Kingfisher Yacht Cyprus

 My birthday (and Christmas) present from my wife… a new bimini cover. Goodness Liza looks like there are a lot of lines around the boat! But this angle the cover colour matches well Sunshine... still sunny October in Cyprus! OK, so the bimini cover does show up as brighter than the stack pack! 

Sheila and Lukas had bought two sit on kayaks this summer but not had much of a chance to use them. Melvin is a long term sea-kayaker so we took them down and Sheila and Melvin took them out while Katie and I sailed Liza, then anchored. Then lunch and time for a sail… …while towing the kayaks. Last time we took the kayaks out we tried towing with a person onboard the kayak. That didn't work!

In June I started replacing the standing rigging, but the shrouds are relatively easy to do. The big one is the forestay because it involves removing the forestay from the furler system and means taking the mast down! So… step 1: Turn the boat around  OK, the photo isn't really necessary except Helen on the bow looks like we're off whale fishing and she wants to spear the whale! Step 2: take the boom off and put it in the cabin.  Step 3: Remove all the electrical connections from the mast Ummm… that wasn't as easy as it should have been as the nuts under the deck kept slipping! Step 4: Drop the mast and take the forestay off… no photos because everyone involved with this process... two lines from the top of the mast and two people catching it as it came down! Step 5: Remove the cone from the furler Attempt 1: Dig out all the corrosion with a small screw driver Result: Failure Attempt 2: Fill up with WD40, try again, fill up with WD40 again and leave overnight Result: Failur