Final Preparations

The departure date is getting closer. The to do list should be getting shorter, but it never does. Yesterday we moved Valent round to Shamrock Quay where she is going to have a new fuel pick up system fitted. This will enable our smaller spare fuel tank to become the day tank (primary tank) and the larger tank to be the reservoir that fills the day tank. In between will be a scrubbing system to clean and polish the fuel before it enters the day tank. As you can see from the below photo, the small fuel tank was originally designed as a spare water tank, but many years ago it was changed into an extra fuel tank.

While Valent is over in Shamrock Quay a number of other small jobs are going to be actioned – making good the spring storm damage to the whip aerial to boxing the microwave in so it is secure at sea.

On the way over to Shamrock Quay we stopped off at Hamble Yacht Services to collect the second spinnaker pole that had been left behind last year since it required some rather more bespoke repair. Valent now has 2 good spinnaker poles that may be very useful when sailing for miles across vast oceans.

All the admin tasks are coming together, the mail redirection is done, the global health insurance arranged, medical supplies ordered plus telemedical support and departure party arranged. Suzy finishes work next week, the girls finish school next week and the house removal company are booked. We have to go now, we will be homeless in a few weeks and the tenants move in at the beginning of August.

Other jobs on the list include finishing the plumbing under the galley sink. I found that the pipes just came to pieces with the slightest knock resulting in sink water in the cupboard and eventually the bilges. As you can see the system looks stressed and has many strange angles. I am pleased with my work so far, though it has been very frustrating learning about imperial and metric measurements, especially when they were mixed on the same system. I never knew that imperial pipes are measured on the bore diameter (inside) and that metric pipes are measured on the outside diameter. All I will say is thank goodness for these new flexible tubing joints.

Lots of new bits of kit are arriving, never realised just how many flags I would need to carry! We have a full set of signal flags, a set for dressing ship (think all your flags making bunting) and then courtesy flags. When you visit a country/island you need to fly the flag of that nation. We plan to visit quite a lot of countries/islands, and that is before we add in any cruising in the Caribbean. Now I am onto foreign currency and paper charts. But I am very pleased with my ‘new’ sextant acquired on ebay. Dates from the 1950s, but appears to be in excellent working order with a relatively small index error (20 minutes, so a third of a degree). I even got the light to work again. I am excited by the prospect of using the sun and shooting the stars to plot our way across the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Of course the GPS should work, but where is the fun in that when you have time on your hands.

I am also waiting on a replacement AIS unit to be delivered. The last one appeared to work, it just never changed our position from Haslar Marina, even when in Cherbourg. We even had a speed of 102.3knots making us similar to a helicopter. The technical team have agreed that it needs replacing, and luckily it is still within the warranty period. Small wins are always welcome. I have started stowing emergency water in various nooks and crannies. Currently I have got 160ltr of bottled water into the holes I have identified. This will be on top of the 1000ltr tank and the water maker that is installed and should give us around 60/ltr/hr.

Many thanks to Richard, Ian and Dwight for helping to move Valent yesterday. Just a few weeks to go!