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Nov 22, 2007 - 2007 RETURN TO THE BOAT
by Beth & Al Liggett

You may recall our report earlier this year about leaving SUNFLOWER on a mooring at the Hole in the Wall while we went to the States for 6 months. We were VERY concerned about the preparations we made, as last year we came home to a disastrous scene - mold and mildew everywhere! The outside awning and dodger were black; the varnish was totally covered in black mold; the deck was spotted in all the places where covers weren't. And inside was a morass of green mildew. We worked days to clean everything up.

What went wrong? We think it was Al's "great idea" of positive ventilation using low draw computer fans to blow air into the boat. That it did - but the fans also blew in the mold spores along with moist air, providing an environment to encourage their growth! This year we were determined to beat the mold invasion. We did masses of cleaning with soap and bleach and a wipe down with vinegar the day we left. We built a sacrificial awning to go over the boom and stored as much as possible down below.

Our one big shock was finding a cockroach just a few days before leaving. Despite the chemical warfare, we were very worried about a proliferation of the beasts. I'm not sure what would be the worse to deal with - mold or roaches!

Well we had a SPLENDID summer in the States and have just returned to the boat. Because we arrived about 6:30pm in the evening we booked a hotel in town for the night. This gave us a good chance for catching up on some sleep. (26 hours of traveling tends to make me unravel a bit at the seams!) Also, we could do some basic grocery shopping the next morning before heading out to the Hole in the Wall.

Lucky for us, it was a dry day when we got back to the boat. We could get all the awnings organized - sacrificial ones down and our regular awnings up. We could leave the luggage on deck or in the cockpit while we got organized below. I say lucky because it has rained off and on ever since, very heavy this morning. On the bright side - this gives us plenty of wash down water!

Grunge along the side deck, right where we board. More elbow grease and it went away.

Basically, the boat is fine. The deck is again filthy with black dirt and green mold, but only in patches that correspond to the edges of the awnings we left in place. The sacrificial awning over the front deck did indeed sacrifice itself. It turned into a horror of different colors of mold! There were some substantial tears that we won't bother fixing, but generally it held together and did the job of protecting both the awning underneath and the dinghy over the hatch beneath it that we had left open.

The sacrificial awning over the boom that covered the whole deck, cabin top, and cockpit area was new. It was in fine shape, and surprisingly, hardly a spot of mold or dirt! (?) However, the varnish outside was heavy with black mold - just like last year. Now I just did the varnish a month before we left thinking that fresh varnish would stop the mold problem. Apparently not. Yet the white winch covers and the white cover on the steering pedestal - all directly adjacent to moldy varnish - were not moldy at all!

We had put the dodger down below, along with our regular awning and the mainsail. The sail and awning were on the floor and a real challenge to movement, and it was a squeeze to get around the dodger, but all of them were just fine. No mold. Well, a little on one inside fold of the awning right where the water collecting pocket is sewn.

Cleaning the cabin top. You can see the difference between the clean varnish and the moldy bit. All cleaned up well with soap and water.

There was mildew on the inside of the boat for sure. I don't think we will ever get away from that problem, but the mildew was not NEARLY as bad as last year. There was nothing on the ceiling over the galley. And all the mold this time was like a light dusting of powder. It all washed off pretty easily. So I guess all my efforts with cleaning and vinegar paid off by minimizing the mildew. Nevertheless, how would you like to return from a trip and find that you had to wash all the walls, cabinets, and floors in your house! It still smells moldy inside and will continue to smell until we can get a stretch of dry days and open everything up and put things outside in the sunshine to freshen.

This dorade looks pretty grim. It did clean up but is still stained. Varnished box is bright and shiny again!

The engine started OK. Had to crank it over several times before it caught, but it is running smoothly and starts instantaneously now. The frig/freezer system is working just fine. Pumps and lights are all working OK. One fan has expired - guess it liked its vacation mode too much. The batteries needed water, but showed a 13.5 V charge on return - we had left just one of our solar panels turned on to trickle charge the batteries while we were away, so that worked out well.

The big "drop dead" of this year's being away was the outboard engine. It was frozen solid. It would not turn over by any means. Al decided not to strip it down and try to fix it. This outboard is 7 1/2 years old. Last year Al spent a good bit of time with various fix-its just to keep it running. We said then that a new one might be in order. So we went shopping the other day in town and came back with a 2HP Yamaha.

The winch pad was moldy. The winch cover was NOT!!

Now - what about the critters? A cursory look around on arrival showed nothing. When we were washing the powdery mildew from the furniture by the dinette Al found a desiccated small roach. I found something that looked like a partial roach body. We found no other evidence of roaches. We've been back aboard now for more than a week. We've been in and out of lockers and drawers and under floors, had a lot of the interior topsy-turvy and haven't seen anything roach-like either. We've abruptly turned lights on in the middle of the night and saw no furtive scurrying-by bugs. So let's hope it was a timely alarm that let us see those few when we did.

It is lovely to be home again and time to get on with the next round of projects.