The Reprise from the bow

Mobile, Alabama. I'm working with Gil Carner, a retired art professor I met through Mark and Anna of the vessel Arianna, to restore a West Sail 32 in preparation for a cruise through the winter and spring. I'm living with Gil while we work on the boat. We're planning on completing the work and setting sail by sometime in early December. Until then, everyday is a full day's work.

The West Sail 32 is a beautiful, sturdy and well outfitted ocean going cutter. It's berthy, of a solid, reliable build, is powered by a large inboard diesel, and boasts a luxuriously finished wood interior. The West Sail we'll be sailing, the Reprise (although the name may change), still needs a lot of work.

The Reprise, port side.

Gil has been working on the boat for more than a year. He has completed various deck and hull repairs, resurfaced the bottom side, cut a new hatch into the main cabin, built custom, wood and inlaid glass hatch covers for both the v-berth and main hatches, restored the topside, installed new AC electrical controllers, mounted and tuned the rigging, and begun some of the interior restoration.

Plenty remains to be done. The boat still needs its sails and some of its running rigging installed, almost all of its topside hardware installed, the majority of the interior restored, and the plumbing and DC electrical systems rebuilt. After a year's work, these last few items can easily be categorized as the details. The devil, of course, is in the details.

The Reprise, aft end of the main cabin.

As is to be expected from just about any restoration, every element of the project completed tends to uncover some new pressing need. Installing new plumbing lines leads to the discovery of a leaky through-hull, removing trim to refinish interior surfaces leads to the discovery of rot or other water damage, and treating existing water damage leads to discovering leaky ports, hardware, etc.

The Reprise, forward end of the main cabin.

All things considered it still seems reasonable to expect an early December departure. Until then we'll be working steadily and crossing our fingers against the steadily creeping scope of the project.