Happy Sunday! Have you seen our latest YouTube video? Watch it here to join us for a day in our new routine, including a tour of the boat yard Sabado is staying at. 

Refit Diaries: 10/05/2025 – 10/12/2025

Let the boat work begin! We’ve hauled Sabado out of the water at Port Whangarei Marine Center, packed up all our belongings, and moved them off the boat to prepare for our upcoming projects. Seeing the interior completely empty is a little unsettling, but exciting nonetheless.

We’ve rented a house nearby, which softens the stress of our pending interior demolition. Taking hot showers daily and filling a full-sized refrigerator with groceries every week feels incredibly luxurious. The neighborhood is charming and everyone is very friendly. It’s on a scenic stretch of river, so we have been soaking up the colorful sunrises and local wildlife. The neighbors say you can swim in the river once it warms up. I’m definitely looking forward to summer!

We’re in a bit of a holding pattern until all of our equipment arrives for the boat. Half of it seems to be stuck at customs, and the other is still in transit, but, like most boatyards, we’ve quickly learned that nothing really gets done unless we’re physically on the boat— the moment contractors see our car parked nearby, they start stopping by one by one with plans, quotes, and progress reports. So, despite being limited in what we can accomplish, we pack a lunch and drive to the yard daily to keep things moving. This week’s projects included: 

Preparing to un-step the mast. We disconnected some of the wires to prepare to pull the mast. We noticed the cable for our IridiumGo antenna was rusty, which likely explains the poor connection we’ve been experiencing recently. We will need to replace that while we’re here. We are waiting on a quote from the rigger before scheduling the crane. If you’d like to see the full, detailed report (with photos) from our rig inspection, we posted it here. 

Removing the cockpit fridge. Over the years, the runoff from the helm area has rusted out the slides on our drawer-style cockpit fridge. The slides are built into the drawer, and replacing the drawer is nearly as expensive as replacing the entire unit. So, we have ordered a complete replacement. The fridge is original to the boat, so it took us a while to figure out how it was installed. Luckily, we discovered it was not bolted to the large metal bracket it was sitting in, but there was an impressive amount of sealant used around the frame that we had to hack our way through. We covered the hole with plastic and duct tape while we wait for the new fridge to arrive. To prevent damage to the new unit, we hope to design a visor to divert water over the drawer, and/or a lip to prevent water from the helm running down the ledge. You can watch the removal process in this video. 

Owner’s cabin demolition. After waiting on the carpenter for several weeks, we decided to complete the owner’s cabin demolition ourselves. Ray removed all the screws he could access, but because the bed was put together before it was put into the boat, many of the screws were hidden and had to be cut. The rest of the bed came apart like puzzle pieces. We saved the trim to re-use later. We plan to expand the base out to the edge of the hulls to accommodate more batteries, electrical components, and a new air conditioner. 

When we’re not at the yard, we’ve been enjoying hanging out with friends. Nick and Megan O’Kelly have been staying with us for the past few weeks, and we’ve loved chatting/decompressing/bouncing ideas off each other. Megan and I have joined a local pilates studio, and have been having fun trying new recipes each night. Ray and Nick have been playing with camera gear and discussing all sorts of boat-related things. This isn’t the first time the four of us have lived together for a stretch of time, but usually it’s on Sabado. They are equally good house guests as they are crew. 😉  

We’ve begun taping thick protective paper on the interior floor to prepare for next week. Our floors dent and scratch easily, so we’re hoping this will prevent new marks from appearing while contractors, tools, and equipment traipse in and out over the next few months. 

I’ve received the shipping notification for my sewing machine, and I look forward to learning a new skill and getting started on some upholstery and canvas projects. If you have any recommendations for where I can purchase Sunbrella in New Zealand, I’m all ears!  It’s also starting to look more and more like we will be executing our carpentry projects ourselves, rather than a carpenter. So if you have any local connections, we’d love to hear about them. We’re primarily interested in help with the cabinetry for our workshop conversion. This is the vision: 

The photo on the left is from a sister ship. We have not yet started the demolition of the port forward cabin on Sabado. The photo on the right is an AI-generated image of our design. We plan to lean into the workshop/garage vibe by using rubberized flooring and a pegboard to store some of our tools. 

Overall, it feels like we are settling into a productive routine. We look forward to taking you along with us as we work our way through our project list. A huge thank you to our Crew and VIP members and all of you who have reached out with recommendations for us. This is a team effort, and we are grateful for your support!