Well, the email you have all been waiting for - the photos of the boat! We moved onto the boat last week. At last! She is not quite ready, but ready enough for us to leave in about 10 days or so.

For those who don’t remember, JC had stripped most of “Taniwha” down to her aluminium ribs, literally gutted her. He has completely redesigned and rebuilt the insides to a modern style that suits us as a family and me as a princess. The boat used to have that typical nautical look with tight small spaces, dark wood everywhere and dark blue upholstery. The headliners (the ceiling) are now a crisp white vinyl with lots of chrome light fittings and we decided to paint the walls a vanilla colour with a golden varnish on the trim wood as a highlight. (photo close up of head liner, especially for Barry and my Dad!). The soles are a darker red colour. JC lowered 3 partitioning walls and the effect has been to open the boat up and make it feel really airy and bright -no more claustrophobia for me! The final touch was the fabric we chose for the salon and beds - it is a corduroy fabric with autumn coloured stripes. It looks great and has a spacious modern feeling to it, like a luxury apartment with sea views! Now that you have an idea of the style and colour schemes, I will attempt to walk you through the boat, starting at the front of the boat in the V berth area.

The V berth is where Saoirse will sleep while we are moored and will also be her play area while at sea. For those not too familiar with boats, the space is shaped like a V, due to the position it has at the very front of the boat (the narrowest point being at the very front). We have hung rope netting outside in place of a door, this allows us to keep an eye on her (and she on us!) and gives her lots of extra air flow and light. There are lots of built in shelves for all of her toys and under the large bed is ample storage for some of the boat’s spare parts and other boaty things we will not need to access on a regular basis. There are narrow long fixed windows on both sides allowing lots of light to come in and a large hatch above which can be set on various openings to let air and light in. She seems to really like paying in the V Berth and she sleeps better than on land - I guess all the gentle rocking motion is exactly what she likes!

Leading from the V Berth is the salon area. Here we have long comfortable sofas on either side of the boat. Starting with the left or port side, it has a large library which we have filled with books (note to any one intending to visit - bring books!!!), and there is lots of storage above and below the library. On the other side, or starboard side, there are also book shelves with lots more storage below the sofas. On this side JC has cleverly hidden the water maker which will allow us to have drinking water made from the sea water. There are many massive jerry cans filled with water too in case anything should go wrong with the water maker (you should always have a plan B and even C). We also have a filter on the tap so when we are at marinas we can drink the water from land. We have still to install, but will have a large computer monitor/ DVD on a swivel stand built into the salon wall with speakers on either side (front and back and even outside) of the boat and already have the hard drive which contains thousands of songs, so we can enjoy music. The salon table can be lifted or dropped low to allow us more space and can seat 7 people and the right hand/starboard sofa is in the shape of an L giving us that comfy extra seat for the 7th person. While we are at sea, the 2 sofas will be where we sleep, protected by the “lee cloth” which makes sure one does not fall out of the bed in a rolling sea! Oh, and guess who made the lee cloths… you guessed it - all those Home Economics classes at the Teresian School paid off!

Continuing on the left side of the boat is Saoirse’s changing station. This also has loads of built in deep drawers underneath and on top, which are big enough to fit all her nappies, clothes and all of our foldable clothes too. Beside this is the Navigational area (or Nav). We have bought all new equipment, so it is pretty much state of the art stuff. Apart from the electronics, this is also where the “good old reliables” live, like the sextant, paper charts……

Moving towards the back of the boat, beside the Nav Area is the toilet (or “head” as it is supposed to be called). I have rigged a netting system which holds all of our loo rolls (single ply!)out of sight and long term JC will install closed shelving behind the WC for extra towels. I still need to source a toilet paper holder and mounted cleaning brush.

Switching to the right hand side of the boat (starboard side), separating the salon area from the kitchen/galley is a gorgeous honey coloured countertop housing the massive freezer. The galley is very well equipped with a 4 stove gas hob and oven, freezer box, refrigerator, double sink and loads of storage space. We will have to start provisioning very soon and that will be interesting! JC has measured all of our kitchen appliances and ensured that each one has its own space. Pots and pans will hang against the centre board (the boat has a central lifting keel so the middle centre section of the boat has a “half wall” in wood which houses the keel and also acts as a protection feature to stop one falling from one side to the other) and kept still with rope or netting. Above the centre board we will hang netting for fruit and vegetables.

Opposite the WC and beside the galley is the shower room. Actually there are 2 rooms - one with storage for bathroom things and where we can dry off as well as hang foul weather gear when wet . We are lucky in that we can have hot showers if we want (in the tropics I doubt we will want that!). Above the shower room is a good size space where we will attempt to grow sprouts. Our friend Barry presented us with a bunch of seeds and assured us it was very easy to grow them and that they are very nourishing and tasty on a longer passage, providing all types of excellent nutrients. We are still experimenting to see which we like best of the 6 varieties he bought us!

We are now at the last 1/3 of the boat (the aft end) and also where you enter the boat. In the middle are wide steps leading up and outside to the cockpit area and on the left side is our double bed, with hanging space to the side of it (bordering the WC). On the other side of the stairs is JC’s “workshop” - yes, he has decided to make a floating work shop and has managed to incorporate most of the tools he has so that he can hopefully pick up casual work in the future, especially in places like the Caribbean and the USA where his work would be in demand. Beside the workshop and along the back right wall to the end of the boat are presses for longer term storage items like Saoirse’s pram, tinned foods, rolls of canvas for repairs and future projects, wood, etc.

That is the inside of the boat. It is bright and spacious and modern. Outside JC designed and commissioned a special “dog house” which protects us from the weather and any larger waves when sitting in the cockpit area. (We have ordered the windows for this and will receive tomorrow). We will have a special “Saoirse chair” fixed in the cockpit area where she will be out of the way but will have an awesome view of the sea. JC also designed and commissioned special sun shades over the cockpit area with mosquito netting on the sides so that in hotter climates we will be able to sleep outside in the cockpit area but will be protected from both the sun and the mozzies  XXXX We bought a sewing machine a few weeks ago and I managed to make wind breakers which are fit to the back sides of the boat, exactly where we will sit in the cockpit to protect us from waves and the wind. I intend to sew all of our curtains too - hopefully later this week. The material is an olive green colour.

We had the boat out of the water recently and painted the area around the newly installed dark windows black, so the boat looks very sharp, white and black with the aluminium bottom. All the sails and outside canvas is blue.

I hope the photos do the boat justice. I realise that there are still many things unfinished on the boat, but we have both resigned ourselves to the fact that the essentials are all nearly done and smaller things can be done in Brazil. The main thing now is to provision and leave for St Helena! I will write again before we set sail.