A visit to Piggy

On the deck

Piggy, an Ariki built in the 1970s by Tom Hembroff and his brother, is moored fairly near us. Piggy is still Tom's boat, and this summer he had her up on the beach for maintenance. We went for a visit. Tom was very kind and welcoming and amazingly patient with our excitement about seeing his boat. (This is Piggy! Tom and his brother circumnavigated the world, "and then some," on this boat. And rhere's a story about Piggy on the Wharram website! She's famous!)

An Ariki is not a Narai, of course, so things will be different on our boat, but we really enjoyed the opportunity to explore the interior. And we especially enjoyed the opportunity to talk to Tom, and to stand on the deck and daydream. Piggy has some lovely touches, and we both hope Tiger is as lovely and well cared for in 40 years.

Nice sliding panels in the galley

It was absolutely fascinating for us to see this lovely boat, partly because she is the first Wharram we've seen who has actually been all around the world, and partly because she looks so great after forty years of sailing, and partly because Tom's made some really interesting choices. Since we've decided not to build the deck lockers for mounting outboards, we were especially interested in Piggy's auxiliary power. (Tom uses his inflatable dinghy with an outboard, hauled up to push against a purpose-built point under the aft deck.) We will write more about this as we think about it more.

Testing the berth

Once we got home, we realized we had many pictures of Piggy details, and not even one of Tom. Oops! Obsessed is maybe a harsh word...

Between the hulls

In this between-the hulls picture, you can see the spot where the dinghy nose presses. (We're looking aft in this photo.) Tom's also working out ways to sling the dingy under the deck, between the hulls, for sailing. Really interesting ideas! In the picture below, you'll see the outside-hull addition of a bracket where at one time Tom had a dagger board. The additional tracking the board provided sounds very impressive. 

Ready for bottom paint. 

Welcome home, beams

Beams arriving home. Yay Matrix! The oddest load yet.

Finally, a post! And finally, the beams are home in the boat shop. Robbie and Trevor moved them from Trevor's shop on our trailer, two at a time. The three of us, with help from Richard, our neighbour Rick and Rick's ultra-cute puppy Molly, got them moved into position. (No photo of Molly available.)

Tucked under the cradles

Interiors

Robbie and Trevor are at work on the interior of the first hull. We see dramatic progress daily, but since the dramatic progress involves gluing small bits of wood in and painting things white, it might not look as dramatic for spectators. Here are some photos, anyway. Soon we'll burst up out of the interior and on to the deck and cabin top, and there will be lots of more visual progress.

Trevor beginning his life's work. Four coats... yikes.

After coat two.

Fillets. And more fillets.

Chart table mockup

Painting is a slow process -- two coats primer, two coats top-coat, all while poised on the verticals and stringers. We're using one-part polyurethane and it looks amazingly white. In the bilge and the stern and bow compartments we've chosen bright white. The rest of the interior (above berth level) will be Hatteras Off-White. It's -- well -- off-white. No decision yet on the hull colour.