The Journey Begins

I got started in earnest this weekend.  Two full days of hard labor ensued, but the Old Dog certainly looks better for the effort.  I pulled all the loose pinestraw out and vacuumed it the day we brought her home.  So here's where I started Saturday morning: (as always, click pics for the full size experience)

            

With the help of my loyal first mate (and Admiral, my lovely wife) I managed to get the mast up on the second attempt.  We tied the spinnaker halyard to a long line and she pulled it up from out in front of the tow vehicle while I stood in the boat and planted the mast base.  All whilst making sure the internal halyard lines made it through the mast pulpit.  Not too bad now that we know how.

Holy Bats that's tall.

(okay, it's only 27', but that's 7' taller than the other boat)

Then I pulled the boat into out front yard where I could reach it with the water hose. I used a high-pressure hose end attachment to spray out the inside which made some small progress but not much.  I then mixed up some hydrogen peroxide based Cove Base Cleaner that my company manufactures for plastic cleaning at the strongest recommended 4:1 ratio.  I attacked the inside of the hull with a stiff bristle brush, lots of cove base cleaner, and all the elbow grease I could find.  It worked amazingly well

The most amazing part was how well the peroxide cleaner worked on the teak (with hard brushing, but still.)  Check out the port side grate above verses this:

 In fact, it worked so well on the teak that after scrubbing out the entire boat interior I launched into stripping the fiberglass off the rails because the rest of the wood was looking so good.

Some of that went easily, and some did not.  It took several hours of itchy arms. The wood rails were in decent shape, although the wood was painfully dry.  Either the glue between the rail strips has long since fallen out in places or the glass pulled it out.  Heck, maybe they just weren't real great from the factory or the rails have already been redone by an amateur like myself.  At any rate, they look better than the glass.

What do you do after exposing dry wood? Why, run to the hardware store for teak oil, of course!

And that's after two coats.  I ended up with three + on everything by Sunday evening. Over the course of the weekend I also fixed the trailer lights, mounted the TIN tag, and added the safety chains so it's ready for inspection.  Getting the mast stepped allowed me to figure out most of the rigging as well.  

                        Before                                                 After 

           

Getting a lot closer to taking this Dog to the lake.

Act One, In Which The Dog Follows Me Home

After a few weeks of attempting to align our schedules, we finally made it to my friend's house to pick up the boat.  Not to mention see it for the first time.  Excited, yes, and a bit unsure as to what I was getting into.  I had done much research online into what a Thistle was, how they sailed, parts availability, rigging options....anything I could think of.  The opinions of the various online peanut galleries fell into two camps - either "Those are great boats, you'll love it!" or "That boat will kill you and all you loved ones the instant you turn your back!"

For some reason I didn't run the phrase "Thistle Restoration" through my Google-Fu.  Maybe that was a good thing.  If I had only known then....

But I didn't and although it was in a little worse shape than I had imagined through my rose tinted imaginings, we were immediately struck by a guarded fondness for the boat.  Under the effects of time and sun you could still see good lines and a solid hull.  Even the name works and we don't plan on changing it. I seem to have a weak spot for neglected vehicles that still wear traces of their former glory, and I'd be lying if I said this was the first pinestraw covered yard ornament I've brought home.  After pumping up tires and collecting all the loose parts we towed it carefully home.  I didn't think to take any pictures of it as we found it, but I did when we got it home.

Gee, Mom, it followed me home.  Can I keep it pleeeeease?