Trailer Sailors

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So, I bought this boat...

I wasn't actually looking for a boat at the time, it was one of those things that just sort of came along unexpectedly, yet seemed a little too good to pass up.

Before I acquired Rosie, she been slipped at Toler's Cove marina by her second owner, a guy named Gene. It is where she rode out Hurricane Hugo in 1989, during which she suffered a broken mast, bent chainplates, and numerous cuts and bruises, but she didn't sink. I'm told that many boats in the marina did sink, their masts seen poking up out of the water around the marina.

Rosie also was kept on a mooring behind Sullivan's Island for a while, and broke from her mooring once in a storm and got all banged up.

Then, sometime around the summer of 1997, Gene had Rosie hauled out on a trailer, where she pretty much sat until I picked her up in Feb. 1999.

Day 1	Dismantled	The Bottom
Two Years Abaft the Trailer	Leaks!	Shall we sand?

Most of the work so far has involved removing things:

stanchions, cleats, chocks, blocks, fairleads, winches, rudder gudgeons, outboard engine bracket, teak hatch frames, teak toe rails, teak handrails, mast step, ports, thru-hull, seacock, chainplates, running lights, bottom paint, topsides paint, ...

Currently, I am filling, fairing, and sanding the decks, getting them ready to paint, having already sanded the hull and bottom with 40 grit paper. I ground out some blisters on the bottom, and I will need to fill and fair those areas before the barrier coat can be applied. I'm also finishing up overdrilling and filling all the hardware mounting holes with thickened epoxy. A couple more passes with the sander over the entire boat, using 80 and then 120 grit paper, and I should be ready to lay on the first coat of primer.