Painting the Decks, Doghouse and Cockpit

The boat seems small in the water but HUGE when you have to scrub, degrease, sand and do several more levels of prep to be able to paint.  It is such a big job you have to concentrate on that one little step and try not to think about the next 1,000.  Definitely not a project for the faint of heart!  We had hoped to not impose on Paula and Bill more than a week, 10 days max.  Of course, the weather laughed at that notion and occasionally washed away our efforts for the day.  It's tough to be philosophical when your tired but we managed.  Also, the primer and paint has to have a window of near perfect temperature, dew point spread and no moisture.  We spent a lot of hours looking at the hour-by-hour forecast to decide what, if anything, we could do that day.  On more than one occasion we pushed the envelope and lost so we got very good at putting tape and paper on. In the time frame, David turned 60 and our daughter, Martha and her beau Dylan came to help him celebrate.  Turned out to be a perfect day so we spent it taping and then celebrating.  After so many hours of tedious and agonizing work, when you first see the paint going on, it is magical.  We painted the boat in sections to better accommodate the gear handling required and not rush any section.  While it seems like more of the surfaces are nonskid, there is still a lot of white.

Every thing you don't want painted has to be protected with paper and tape.

All port lights were covered.  I almost like the look of the blue.

First of 3 coats of primer.  We had to sand and prep between the primer and final paint.

Dressed to Paint.

My job to was to keep the hose from touching any wet spots and keeping an eye on thin spots in the paint by looking at the surface from a lot of angles.

The cockpit was tough to get out of once the paint was on the seat tops.  Good thing he has long legs!

The stern was a real challenge to keep your feet from touching wet paint or falling into the water.

The fore deck had a lot of little surfaces to paint around the anchor locker.

Cockpit looking so much better.

Final coats of paint going on.

We were able to paint all the removable pieces at home.  Our neighbors wonder what crazy thing we're up to now.