Hot Rails

With First Mate away on a jolly in France, Mr. Jones and I thought a few days boat painting would be a good idea. The plan was to paint the handrails and the cratch front. 

But we hadn't counted on the weather. Now DIY painting of boats, or bits of boats, is always a trial. There are flies, blossom, leaves, wind blowing other stuff, farmers mowing, it can be too cold, too damp, and of course there can always be rain. This week, though, the problem was the sun and the heat.

But we hatched  a rough plan. It involved getting up at SIX! and masking as soon as the dew had gone. This was tricky on the handrails as the dew kept down rolling off the roof. Then the idea was to paint before the sun became too strong. As a way of mitigating against this, the unpainted section of handrail was shaded with old bed sheets (at least I think they were the old ones).

Handrails don't look very exciting in photographs, so here is the cratch (before and after). Mr. Jones and I are reasonably satisfied.

Fighting With Nature

Cratch after second undercoat

I have long been a believer that fighting with nature is a task you are never going to win. Attempts to engage that power need to be considered carefully. 

It is one of the reasons we do not have any lawns at home – in fact we barely have any land. We acknowledged the nonsense of lawns at our last house, where the ratio of the time spent mowing it, to sitting in it, was about 20:1. 

Of course there are occasions when the fight is necessary; such as staying alive at our age! But clipping hedges, mowing lawns, and vacuuming, or is it blowing? the autumn leaves surely must be questionable.

One - Two -Three

Staying with the garden theme a bit, we realised, a while ago, that oiling or varnishing outside furniture is a battle you are going to lose. After a summer or two, you will have lost. I know this from experience and it has been added to my list of questionable activities.

Now the wooden cratch on our boat is rather tired: the varnish has gone and the wood is looking not so new. So armed with my garden furniture knowledge, I set about painting it. I am a big believer in paint. 

And whist I was painting it, First Mate and I thought we might add some diamonds or hearts: something to give it a bit more colour. So after much debate, including discussion of the rather difficult to prove 'Four Colour Theorem,' we came up with the picture here.

To save dragging the cratch home and having it on the living room table for a week or two, we decided to paint the cratch timber a single colour in situ, and make the decorated centre panel from sheet steel that could be screwed on when finished.

The plan is progressing well and I will post again when it is finished.