As I was needed to use up the rest of my holiday days and lower the amount of compensation hours I have. I needed to take 3 weeks off. As sitting home would be boring I decided to drive down to Marina di Loano and do some new installations onboard our dear Luna Azzurra.
So I departed from home Saturday the 12th of December around 9:00 in the morning. I did a first stop at the bakery close by to purchase a bread for a few days and a sandwich for my drive down.
It was a nice day. OK a little cloudy and some drops of rain when I left. But the weather improved as closer to the alps I came. When I was on the top it was good. Some snow beside the road though.
I arrived Loano approximately 14:30. This was a new record for the drive down. Was not much of cars on the road at all. Don’t know if this might be a covid reason. Nowadays to be allowed to enter Italy you must do a covid quick test, fill in a travel form. This to be emailed to the local health authorities in Ligurian before enter.
I did my covid test on the Friday the 11th as the test was not allowed to be older than 48 hours when arriving Italy.
The main idea why I drove down was to finally install the chain-counter for the anchor winch. As well to install the new VHF radio we bought a few months back and to mount a boom break so we do not need to mount preventer lines when we are downwind sailing for longer distances. Then of course some additional small checks for parts which are needed to be changed (blocks and UV protection for the mainsail).
On top of this some other planned investments to check measurements and places to install them. (Inverter, water maker and measurements for and solar-panel/ dingy arch in the aft etc.).
Number one priority was the chain-counter which I started to install Sunday. I thought this would take a day only but as wrong I was. When Looking at the wiring diagrams for the remote control it would not a big deal….. OK that was before I realised that the guy who had done the color code for the cabled to the remote control was color blind. In the end it took me 3 days to install the remote and get it up running/ counting. There was not one wire which had the correct color code.
When doing this job I realised that the quality of electric installations done by Bavaria yacht is a catastrophe. No connection boxes, all cables was only hanging loose. Will be the new projects to install proper connection boxes everywhere in the boat as it is the same for all cabling installed onboard.
After the chain-counter and its control was installed and working. It was time for the VHF radio. For this I only needed to remove the old cut up a bigger hole where it is mounted. When done it was only to connect the antennas (radio and gps) then connect power. After this start it up, install the MMSI number and on it was. A radio test was done after this I let the radio run for the rest of the day. This to hear the quality of the sound when other boats was talking to each others. The new radio have a really clear sound compared to the old one.
Next project was to check that the AIS sending our position to other boats too. We new before that we received positions for boats around us. But I wanted to make sure we sending our position too.
To check this I had to connect my computer to the AIS unit and do a control that our unit really transmitting our position. That it was working I could see after a few minutes.
With these two projects the most important tasks was done. Then it was time for going through parts on the rigging which needs to be planned in for an exchange before the summer 2021. We knew that we must change the UV protection on the mainsail. I went over to Balbi yachting where we normally purchase parts when we are onboard. This to ask if they have a name and address to someone doing this kind of work.
To my happy surprise Francesco and Alberto the owners told me that they are doing service on sails. As well that they could dismantle the sails for me. Then clean and service them change uv protection and take them onboard again. We will ask them to do this, will only need to inform Matteo our care taker first so he knows that they will be onboard. Plus so he don’t get a chock when he sees that the sails are gone.
When talking to Francesco and Alberto I also asked if they knew a company who could produce our dearly missed arch. On this arch we will install solar-panels plus to be able to hoist our dingy. They did not know anyone but told me that they would ask around. Two hours later Alberto came to Luna Azzurra and gave me a name of a producer and a boat in the marina who have one mounted. I went over and looked on it and it is exactly what we want.
Manufactured in France close to Marseille. Diana contacted them and within a few hours she received a quote. Look promising so far.
With solar-panels we don’t need to run the engine to charge our batteries. We can more easily lower the dingy in the water and drive ashore when laying at anchor.
So left was to take some pictures of parts needed to be changed and for places where it would be possible to install parts needed for improvement of Luna Azzurra.
Last evening I received a phone call from Diana.
She have had a flooding in the kitchen at home destroying the floor and some of the kitchen cabinets.
Most probably 400 – 500 liter of water was covering the floors before Diana managed to stop it.
When this happened the water was flooding the basement and destroyed the fuse box. So now we have industry dryers running in the kitchen and in the cellar.
More about this will be another post.
