Friday the Thirteenth!!!

In the yard
Following the damage to her port propeller...

Ouch!

Distant Drummer spent just under two weeks in Ponsharden boat yard during which time we scrubbed her above and below the waterline and applied a fresh coat of anti-foul paint to the hull.

Gleaming

The prop shaft was refitted nicely by Steve Farley. Nick and Cove Eddy serviced the diesel engine. The new propeller, however, would take a few days to arrive as it needed to be machined correctly and our friends at C&O Engineering in Newton Abbott were snowed under with orders so we'd just have to wait it out. Graham Innard at Ponsharden kindly let us live aboard in the yard so we were able to set about other jobs.

The weather was mostly very good and we took advantage of the warm April sunshine to reseal all our windows and repaint the 'Heavenly Twins' logos on the side of the hull. We also had a massive sort-out of all our storage lockers to make things more easily accessible.

Robin's birthday was celebrated in the boat yard! However we did take some time out to visit the 'Working Boat' pub at the Greenbank Hotel overlooking Falmouth harbour for some excellent food and beer.

Working Boat Pub

News on the arrival of the propeller had not been particularly optimistic until Steve Farley unexpectedly turned up early on Thursday morning to say he had received it! So without further a do it was fitted and Graham's team relaunched us that very afternoon.

Will life-jackets ever be fashionable?

Rhiannon came to visit for the day and joined us for the short trip up the river from Penryn to Pendennis Marina.

Friday 13th April
Was actually uneventful and everything went to plan. We got married February 13th and we also had 13 guests to our evening reception so 13 has sort of become our lucky number. We delayed departure until 11am in order to benefit from a favourable tidal flow heading into Fowey.

Gotta get those tides just right.

Just as well as there was very little wind and all from the south-east so we motored the whole passage. On the plus side our engine ticked along beautifully and we had no issues with propellers.

No worries.

We arrived at Fowey an hour ahead of schedule and came alongside at the Mixtow Pill visitor pontoon (otherwise known as Penmarlam Quay). OMG! Third time lucky. We were both very pleased and relieved to have completed stage 1 of our voyage.

Finally in Fowey!