A hammer, a hose, a fork and a butcher’s knife

Istanbul, Turkey

One day we were in a marina, sitting in the cockpit of Berkeley East when some repairmen arrived to work on the boat next to us. As we watched, we became curious as to what they were going to do with the garden hose that they seemed to be attaching to the boom. Were they washing the inside of the boom?

Then came out the hammer; ouch, not a tool you want to see near your stainless. A butcher’s knife? And finally, a fork. Must be lunchtime. No, they didn’t stop to eat. Soon they were removing a lifeline from the boat, which seemed strange since the boat was new. They must just be tightening the lifeline? Nope, off it came and it was quickly threaded through the boom, used as a snake to guide a new furling line. The lifeline succeeded where the garden hose had failed. We were impressed by their MacGyver-like creativity, but wondered why professionals would not have tools for this type of work. Do they disassemble every boat to do a repair? Is this how all yacht work is done, especially on one that costs nearly $1 million?

We whispered so they would not hear us, and snapped some pictures when they could not see. Soon the fork was gone, they must have either heard us talking, or the click of the camera. Oops, that’s embarrassing. No, they didn’t hear us after all; the fork was just needed for a task on the other side of the boat!

One of the first things you learn in “Cruising 101” is that every captain, or admiral, should know how to troubleshoot and repair at least basic things on your own boat. And we can handle a lot of the problems that occur on Berkeley East. But there comes a time in every cruiser’s life when you need to call in the “professionals,” experts in yacht repair.

The second thing you learn in “Cruising 101” is that when you can’t fix the problem, watch the experts that you hire to do the job in order to learn, and also supervise. While there are many excellent yacht repair companies out there, mistakes happen, meanings are lost in translation, things are missed, and often a boat has sailed away before the botched job is discovered. We got bad floor varnish in one of the best boatyards in Annapolis, MD. We paid to have BE waxed in Charleston, SC only to discover (after we had sailed away and mailed the check) that just one side of the boat had been waxed. We hadn’t noticed because we could only see the shiny, waxed side from the dock. In Hampton, VA, the wrong engine injectors were installed in Berkeley East and we had to pay for the right ones (again) once we got to Bermuda. So over the years, we have learned that we have to observe whenever we can, and inspect the work (as best we can) before the boat leaves the dock. It is difficult to do, but we seem to have a better result with that approach, regardless of what country we are in. That said, after watching the work being done on our neighbor’s boat, we have added one other task to be done after a repair on Berkeley East…check the silverware.

Previous Comments

30 Aug 2014

Vanessa

You know that ole sailor song “pass me a fork ere I climb ye mast?”