Final Touches to ‘Sandpiper’

The sun shone this morning in more ways than one. Paul, a follower of my blog, paid me a visit. We had a jolly good chinwag, mostly about small boats, but also reminiscing on the subject of our youth. He lived in Essex before moving to New Zealand; therefore I was rather touched that he should take time to meet me during a busy holiday schedule. He gave ‘Sandpiper’ a thorough look-over, and said that she was smaller than he had imagined, especially her narrow beam. I explained she was similar in some respects to Matt Layden's Paradox – both single chine vessels roughly the same size.

After Paul left to revisit places he had known years ago, I set up ‘Sandpiper’s’ rig to check if the anchor on the foredeck would snag the foot of the jib, which it did. To overcome the ‘technical hitch’ I moved the wire strop from the head of the jib to its tack. An unforeseen advantage of this was to improve visibility forwards, because the sail was raised above the deck by over a foot.

There is very little left to be done before the boat can be launched; therefore I am hoping for a few days of sunshine next week when I can try her out on the water.