Kurt down at Rich Passage was incredibly kind and helpful with getting us a new daggerboard and sail for the little boat. He’s been making Minto dinghies for the past few years & is a delighful resource. Our trip to his workshop was a fun little road trip. My, that gel coat on a new boat is shiny!

Natalie and I got ready for bottom paint. People have asked why we’re painting her; the 40 year old gel coat is just too tired to really bring back. I’m excited to try Awlgrip on the main part of the hull.

Brock finished up all the new tigerwood. We’re going with an oil finish. Easy to maintain, very warm and great feel to it. I’m a fan of  varnish in many applications, but this feels right for this project.

Rigged her with the aluminum mast that Brock had previously devised. The transition between the two pieces will require a little bit of modification to make it easy, but overall it worked great. I’ll be putting Awlgrip on that too, just to ‘prettify’ it.

And then came the lovely moment when we got to take her out on the water. There wasn’t a lot of wind, but then, she doesn’t need a lot of wind to make her move. We were mostly checking the waterline so I would know where to end/begin the bottom paint. The christening ceremony will be this coming weekend out here at Lake Roesiger. And then the summer of sailing can begin!