Finally A Job I Enjoy!

I have been working at Noakes Boatyard for the past four months. I have finally found an Australian job that fits me and I am finally doing something I enjoy! After working construction and doing odd jobs for over two years, I am very happy to take pay cut to do something more challenging and rewarding.

Noakes is a boatyard that caters to sailing yachts and wooden boats. The owner is a collector of wooden boats, and several of the shipwrights on staff have years of experience with timber yachts. My job is simple, I am starting at the bottom, of the yacht that is, sanding and painting the underbelly of boats with anti-fouling and prop-speeding.  This is the bottom paint on a boat that keeps marine growth from accumulating when it's in the water. I have been doing a lot of  polishing, and the odd engine service. I also look after the boatyard's old mobile crane and it's 80 ton travel lift. The travel lift can take boats up to 80 foot out of the water to be put onto hardstands so they could be worked on. Supposedly we are getting a new travel lift in December so we are attempting to keep the one we have running for a few more months. We also have an old travel lift from the 1970's that is about to fall apart and the plan is to scrap it soon.  I did get the chance to be part of a massive project removing a straight eight cylinder Gardner diesel engine from one of our ferry's so it could be rebuilt. It took four of us over a couple days to remove the engine, which is the largest engine I have ever worked on. We had to cut holes on the roof of the ferry to use the crane so we could move it, It was a massive project.  The other day I took a few pictures of the yard. The timber yacht in the slings is in the old travel lift that rarely gets used,behind it under the tarps, is the ferry which weremoved the engine from.

Everyone I work is very nice and most of the guys are involved in sailing of some sort. About half of the staff goes on the Sydney Hobart race every year. Emily and I have booked tickets to Hobart for Christmas to see the finish of the race, but we have a very special trip coming up next week. We will be staying in Port Stephens for a few days celebrating our third anniversary of meeting each other,and Emily's birthday is on the 24th.  We cant wait to get out of the big smoke(Sydney) and see some of the countryside!