Cleaning, cleaning and more cleaning

The majority of my sailing experience came as a crew member on my friend's uncle's boat, the Talofa Lee, based out of West Vancouver. Captain Speck, the previous owner of that fine vessel, did well to instill very high boat standards into all of his crew. As a result, I've realized that I'm going to be a neat freak when it comes to my boat (which I consider a good thing).

Before I bought her, the Ripple hadn't seen much action for at least a year prior. As a result, she was a bit rough around the edges when she came into my life. Nothing a few brushes, a hose and some good old fashion boat work can't fix though!

This just won't do...

So this Saturday was the first official 'Ripple Cleaning Party'. I started early, tearing out just about everything in the cabin and giving it all a good scrubbing. It also served a chance to really explore the nooks and crannies of my boat, as well as inventory what I have/need.

Cleaning/Inventory

The more I dug into the boat, the more impressed I was with the amount of storage I found! Really quite impressive for only a 27 ft boat. Just about every wall panel has a cabinet behind it, as well as both settee births and the v-births. I was also impressed by how dirty some of said cabinets were...

Before and after!

After a few hours of wiping down the cabin, my friends Rhys, Shannon, Leilani and Max showed up to help the cleaning effort. I had thrown up a bit of bribery on Facebook the day before, saying that anyone that came and helped clean would get priority on trips this summer. I was more than happy with the turnout.

Once everyone arrived, we started in on the daunting task of "de-greening" the topsides. At first, we went at it with scrub brush and soap.

Making some headway the old fashion way

While we were cleaning, we met two of my neighbors, Steve and Sean, who both live aboard boats in the marina. Nice folks! First Steve offered to pick up some beer for us, then Sean offered to lend us his power washer. What a glorious piece of technology that thing is...

Now we're talkin'!

Before long, the Ripple was shining in the sun, and I was grinning from ear to ear.

Clean boat beers!

Overall, I'm super happy with how the day went. It was awesome to have some friends come out and get stoked on the boat. It was also very cool to meet some of my neighbors. I was a bit nervous about being "the new guy" in the marina, but so far everyone I've met has been very welcoming and helpful. So far so good!