Baddeck NS, "46:05.99N 60:44.68W"
VulcanSpirit
Richard & Alison Brunstrom
Fri 22 Jul 2016 08:42
To get here we had to pass through the Barra Strait bridges, a combination of swing railway bridge and lifting road bridge:
Our missing lower cap shroud eventually turned up having taken a whole week from the US
And Baddeck was the place to fit it.
Here I am up in the rigging. This is a very fiddly procedure with a high risk of dropping a vital part overboard. VS has linked rigging, with the upper and lower cap shrouds as two separate wires joined at the first spreader. Also at this point is the intermediate diagonal or D2, making for a complicated joint. For reasons best known to the designer the whole lot is held in place with a 19mm pin, but the hole in the ends of the two parts of the shroud are 24mm, necessitating a bushing to fit over the pin.
In the photo above the D2 is hanging loose, while in the one below you can see the floppy upper shroud while I am fiddling with lots of bits of string. To avoid the catastrophe of dropping a small part overboard the bushing is tied on with two loops, so that as each is untied to rethread the other ensures its retention. The string eventually has to thread through the spreader tip, then through a plate holding the D2, then through the fork of the lower shroud and the bushing, then the other plate, then the other side of the spreader. This requires an amazing amount of tying and untying, but it works. I was aloft for over two hours and upon returning to the deck was almost unable to stand having lost circulation in my thighs.
And acting as unpaid but vital capacity as rigging consultant is our friend Magnus who has an essential inside line to Hallberg Rassy in Sweden for detailed advice:
The new plank in the photo above is for lying to quays further north if anchoring is not possible. It cost the princely sum of $CAN 6 in the local hardware store.
Sent from my iPad