Trailers and Timelords

The day before Calypso set off on her road trip south to Sitges, Gösta and I spent the day going through the many details of the new-to-me vessel. Luckily she’s a small boat, and we had her rigged, de-rigged, secured, and labelled ready for transportation within a number of hours.

The crane arrived the next day and, without further ado, duly plucked Calypso from her small trailer settled in the mud outside the lovely red traditional Swedish barn that has been her winter home for the last 20 years. We walked her round to the far more robust road trailer that is to carry her safely to Spain, thankful that the short sharp rain showers had stopped, and the wind had abated. Nobody wants to be man-handling a boat suspended swinging in the air with a rising wind.

My primary concern in all this was making sure that she was seated properly on the transport trailer, and the pads on the acrow props were positioned such that the load was taken across many planks without putting pressure on the corners or lower edges of any of the strakes. In lapstrake construction the planks are simply laid on top of each other. There is no glue or caulking, and any hard pressure points could cause the planking to open up, leading to (oftentimes dramatic) water ingress.

Gary is a consumate professional who took heed of my concerns and spent a great deal of time making sure I was happy with the hull arrangement as well as strapping the mast down very securly to the cabin so that it doesn’t whip and crack on the road south.

I wouldn’t have let her go if I wasn’t happy (once the skipper, always the skipper); but, for the record, I have also bought a bloody great big water pump for launch.

Let’s see how this goes…