Over the past few weeks along our travels, we’ve kept a running list of boat projects. It’s quite amazing how many small and sometimes large jobs a boat like this creates for you. The small ones we often don’t mention in our blog. What you hear more about are the bigger, sometimes frustrating, problems, and the repair jobs they require.

With visitors coming, our kids and later my sister, we have some extra motivation to get things taken off that list. Some of the items have been on our minds for a long time. But you never quite muster the energy and motivation to tackle them. But now we do. So during those four days in Antigua awaiting the arrival of Anika and Kristoffer we get to work to get JACE shipshape.

Since this won’t probably be too interesting, I will keep it a brief listing of tasks, just to give you a glimpse. Suffice to say that we are quite proud of the amount of work we accomplish and of some of our achievements in particular.

– In our galley (kitchen) over time both one of the lights and the hood over the range stopped working. We are able to identify bad switches as the culprit, fix one and find a replacement for the other.

– Our fridge door has always been closing very poorly and got worse and worse overtime. The lower of the two hinges has come loose and the alignment is off. But after 20 years of salt, water and heat, the hinge pins are hopelessly corroded. Usually, you should be able to tap them out in order to access to screws that secure the hinge. Not with ours; they are completely stuck. But we come up with an ingenious and simple fix and now our fridge door aligns perfectly and closes smoothly. It’s a dream!

– the ladder off the swim platform has also become rather lose from years of wear and hangs down past vertical which makes climbing up a little more cumbersome than it should be. Karin devises an inventive solution that works quite well.

– the swim platform itself gets pulled up when you go sailing which is accomplished through a line that runs through a triple pulley system. But one of the blocks has chafed very badly and needs to replaced.

– the large hatch over the front berth has had an ongoing problem with leaking. Last year, I had quite a bit of water ingress and already had the hatch re-seated in the deck and the deck-to-hull also re-sealed by a professional. That has helped greatly, but there is still some leaking through the hatch handle and hinges. We find a way to fix the handle issue and are still working on the hinges.

– Jeff and Lynn, the previous owners, had started to replace various of the fabric covered panels throughout the cabins with a very nice new material but did not quite finish the task. One of the trickiest jobs left are four panels in the large forward cabin, that are hard to remove to cover with fabric. We finally tackle that and it works out beautifully making that cabin so much nicer.

– Also in that cabin, the ceiling panel has a history of coming loose from its various Velcro attachment points. Lately we had to use an expandable boathook to prop it up and stop it from falling down. That needs changing. So we finally bite the bullet, take it down and glue on a whole set of new Velcros. Looks great and holds well

– Since the fridge is low and relatively deep, getting things in and out sometimes requires kneeling in front of the open fridge to reach back and find that last jar of yogurt or that cucumber that must have slipped all the way to the back of the vegetable shelf. Quite an annoyance that we surprisingly have lived with for quite a while now. Finally, Karin put an end into it, finding a perfectly fitting set of trays that now slide out almost like drawers. Perfect!

– Over the last week or so our fresh water pump has been developing a bit of a cough. After some extensive troubleshooting, we realize that the accumulator tank, a device that maintains the pressure in the system and stops the pump from running with a stutter, has gone bad. But fear not: thanks to Jeff, have a brand new replacement on board which makes that a quick fix. Thank you Jeff!

– But that is not the full story on the water pump. In addition to the cough, it has also a bit of a runny nose, meaning that even if no one uses any water, it kicks in every few minutes for just split seconds to re-pressurize the system. As we read up on the problem we realize that the check valves inside the pump, devices that stop the water from flowing backwards when the pump is not running, must be malfunctioning. A couple of YouTube videos later we know how to take the pump out, open it up, clean all the rubber gaskets, and reassemble it. And sure enough it works like a charm, no cough and no runny nose.

– in addition to all these repairs and beautification, there is general cleaning to do. We clean out the third cabin that we have been using as storage and give the whole boat a proper clean. And there is laundry to be washed, beds to be prepared, and groceries to be bought.

All in all, it is a couple of very busy but also satisfying days as we see our boat improved and beautified and ready for our loved ones. We are so excited for them to arrive later today here in Antigua.

With some Christmas lights hung along the lifelines, we are anchored in Jolly Harbour, and ready for Jolly Christmas with our kids. So sweet!