Tidal Surges and ongoing work.

We went to Robinetta today since it was our first chance to check on her after the tidal surge flooding last Thursday. Everything was fine, it almost looked as though nothing had happened until I found fresh seaweed caught in the sail cover which I had wrapped around the boom which is currently stored under the boat. The cover was a bit muddy too, but since there was a 2metre tidal surge we got off very lightly. Talking to people who live on Mersea, and were up overnight to keep an eye on their property, its obvious that lessons were learnt from the tidal surge of 1952; all buildings constructed on Mersea after that had to be raised above the level of those floods. The chandlers made sure to seal up their letter box, and had five layers of sandbags blocking the door. The water got up to the fourth one before retreating. The surge peaked before high water at Mersea, and the wind had dropped too which helped minimise the damage.

It's always difficult getting the winter work under way, but luckily this year it's not just me doing it. Paul has been getting on well with the things we asked him to do, and the boat is looking smarter already.

When Paul took a good look at the sternpost he found the bolts in the lower end were corroded away. He has replaced them with galvanised coach screws that refasten the stern post to the dead wood below the sterntube. He also fitted a stop water, which is a large dowel fitted to intersect the joints of the keel and sternpost. This stops water creeping up the joint and inside the boat. He then used bitumin mastic over the whole area, and fasted copper tingles over the whole thing. This will prevent damage to the area when we scrape off weeds and barnacles, which tends to take the anti-fouling paint with it.

He has also re-caulked the area of garboard seam under the mast which was leaking, and refitted a copper tingle over the engine bed bolt... little things that came make a big difference to the amount of water in the boat.

The rotten iroko capping where the cockpit seats meet the transom has been replaced by a lovely bit of teak, but the most striking teak is the new rubbers to the cabin top. I shall have to work hard to get the teak grab rails and the varnolled pitch pine of the cabin sides shiny enough to match the rubbing strip!

The floor in the forepeak is also back in place, so I'll soon run out of excuses for not getting on with Robinetta's interior.