Well, here we are again, after another long time without posting.

We have had a good summer down on the river & are now preparing for the next winter,just hoping it is not as long & hard as the last one.

We are unfortunately still experiencing a few leaky problems with windows & I have today begun to remove & reseal the arched windows which,run along the entire lenght of Warrior. To gain acess to the windows, I have removed most of the timber cladding from the kitchen/dinning room wall. I have managed to remove one window today, cleaned it all up & replaced it so, now that one has been done, the remaining seven should go a bit easier,now I know what is involved.

It also gives me the chance to increase the insulation & update some of the wiring that is usually hidden from view.

I will upload some photos of this work once it is all done so,don't expect them for a while!

Long time.

Well,it has been a few months since my last post on here,how time flies!

It has been such a long, hard winter on the Crouch & just when things looked promising with the start of 'summer time', it seems as though winter has returned just in time for the Easter weekend.

We have not done a lot of work on 'Warrior', apart from the usual daily/weekly chores of tightening ropes,filling the water tank etc etc however, we have been busy in other directions.

With no luck on the job front, I decided to start up my own business.To give me a good base from which to begin, I attended a two week 'Business start up' course in Southend.This was on the promise of a grant of £3k from Southend Borough Council however, three days into the course, it was decided that I was not eligible for the grant, as I live outside the catchment area,great!

Any of you that has started up in business knows the amount of work involved,from research, through to the all important Business Plan.

Anyway, to cut a long story short(ish) I begin trading on the 6th April & here is my website address,giving basic information;

www.keepsafepat.co.uk

If any of you out there in cyberland, work in a company that requires Portable Appliance Testing to comply with the Health & Safety in the Workplace Act(yes I know it's a boring subject) then,please do pass on my details the the person responsible within your company, or email me at, keepsafepat@gmail.com with contact details & I will do the rest.

Just the mess to clean up.

Although we kept the site as clean as possible, on a daily basis,there was still a lot of mess covered by the hull. Most of the area was covered in the remains of the shot blasting grit,after a couple of hours of sweeping & hosing down, we were finally ready to leave our boat yard prison.

Back on the mooring, safe & sound.

We could not relax until Warrior reached the water, as there is always the chance of the hull breaking its back. When something weighing 58 tonnes & 85 feet long is lifted, any weak points are going to be found out under the stress.

At least they chose high water this time, so there was not too far to go!

At last!

8.30am Friday 11th December & Warrior is lifted into the misty air,ready for the nervous journey back to the mooring.

I finished painting the areas covered by the chocks, at 9.30pm the night before. I make that about 50 hours spent just painting underneath, without the preparation time.

Nearly there.

Just the sacrificial anodes to bolt on then, Warrior will have to be lifted by the hoist & moved a few feet forward to allow access to the areas covered by the wooden chocks. I will have to paint these areas during the evening prior to the relaunch.