Post-Sea Trials-- Maintenance Continues and Renewed focus on deckhanding

Jonathan, aloft bends a messenger line
 onto the errant halyard 

 In the ten days since Spirit of South Carolina's Sea Trials, various volunteers have come aboard on four separate occasions to advance existing projects or start new ones. 

Starting as early as the following Thursday,  Apprentice Volunteers came aboard.  Jonathan Bautista went aloft to the foremast top to retrieve the loose throat halyard that had come loose from it's pin. 

 He joined fellow Apprentice Keshaun Holmes and Bryan Oliver back on deck working out some sticky geometry problems to cut the pattern out for a new Foremast boot, to replace the torn and leaking one.

The following Saturday, on the 11th, Volunteers mustered aboard and started with up rigging the Jumbo boom which had been secured on deck. Nate and John Hart laid out forward on the bowsprit to complete the jumbo luff hanks. 

Meanwhile,  Old Salt Shipwright, Kenny Blythe borrowed a couple of belaying pins as patterns. 

Kenny Blythe delivers the long-anticipated
 belaying pins 

With some stock supplied by Joe Gorman he milled out five new Purpleheart belaying pins to fill out the mainmast fife rail and six smaller pins of white oak, to be positioned on the main boom jaws. He delivered them just in time for this last Saturday's group of Volunteers to fine-tune and fit them to the rail, and finish them with several coats of Deks olje D1 sealant/preservative. 

 This past Volunteer Day, on July 11th, Volunteers picked up the pace. With days getting only hotter, the intent was to get the bulk of projects advanced by lunchtime so that afterwards would be devoted to securing from from all work, cleaning up, and may be a practice of some individual deckhand skills. 

Immediately after the 0900 Muster, Danny Johnson split off with John Hart to the floating dock  to start constructing a pair of cradles to better secure the dory, with flexibility of the hull being stored upright, or overturned.

Nate's sawdust-encrusted forearms
would confirm he'd been working 
with purpleheart.

Calvin Milam, John Hart and Nate Mack started in finish-sanding, then oiling the 11 belaying pins Kenny had delivered earlier.

 Jonathan Bautiste, having recently achieved the milestone of 100 Volunteer hours, was now closing in on his 120 Apprentice hours target, by getting the last coat of white paint on the newly installed Foremast boot.

Jonathan Bautista checks his work
 after the last coat of paint on the Foremast boot.

Lexi Fine and John Whitsett, laid out the recently well-patched dory mainsail over a salvaged C25 main sail to see if it's lower part could be repurposed  to be sewn up  to replace the old patched up mainsail.  

To close out the work day by lunchtime, the entire volunteer crew lined up on a line to stretch out the Jumbo staysail foot and shackle the clew to her boom end, then lay out on the bowsprit to harbor furl. 

With the next Saturday being effectively a "lay-day" for Volunteers, there would still be a few projects to advance over the coming week.