Folding Radar Mast

One day when we get to the canals we're going to need to have this folding mast. The fixed mast at the moment means that we need about 3.6 metres clearance under any bridges. By the time we've got this fitted and then fold the radar , TV and VHF antennae down in one movement we'll only need about 2.4 metres.

That means that a whole bunch of French canals are now possible and assuming we get back to Netherlands at some stage where we would have had to wait for bridges to be opened we'll be able to go straight thru.

The job now (after I've gone and bought the right tools) is to remove everything from the old one and then refit.

Guest accommodation

Visitors accommodation. Trudy and Justin arrived for a couple of days and this is the second time we've been able to try the additional bedding. We have definitely got better with the air conditioner and certainly comfortable enough for a couple of days.

It's been a lot more convenient this time as we're on a dock connected to the mainland. No ferries for us.

Morning walks and flex-a-rail

Most mornings we have been walking and getting in 5,000 steps before breakfast. I've got to admit that breakfast here in Slovenia has regularly consisted of coffee and a croissant while we're out.
We've kind of settled on two 'locals'. The morning local is pretty close to the Spar supermarket and the coffee (latte macchiatto) is the closest we can get to a flat white.
For the full price of EUR 5.80 we get two glasses of water, two coffees, a creme croissant and a jam croissant. Not bad.

I digress.

This morning we walked a couple of kms to a sailmaker hoping to be able to get some more flex-a-rail. As it turns out he's on holidays this week so I said I'd send him an email.

This is what the flex-a-rail is used for.

And this is the full version of the shade cloth that we bought from Bunnings in Australia.

The plan is to extend the rail so that it goes up both sides of the boat and when we come back next year we'll probably have another 3 or 4 metres of shade cloth.

Plenty of jobs to do

So yesterday I needed to clean out the grey water holding tank. There's an electronic sensor that detects when there is water and automatically turns on the pump. When it has pumped enough water out, the pumps stops. Sound simple, doesn't it.
Not quite, the sludge ends up providing the electronic contact and the pump keeps going and going and going. Anyway, I got sick of doing a quick clean every couple of weeks and this time I spent an hour or so down there giving the tank the best clean it's had in 8 years. Hopefully it'll be a while before I need to do it again.

We also discovered that the bottom part of the swim ladder was attached to the fibreglass with self tapping screws. Not ideal and two of the four were loose and couldn't be tightened.

This morning instead of the normal morning walk of 5,000 steps before breakfast we took a bus ride to Koper and walked to the chandlers and picked up some bolts and locknuts.

While we were in Koper we clocked up the 5,000 steps so it was time for breakfast. Coffee and a croissant each with this view.

While we were in Koper we also did a little shopping, had lunch and then came home to finish off those jobs.