A Spot of Varnishing

Here's another photo for all those people who shake their heads when they see your boat is made from timber. 'Lot of work,' they say with satisfaction as they powerhose the white shiny plastic of their fibreglass cruisers.

The decks of Winter Solstice, which looked smooth and beautiful last year, are peeling and cracked this. It's one of those jobs where as soon as you lift a tiny corner a whole swath of stuff comes off in your hand. The process began in Terryglass and is still ongoing. Really a proper job should be done, but that would require removing all the stanchions and that in turn would mean not going boating very much.

That would be a problem. We plan to do what we did last year which is start the major boating trips early. May and June are, according to the Man from New Zealand, the best for sunshine and dryness. It was the same last year, so when July and August came with their nasty cold mockeries of summer we didn't mind so much. We'd had a month or two of sunshine on the Shannon, and that is worth everything.