Haircuts and Haulout

We are now less than a week away from our departure date, which has shifted to Sunday, August 17 for various reasons. It has been a hectic week of packing a well furnished 3 bedroom house into a small bedroom and crawlspace, sorting through clothes to select from 3 bedroom closets what will fit into 2 rubbermaid containers, and working on various boat projects.


We hauled out Ladybug and cleaned and painted her bottom, raising the waterline an inch to allow for Rani's stuff and additional stores for the trip. We waxed her sides and changed the fluids in the outboard. Although there was not much growth after 16 months in the water, her speed under motor increased by 2 knots at the same RPM! It will be critical to keep her clean on the trip and we will be doing a fair bit of in-water cleaning using a snorkel and mask.





We also learned another valuable cruising skill - how to cut each other's hair. See below for some before and after pictures. Our friend, Joanne Rife, was in control (and fixed our mistakes), explaining how to achieve a layered cut, where to leave hair fuller, and how to thin - just using a comb and scissors. We will try a small trim again this week.












Other projects completed this week include curtains (again our friend Joanne came to the rescue and helped us sew these) and installation of the autopilot. The missing wheel clamps for the autopilot arrived from the UK and installation took only an afternoon. We have also managed to squeeze in a couple of hikes, a swim in the Cowichan river, and a morning at the opening ceremonies of the Indigenous Games...