April 3, 2025

Miss Helen 14

Thursday

The starboard side of the cabin trunk, with its fresh first coat of varnish from the day before, required a light sanding before I began with the wholesale varnish of the entire boat.

After final cleanup and tacking-off, I started the second maintenance coat of varnish with the on-deck areas, including coachroof trim and handrails, hatch frames, the forward end of the cabin trunk, and the cockpit coamings.

Before continuing with the other work, I dabbed more varnish on the new bungs on the starboard deadlight–any extra varnish I could get on the new wood would help to catch up the total coating–then worked on the port side to varnish the cabin trunk, eyebrow, and window trim, followed by the toerail, rubrail, and taffrail.

Now I repeated the process on the starboard side, starting with the cabin trunk (now the varnish I’d put on the bungs had cured enough that I could go right over it) and then the toerails.

When all was said and done, I applied a coat of varnish to the top part of the outboard rudder.

Total time billed on this job today: 4.75 hours