Australia’s answer to Britain's famous seadog , Lord Nelson, correspondent Peter Burleigh , and his caulking consort , Lady Judi , have been missing for yonks , feared captured by the Spanish as they crossed the English Channel to get their cruiser , The Butterfly , out of mothballs in France . Semaphored under great difficulties and at extreme expense , Pete breaks his silence.
Burleigh love boat embraced by French cradle
 |
|
When
explorers go missing, the public expects they have been distracted by an
insurmountable challenge – for example, climbing Mt Kilimanjaro one-legged, on
a pogo stick – but in this case it’s a combination of unnatural elements which
has caused our silence.
Instead
of the warm Spring welcome we expect, we are blown into the boatyard under a low
ceiling of rainclouds. Our first job was to prime and paint anti-fouling on the
bottom of the hull and repair several scars above the waterline, caused last
year by lock gates and walls leaping out at the boat without warning and
savaging the paintwork, but days pass in a fast-forward weather mode: 30
minutes of light rain, 30 minutes of overcast, 30 of high wind, 30 of sunshine,
30 minutes of heavy rain, then 30 of the above, randomly combined…and so on,
preventing us from working outside.
Observing
this from my
position lying under the boat, and participating in the weather by allowing
rain to run down my neck, I realise that Michelangelo had it very easy in the
Sistine Chapel. Mike had a roof. He was out of the weather. His paints were not
made from the most carcinogenic chemicals known to man. The Chapel ceiling did
not require anti-fouling. His foreman was the Pope, who was required by the
Commandments to be nice to him.
Despite
a boilersuit, gloves, hood, goggles and mask I feel the mutations occurring in
my blood and brain as the anti-fouling goes on. Three coats of it. Thick,
syrupy stuff, probably radioactive as well as everything else, attacking the
lungs and bone marrow and very hard to get off the skin; after trying steel
wool, white spirit and acetone amputation seems an easier solution. The foul fumes bring on fantasies. Lying on
the cold gravel clutching my paint roller and staring at the bottom of the
hull, I wonder if every boat is indeed a ‘she’, whose bottom would I prefer to
be painting?
My imagination tries Angelina Jolie’s (too
much plastic) and Janet Jackson’s (wrong hue) and ends with Mother Theresa’s,
which finished off that line of
speculation. Eventually her bottom (the boat’s) was adorned in a beautifully
smooth, vibrant Varicose Blue. Judi’s deft turn with filler, brush and
sandpaper concealed the bumps and grinds. The annual search for spots of rust
must wait for better weather.
KILLER CAT
The
boatyard at night is a creepy wilderness of deserted boats and shredded
tarpaulins snapping in the wind. Staying on board is possible, but to climb
down the ladder and go to the outdoor WC at 2am is not pleasant. This year we
rent a tiny cottage in the yard and enjoy its Sistine benefits – a roof, a
fridge, a kind of kitchen, heating and no ladders. You can read a chronology of
its past inhabitants by the layers of dirt in its corners, like the rings in a
treetrunk. For all that it is fun, and a kind of luxury. The dominant Tomcat in
the yard visits regularly, ready to fight intruders both feline and human. Both
his ears are bitten off, so there must be an even tougher cat around, probably
named Tyson.
After
10 days we are lowered into the Burgundy Canal by crane. No matter how many
times we do this, there are moments of sheer aghastness as the boat swings
perilously close to the concrete wharf. The voyage from the wharf to the marina
is at least 800 metres, and here we still lie, watching a new galley cupboard
and stern hatch being installed, and standing by to replace a fridge which
flattens the boat batteries overnight. A plate in our gearbox is (apparently)
in Dijon for re-drilling and refurbished connectors. The mechanic told us he
would not let us leave, as the part may have failed at any moment. As we are
considering a trip down the Danube, a major engine breakdown in that river’s strong
current would be a MAYDAY event…and do the Albanians recognise the MAYDAY
signal?
The
lack of Internet access again reveals how dependent we are on our computers.
After a week I get the twitches. Judi goes through the security fence to sit on
a plastic chair in the carpark, where she picks up a Wifi signal on her i-pad.
My PC laptop refuses to consider recognising the signal in such an uncouth
environment, so I am reduced to silence, made enforced by Apple’s refusal to be
compatible with Windows machines.
With
our repair and installation projects holding us back, our departure date for
canals unknown is unclear but we are maintaining our normal standards of
indulgence (a new benchmark was reached on Singapore Airlines when we had Pate
de Fois Gras followed by fresh Lobster Thermidor).
But
wait. Our new refrigerator, an identical twin to the one which had a coronary
last year, has arrived at the marina and it’s only been dropped a couple of
times, probably from less than three metres above the ground. What are you
going to do, try to get satisfaction for an international Internet purchase in
France? No, our way of handling it will be to keep the new fridge in its carton
for as long as possible. This way we can’t see any damage until the last minute
and, a big and, there remains a remote chance that only the cardboard packing
has been bruised. NEXT : A language warning
followed by Parramatta Virgins who add
to frantic shipboard
activity .
