April.

Some photos from last week.  Put the steel pipe into the bow, and cut it to match the angle.  A rope will go through this pipe to hook to trailer wench strap onto.  

Drilling holes all over the boat, extra large to be filled with epoxy.  We realized a while back that some of these holes we were filling had air bubbles in them because we weren't getting the epoxy all the way through the hole, so this time we punctured the scotch tape one one side with a needle to let air escape and get the epoxy to entirely fill the hole.  That method seems to have worked well.  All these holes are now ready to drill to the correct size for screws/bolts.

We also built the boom.  I cut lengths of two pieces of wood with the circular saw and then we chiseled these out so that the boom is partially hollow.

We glued the two halves together with the hollowed out sides facing in, using a few screws to hold it in place while we put tons of clamps on.  Today we worked on the boom, routing the edges to make it rounded just like the lug and sanding it to perfection before applying its first coat of special clear epoxy hardener.

Today we built a belay pin for the halyard.  Debated using curly maple or black walnut, but went with the curly maple to keep with the theme of the boat, even though the walnut would have been really cool.  I think the maple is stronger, too.

Cut out a rudimentary shape, then sanded it down.  Et voila:

This will sit in a hole in the deck near the mast and the halyard (the rope that raises/lowers the sail) will be tied off on this.  We gave it a coat of clear hardener, too, along with the boom, the lug, and the mast.