Living Water was launched last Friday which was a very exciting experience. Guy started the main engine and manoeuvred out of the pontoons and onto an outer berth. The turning circle is none too tight because she is a long-keeled vessel but this is to our advantage as this very factor reduces our leeway at sea.
The slipmaster Sam and his merry men will be finishing off the paintwork plus a number of other jobs before finally tidying up and enabling us to move out of tents and onboard. She looks totally different with her new coat of Oxford Blue and truly looks amazing.
The Papuan crew have just finished there STCW all passing with flying colours with some amazing stories about the fire-fighting part of the course. In fact participating in this course seems to have had the beneficial effect of helping them to open up and develop some initiative as well. Gelly amazed everyone when she launched herself into the water and was the first to get into the life raft and haul everyone else on board. Rose was chosen by the instructor to lead in the fire exercise where they all had to put out fires and rescue an inert body by dragging it out of harm’s way.
Chris du Toit is arriving on the 24th to fill the position of the 1st Mate. I am looking forward to setting them to the task of setting up the solar panels and also the watermaker.
If you want to see some of the drone pics that Tom took then click the YouTube icon on the top right hand side. They will be up soon!
God bless you all.