On the hard at Dockland 5 Marina, Whangarei
Wind: W F3 gentle breeze
Weather: sunny periods, showers, cool

I recall a saying, “When you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is to stop digging”. Unfortunately, when it comes to steel boats this little adage does not apply. With a steel boat, when you find a hole, you have to keep digging until you are back to good steel. And today I have spent mostly on the foredeck expanding the hole to remove rusty steel. I think I have pretty much cut it back to good steel and can now clean the area up for some new steel to be welded in.

But, the most important achievement of the day was my meeting with Lee, the welder recommended to me by another steel boat owner in the yard. We had a very productive conversation and while he has a month long contractual commitment coming up for the next month, he has agreed to fit my relatively small jobs in over the weekends. I think this arrangement will suit me very well. I will work during the week to prepare the welding jobs for him and then hopefully he can come in and do a couple of hour’s work welding up the holes.

Given that I will not have too much to report on a daily basis over the next few weeks, I will revert to a weekly reporting schedule unless I have something particularly noteworthy to communicate. So, until next week ...

All is well.