We have been working day and night to get these projects done and make it so PRISM can go sailing again. WE ARE GOING NUTS WITH A WANT-TO-BE power boat, there is nothing we want more right now than to have a mast and bowsprit again.

Friends of our came by the boat and made a cute improvement to our bow. It cheered us right up.

Friends of ours made a slight addition to Prism. She is missing her bow sprit.. but she now has a red nose.

I spend my days working at the yard, while Jon is doing his best to single hand most of these projects. The mast is almost done! It has only been 2 months of no mast and sprit but it feels much longer. Our bowsprit came back from Casey and we talked another friend in the yard to help us finish shaping  the tip to fit the new Kranze iron.

We have finished painting our mast with 3 coats, we riveted the folding mast steps on one side and have the other to go still. Started to run the new wire, installed the new mast tri color and VHF antenna mount. I help as much as I can when I get off from work. But it is truly looking so good!

 

Shaping the bow sprit to make the new Kranze iron fit

Using the rivet gun to get the new steps on the mast

Making the mast head all pretty and organized.

The MAST! looks so good

Jon has completely taken apart our engine. We were thinking about buying a new Beta to re-power because we were having a hard time locating parts for our very old and discontinued Yanmar 3QM30F. But with some serious internet searches and long talks with people at the boat yard we have found what we need to make the engine purr again. We have bought a new starter (rebuilding the old one as well), new raw water pump (Rebuilding the old), rebuilding the fresh water pump and a whole new balmar alternator.  Jon has designed a whole new fuel pump/ polish/ priming system. The racor 500 fuel filter was located at the back of the engine room and was very hard to get to, plus it made you work over a hot engine ( no one likes that). So now that the engine is all pulled apart Jon painted the engine to make it look at purdy again. We were also lucky enough to find some old but still in ok shape 3 yanmar engine mounts! SCORE!!!! Jon got all the rust and dirt off of them and painted them. They are perfect for spares!

All the pumps off

Wire Brushed off rust and taped off for paint

 

Painted with and looking like new

We did however complete a HUGE NASTY project: we took off the diesel lid, emptied the tank, cleaned the tank,  resealed the lip, made a gasket and re-bolted the lid back in place. NO MORE LEAKING DIESEL! or so we hope.

 

The inside of the Diesel Tank

We found this broken off jerry can nozzle in the bottom of the tank

Not happy about the position we have to be in to work on the tank.

Boat Yoga

under the galley sink and into the abyss.

the new fuel fill line making its way to the tank

We had to empty the pantry to get the new Fuel fill line in

This is where the fill line comes into the boat.

Last night we refilled our tank using the BAJA filter and a large funnel. It took over 2 hours to filter the diesel and pour into our newly resealed deck fill cap, new fuel fill hose and clean/ polished tank. What a task that was! wow! Jon has a very sore arm this morning.

 

1st can out of 11

we had to find a good lid that DIDN’T leak, out of the 11 we had 1

Jon with jerry can and Baja filter

We are leaving for the BVI tomorrow night and will be gone for 18 days! We are so excited! However we still have so much to do in the next 24 hours. We are going to finish the mast tonight. Jon is finishing up what he can on the engine with out all the parts that we are having rebuilt.

We have been having some fun too:

on our way to Friday Night Jazz

 

Bike riding with the family in Berkeley

 

Family Biking- Chris, myself and Momma Neely

 

WILD TURKEY IN THE MARINA

 

Jon and Chris finished installing the new water heater on the Mason, it still had the original!!! CRAZY

 

In comes the new water heater

 

Mom helping Jon with some of the last details of installing her new water tank

Tomorrow it will be all cleaning and packing. Then it will be all sunshine and warm water! WHOPP WHOOP! More pictures and up dates to come when we get back!

OK so it is Monday night and I am finishing writing the blog sitting inside an AC cooled HUGE 44ft Lagoon Catamaran in the BVI, life is way rough right now……. So Jon and I did rock and roll all day on saturday. Jon put everything away that was on the dock. I went and did laundry, when I got back we both put away the inside. Our Neighbors said “Wow we really didn’t think you would get it all done today!” HA! BUT WE DID! Mom showed up around 4:00 and we were out waiting for the bus by 6:45. While waiting for the bus we decide to use UBER instead. SUCH A GOOD IDEA! We actually saved money, and made it to our flight with perfect timing.   Today mom and I went up to the store and provisioned for the boat- its hard buying food for 7 people for 2 weeks when you normally don’t buy food for half the people… but we made it out and we hope everything is good to go.  My family ( my aunt Elly, uncle Kelly, cousin Noah and his gf Shay) gets here tomorrow and we will shove off and head out to our first Island! This is going to be such an amazing trip I can’t wait!.

A look from our Lagoon 440 inside Rode Harbor BVI

CHEERS!!!!