Essex

A sneaky weekend at Steeple Bay in Essex.  I am always surprised how rural this part of the country is.  remote salt marshes and farmland just a stones throw from London.

Had to get my boat fix while in Maldon.

And a walk along Southend pier; the longest pleasure pier in the world at 1.3 miles.

Small boating

Last summer our contractors at work had some scrap pieces of 3.6mm ply that needed to go to a good home.  I was willing to offer one and they have been sitting in my lock up since then.  With the weather improving, I decided to see what I could make out of them.  Well, a boat obviously.

I gaffa taped the two longest pieces together and pushed and pulled them, then trimmed them until I got a shape I liked.

Added a temporary frame in the center.

Then covered the bottom with the other two large pieces of ply that I had.

Once trimmed, I glassed the bottom with 162 gsm cloth and epoxy.

Tied up

After two years of making do with some horrible lengths of knotted, frayed string on the boat, I have now treated myself to 25m of 14mm soft black mooring rope.

Currently watching Youtube videos on how to do splices.

Out from hibernation

With the lengthening of the days, I have crawled out from my cave with the beginnings of something akin to enthusiasm for doing stuff.  I have written a list - that's a start at least.  Hopefully we wont have too many more chilly days on the river now.