Its been so wet and windy recently that our winter painting has been delayed by weeks. However the sun has finally come out to play for a couple of days and so the brushes have been busy. Our tender has a new combing and cross bench and two coats of topside paint while up on the quayside. She is looking much happier. (She is a 1960's heavy fibreglass racing dinghy, a cross between an Albacore and a Norfolk One-design, with a gunter rig and an outboard, so when we aren't sailing Snark, we can potter on the river under sail)
People wonder why we have a spritsail rig rather than the more conventional gaff rig. Well Snark was originally designed as a cargo ship and the sprit was an essential part of her cargo handling facilities.
Allowing the goods to be unloaded quickly and with minimal manual labour.
I can shifting the 350kg tender on my own with the aid of the sprit (the long diagonal spar) a burton purchase (that's the pulley at the top of the sprit) and in our case a couple of electric winches.
And while she is hanging there it's a good chance to apply a new coat of antifouling to her bottom.