13 May 2016

Re-rigging Day 12-13: All done!

The snow has indeed blown off the mountain by Thursday morning. There's enough wind to blow a dog off a chain. When the rigger arrives, he confirms our view that it is not the day to try and put the mast back on, so the crane is cancelled, and we mooch around with not much to do. It goes on blowing all day and most of Thursday night, finally starting to abate at about 5am on Friday.
Rigger arrives mid-morning, decides the conditions are improving, books the crane for midday. It arrives early, about 11:40.
Crane erecting
Mast on its way up
Almost aboard
Unhooking the crane
The lift of the mast and return to the tabernacle goes as smoothly as the removal on day 1, and we once again enjoy watching experts work. Once the cap shrouds and inner forestay are in place, the crane is unhooked, folds itself up and goes off, while the riggers attach the rest of the stays and adjust rigging screws.


Forestay laid out on trestles, ready to go up

Then they haul up the forestay, with the furler on it. Ian goes up the mast to attach the furler and do final adjustments, while Chris attaches the foot of the forestay.
By 1pm it is mostly done and we're all hungry, so the mate nips up to the German bakery for cheese and spinach rolls and a couple of pies. After lunch there's a bit more adjustment, and they give us a hand to put the boom back in place. Then we farewell Chris and Ian and go back to tidying up and cleaning the hull.
We consult with bosun Carl about going back into the water. He is planning to put us into the water on Saturday morning, but it's after several other boats and as we have made a lunch date at Koonya, we're concerned that we won't get back into the berth in time. We suggest going in straight away, even though there is still quite a bit of WNW wind, occasionally gusty. Carl agrees, we quickly prepare to move, and we are back in the water by about 4pm. We get out of the cradle and turn Nahani round easily, head back round the marina. As we enter the channel, the wind goes back round to the north, and we get more nervous about getting in to the berth. Fortunately there are people there to pass us lines and help, but despite that we manage to lose control of the back of the boat in a gust, and she swings across the berth and bumps Vanity, the first time we've ever done that. But there is no harm done as far as we can see.
While there is still light we get the mainsail back into the sail track, and re-attach the lazyjacks, so the boom now looks its usual self. Over the weekend we'll re-fit the headsail on the furler, and the ship's engineer will re-connect the electrics on Monday when the mate returns to Melbourne.

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