I arrived on Wednesday and the boat was in good shape. Less dirty than I expected - I guess no storms with desert sand from the South since August? The guys did a great job cleaning everything on Thursday for a price that McMichaels would have charged for the first few feet ....

Yesterday, the boat was launched again. They do a nice job here - lots of "marineros" helping. First, they lifted the boat up by a foot or so - to paint the bottom of the keel. See the first picture - I got stuck on the boat! Then they wait for the paint to dry and off it goes into the water.

I was a bit nervous about handling the boat by myself to get it into the "slip". There is no "slip" really - you're lying stern to the quay with a couple of mooring lines to the bow. So you come into the allocated spot stern first, stop the boat 1 meter from the quay, hand a stern line over to the waiting "marinero", take the leader line to the mooring, walk forward and haul in the mooring line. Helps if there's little wind and the marinero, after asking permission to come on board, ties up a second stern line and hauls in the second mooring line. Piece of Cake! We didn't even hit the quay!

The Amel crew is arriving for the "intervention" on Monday. Until they arrive, I have some work to do on the boat - plenty of entertainment. All is good!