Wood Rot

The head refit began as an elective procedure. We felt the space in the head was used inefficiently, and so we wanted to make better use of that space. We began by tearing out the cabinets and some small rotten corners were noted on the cabinet itself, but nothing structural. 

Then I removed the old shower floor, and this is what I found! 

Under the shower was foam, to take up the dead space. The foam was sprayed in between the floors and keel so that water would not collect in there under the shower. The problem with this plan is: water will always find a way!

The foam quickly became a dry sponge that yearned for the moisture above it, and as small bits of water crept past the bedding compound used to hold the shower floor in place, the foam would soak it up and hold it there forever! 

Fast forward a few decades and you have waterlogged plywood that has never dried out. It rotted away to mulch!  The floors under the shower are completely gone, only the fiberglass tabbing that held them to the hull remains!

Where the bulkhead came down to meet the shower also rotted away completely. The bulkhead is two sheets of 3/4 inch plywood, and the entire bottom section rotted away.  

To access the rot, I first sanded away the paint so I could see how far up the wood was discolored. Then I took a small circular saw and cut a 3/4” deep cut to remove the afflicted wood. 

With the bulkhead cut back to healthy and unaffected wood, I was then left with the vertical finishing boards of the salon. The entire lower portion of the bulkhead had rotted away because it was abutting the shower floor. 

The rotten wood, which had turned into mulch was simply removed by scooping it up and throwing it out. With all the wet and rotten wood out of there, the remaining wood will be left open to dry for the next month. 

What looks like mulch is actually the remains of the bottom of the bulkhead. This wood will need to be replaced in a more sound manner that way this issue doesn’t repeat itself in a few more decades. 

At the moment, I am debating whether to replace the lost bulkhead material with close cell foam or with new plywood. Either way, the new head will be fully glassed to the walls so that the entire thing is a fiberglass shell that won’t leak water into the timbers of this old boat. 

Butcher Block Galley Countertops

While on the hard in Terceira, we decided to take care of some boat projects that we had been toying with tackling “someday”. First was repaint the whole boat, second was refit the head, third is refit the galley, and fourth is re-finish the entire inside of the boat (a lot of varnish to do this one). 

The boat is being painted, the head is under deconstruction, so it’s time to get the wood for the galley! 

The plan is to replace the Formica and plywood countertops with edge grain mahogany butcher block. In the Azores, the prices all seem rediculously low, which is what spurred our desire to tackle the refit here, even though our visa to be there and work on the boat only grants us 90 days in a 180 day period. 

Oddly enough, there is no logging on the island, and all their wood is imported from Africa. As a result, wonderful African hardwoods are readily available at a very low price! We ended up paying €250 for all of this wood, including the delivery and milling! 

Sadly, the quality of the woodworking on the island does not match the quality of the wood that they import, so finding the right kind of wood glue for the project proved impossible. I want to use Titebond III because it is waterproof and permanent. I have used it before in the construction of Tooth II, and those seams had zero leaks! 

When I asked around for wood glue, I was offered Elmers Glue and local wood glue that specifically said “temporary holding, not for items that will get moist”. When I told them I need something that is waterproof, they offered me Silicone. I promptly left that establishment and began to worry about what all wooden construction on the island was glued together with!

I looked into special ordering a proper wood glue but the cost of delivery and limited time left on this visa proved to be too much. So, the wood for the galley will remain on the cabin sole until we January, when we return and begin the reconstruction phase of the refit. 

Alternative to a Circular Saw

Circular saws are awesome! When you need to chop something into smaller pieces, these machines will slice and dice until the wood is smaller and more manageable to carry out. The only problem with circular saws is they tend to run on electricity, and what if you can’t connect to the local power grid? Now what? 

While dissassembling our plywood cabinets in the head, I ran into just this very issue. The solution was to get an axe and chop it up into smaller pieces! This may sound ridiculous and barbaric, but it did work very well. I managed to chop my way through a sheet of 3/4 inch plywood! Now, in a boat is not the place to begin swinging an axe around! No, no. The trick to using an axe safely inside a boat is to set the axe where you want to chop and then strike it with a heavy hammer! 

This will ensure that the axe doesn’t smash into something else and cause damage, or miss the mark and begin chopping out small pieces of wood. By placing the axe and then striking it, the blade will simply work its way through the wood in a very controlled manner. There is no wondering swings of an axe in the boat, and no dangers of putting a sharp blade into your interior joinery either! Just a lumbering old sledge hammer to power the axe, and it can be controlled with small and short (but powerful) strokes.

An axe may seem out of place in a yacht refit, but if you need a specific tool and don’t have access to it, then it may be time to get creative with different tools that might meet your needs as well. 

The Power of Nature

The Azores were formed when massive volcanoes rose up from the abysmal plain and pierced the surface of the ocean. They were born out of fire in the middle of the ocean, but now they are lush and covered with fresh water. 

All the vegetation and animals that were here when the first explorers stepped foot on these rocky cliffs in the ocean had arrived either by air or by sea. Sea birds would stop here to nest as the islands were devoid of predators, and any animals that were present had arrived by raft at some point since the creation of these islands. The vegetation also arrived on these islands by ways of sheer improbability, but yet they were green and lush when the first explorers arrived.

What I find most incredible is the collection of fresh water that is present on these islands. The ocean is a world of salt, and these tiny islands are oasis of fresh water in abundance! These waterfalls flow from never ending lakes and rivers, and just pour their fresh contents right out into the salty sea beyond the beaches. 

Life on this planet is very resilient, and it will find its way to every last point of habitable land possible!  

A Simpler Time, Now

We often feel like the olden days were a simpler time. The world seems more complicated as the features that were supposed to make our lives easier seem to have made our lives a chaotic cacophony! Technology that was supposed to make life flow more seamlessly always needs attention and allows us to pack so much into our day that we can’t seem to spare any time. When these “conveniences” fail us, we then are inundated with stress as we try to sort out the technical issue while still maintaining our insane self-imposed schedule. Why isn’t the simpler time now? 

We don’t have radar, we don’t have electronic autopilots, or watermakers, or bow thrusters, or most any gadget that they try to shove down your throat at a boat show. Instead, we have a simple setup of sails and a hull. We carry a lot of water and collect the rain that falls from the sky. We eat foods that are easy to keep, and we eat them before they go bad. We plan our day based on what feels right and what seems easy enough, instead of following a set schedule that we created long before we knew what we were getting ourselves into. We went back to that simpler time of sailing, and found ourselves in this simpler time of land. 

Here, a farmer sits on a seat as he milks his cow by hand. Behind him is a splendid waterfall and lush foliage over the foreboding cliff. No milking machine, no hormones, no complicated setups. He has a cow, the cow eats the grass in the field, and he milks the cow.  

Life doesn’t have to be complicated, and the simpler time can be now. Uncomplicate your life so that you can begin living it!