a dirty hour or so getting the completely corroded chain shrouds off the boomkin astern. Sure is time to get them replaced! I have the chains already cut and ready but Dennis Trudeau (S/V Dream Maker) comes along in his inflatable dinghy after walking the dog ashore. He recommends washing the galvanized chain in vinegar and painting it. So I take his advice. He thinks even just porch paint will work but I decide to use metal primer and the black car-paint we have used for the galvanized metal shrouds. Although it’s actually a perfect day for painting, sunny and breezy, the painting is making a mess of the deck and I lose patience. I resolve to take them down to Victor. He’ll be glad to have the work and he’s not expensive. At the cost of help around here you can afford to hire out some routine work. What that would cost in Long Beach or even San Carlos doesn’t bear thinking about. $60 and hours?

I also try out the “oxidante”, the rust converter spray on the forestay. It’s German stuff by a company called “Würth”. Once it’s dry, I try painting the galvanised wire with the black paint. Looks pretty good. The forestay is spliced around the mast at spreader height. Too bad I have already put the bosuns-chair tackle away or I could bring the stay in to the mast and ride up and down in the chair to paint. Oh well, I’ll just paint the 12 inches of galvanized chain at the bottom of the stay and as far up the wire as I can reach by way of experiment and let everything else go until we have the mast on the ground next spring. I’m actually looking forward to that now.

Travel plans

We leave here by bus on Sunday morning (on Saturday night we shall be celebrating Pierre’s birthday. Pierre and Heléne are a young couple aboard the little yellow plywood boat out of Toulouse called “Caracolita”. They are leaving soon to fly back home to have their baby girl in February.) The first stage of our trip is to Riobamba and the high sierras for two days with Gerardo Chacon. Then, on 02 November 2006 we fly to Caracas, Venezuela, for our next little adventure. When we get to Caracas we shall likely be taking the bus to the ferry for Isla Margarita. If you are interested in information on the island, visit www.casatrudel.com.

We still have to finish stowing everything. Greg, an American chap working for Puerto Amistad, will be checking the boat weekly, starting the engines, etc., and I have asked Carlos and Raimondo to check on things especially when the river is running full during the rainy season and sending logs and mangrove islands to the sea. This stuff can foul your anchor chain. Our anchor is set extremely well here after five months here. The holding is very good. But I shall be glad that somebody will be keeping an eye the things.