After 2 years in the water, it was time for Guppy to get a serious manicure done. We hauled her out and worked like crazy for weeks to make her look all beautiful again. The rudder had to go back to bare steel to be retreated and so did some spots on the keel. I finally closed up one of the un-used through-hull holes which was always a potential leak… We polished the topsides to change its color back to her beautiful own red. And after we had put on some new Anti foul and anodes it was time for a sail!

Guppy, all ready to go back in the water.

Guppy & Guppy car

We had 2 great days of sailing on which we had an average of 7.5 knots! Well,.. okay, I have to admit that we had very good winds, but the clean and smooth hull did sure make a big difference. It was such a joy to be out on the water again, and I am especially glad we managed to take her out before heading of into the cold winter of Europe.. We will be in Europe with Family a while. But at least Guppy can shine in all her beauty now.

8 knots! Guppy and crew in their element 🙂

I have been toiling with the idea of selling Guppy for a while now, I have fallen in love with the taiwanese style clippers – like the formosa 51 and hudson 50 yachts. And so,.. even though it still really hurts – I would have to sell Guppy. I won’t just give her away to anybody though! After all she is my first love and baby and the best boat I could have wished for to do my circumnavigation on. If anybody is interested feel free to e-mail me at media@lauradekker.nl and I will give you some more info on her.

Another thing that has kept us busy is building a cabinet in our friends apartment. Over the winter they have been so kind to let us stay in their basement apartment which was warm and we didn’t have to paddle in the cold and rain.They mentioned that they’d like to have a cabinet in the kitchen, so we thought we would just build one from scratch.Neither of us had done anything like this before and so there was a lot of thinking work involved, which was Daniels job. I stuck with glueing, staining, varnishing and… well, what I do best of course – supervising 😉

Cabinet in the making.

The cabinet ready in it’s place. The windows resemble a New Zealand fern, or a wave. Whichever you see first 😉

We landed in Germany about a week ago – back in the fridge – and certainly worth the freeze as we really enjoy seeing our families again!

A fresh late Autumn walk with my little sister. ( well not so little anymore..)

Maggie, Kim, me & Daniel – on top of the Drachenfels in Germany.

Laura