“A Great Project”

I like to keep an eye on the boats for sale on Trademe (along with about 15 other categories of potential purchases including guitars, marine equipment, motorcycles, and fishing tackle). It’s a tragic hobby of mine.

Every so often there is an ad that includes the immortal word "project." It grabs my attention every time because translated, the word project means "guaranteed to soak up every spare minute and dollar you have, until your finances, marriage, family and life are in ruins."
Ladies and Gentlemen I present for your entertainment, some of the "great winter projects" that will one day ensnare some brave soul who falls in love with the dream - to the extent that he fails to see the reality.


Sound carvel planked hull

“A great rebuild for a keen and energetic person.”
Translation: Ignore the pair of industrial-sized skillsaws still sitting in the bilge. Please let us fleece you in order to remove ourselves from this nightmare of festering diesel, rotting timber and gaps between carvel planks that you could drop a Rottweiler through.

Don’t worry about the need for specialised building skills that are rare even among the top boatbuilding yards. You’ll be fine with your carpenter’s hammer, a box of galv nails and a gun of roofing caulk.


Piece of NZ boating history

“Stored out of the water and ready for restoration.”

Translation: You can think of all the people who have had fun on this boat for the thousands of hours you’ll need to work on it. Don’t worry about the gaping two metre by half metre hole through the keel. It’s there to let the water out. You can tell where the water came up to by the watermark a foot below the gunnel. It’s a good thing there is nothing inside or in the cockpit because it would only have gone rotten like the cabin top and engine beds.

And we’ve already started to strip the exterior paint by leaving it in the sun for 15 years – see how nicely that acrylic weatherboard paint is flaking off.


Big launch

“Stored in Shed.”

Translation: Hey, it’s in a big shed which is great. But the owner has decided he wants some rent and we have to move the launch on. The “only” work that needs doing is the cabin sides, hull bottom and transom. But the last owner started it for you by leaving the boat sitting in the water for so long that all the paint has fallen off.

Other than that it is completely sound.


Bargain trailerboat

“Old Hartley – ongoing project.”

Translation: Don’t worry about the badly tied blue Warehouse tarp over the top. These plywood hulls are renowned for their ability to withstand puddles of rainwater in the bilge.

Look what you’re getting – we mounted a kitchen sink on the cockpit bulkhead. Now how handy
is that and well worth the $1800 we’re asking for it. Oh, and it has no trailer so technically, it’s just a boat.


Hull with steel strengthening

“Very strong fibreglass boat. Has steel supports.”

Translation: We’re too stupid to know that what we have is in fact a female mould. We’ve faired it up but left most of the structural steel there. Just need another person with absolutely no knowledge of boating to complete this catastrophe.


The hull package.

“A winter project for the person who has always wanted their own boat.”

Translation: Did we say anything about it floating? This 35ft launch has sat in our back hard for 15 years while I smashed the whole interior out of it. Then I realised that I had no idea how to put another one back in.

The boys and I have spent many nights pretending to work on it while we were in fact bashing the sides of the crates we were sitting on drinking beer. But the missus caught us out and now our excuse for alcoholism has to go. We will be sad, but I’ve convinced her to let me buy a clapped out 1964 Chevvy – it has wide bench seats and enough room for 5 blokes and a crate of beer.


Needs a bit of work

“Hole in the side and needs a bit of TLC.”

Translation: This is a thoroughly rotten old jetboat. The hole in the side extends from the bow, right down the starboard side and half way across the transom. The jet unit is hanging there by the control cables.

This boat will first need a clean and by that we mean the chicken shit will need shoveling off it followed by a cleaner that would take the paint of the Auckland Harbour Bridge.


Let the Force Be With You.

“Unfinished project, selling on behalf of a friend.”

Translation: This old Force outboard used to run like a train but it’s been leaning against my tree for so long that the tree is starting to fall over. The cowl is held together by the decals and having it out in the open will have ensured that the cooling waterways will be sound and not corroded right through the block.

Me mate left the outboard as part payment for my wife when he took off with her. Will throw in a crate of Tui’s finest beer to the buyer.

“Unfinished projects” all of them. Sitting, mouldering away and waiting for the one buyer in 10,000 who has the resources, guts and skills to get to the end. Most will go to grace someone else’s lawn for another 10 years before finding their way once again onto Trademe. For the 9998 other buyers, there is astonishment and humour at the sight of the ad for these old wrecks and the feeling they would make a great way to mark Guy Fawkes night. Amen.

The Dreaded First Night Burnout

There is a mysterious and dangerous ritual that takes place at the beginning of just about every fishing trip.

The excitement of what’s about to happen, mixed with the trip “supplies,” (enough liquor to knock out several herds of Rhinos) mates freed from the usual constraints of life and hell bent on having a good time. These are the key ingredients, but mix in a little boredom and frustration that the trip hasn’t quite got under way and you have all the ingredients for First Night Burnout.

Who among you has not greedily eyed the trip’s liquor supply early on that first night and woken up the next morning wishing you hadn’t?

A First Night Burnout session might start with getting fishing tackle prepared or cooking up a feed. Note: The only green thing that should be ingested during a blokes’ fishing trip comes in bottles “World’s Best Beer” somewhere on the label.

Let’s say the evening starts with a knot tying session, lubricated by a few beers. Just a few, mind. At some time during this innocent early stage of the night there will be a dislocation in the space time continuum.

It sneaks up on you so stealthily that one minute its 9pm, you blink and it's 3am. There is rum in your glass and everyone is talkin’ shorthand.
Eventually someone will say something like “bejasis, look at the time.”

A glance at watches and clocks will show the little hand pointing to numbers like 3 and 4 and there will be a scramble for bunks as people realise there are only a few hours left before they have to be bright eyed & bushy-tailed for Day One of the trip.
But they won’t be BB&BT.

Invariably the first day of a fishing trip is clouded in pain, bloat, thirst and clumsiness. This is the inevitable result of First Night Burnout.
I’ve experienced several First Night Burnouts (although it might be more). Memorable ones.

Perhaps the most memorable took place during the infamous Cooks Beach Midwinter, a mates’ fishing competition that has already yielded the material for several of these columns.

No wonder it’s infamous! We’d arrived early and headed out for a quick fish. As we processed the snapper under the campground’s lean-to filleting area it poured with freezing cold rain and someone offered up a glass of drambiue.

The result was catastrophic. That dram tasted so good we just kept on going until a bottle and half of that – plus a wide assortment of other liquors – had been consumed and it was suddenly the wee small ours of the morning. Classic First Night Burnout.

I was pretty crook the next day, but managed to catch a fish. It’s just that my fishing mate, John managed to catch about 15.

At one stage I tried to quell the dancing demons in my stomach with a couple of slices of bacon and egg pie but that simply turned my gut into the Wall of Death sideshow ride from the Easter Show – the one were two motorcycles scorch round a vertical cylinder at ever increasing speed.

Then there are the times when First Night Burnout leaves you with very little chance to sleep before you are due to go fishing. One of these occurred at Omaha, shortly after a mate found a brand spanking new bottle of Cointreau in the liquor cupboard. I didn’t even know we had a liquor cupboard.

What fun it was to light the wineglass size servings we dished out to ourselves, watch the blue flame shimmer over the surface, then knock back the warmed liquid.

Until we realised that the bloke we were going fishing with would already be on his way down State Highway 1, boat in tow, from Wellsford. Desperately we tried to cram in some sleep but it could only be crash and burn material when our mate turned up at 6am ready to hit the water only to find the rest of us crawling around on all fours searching for a grave to fall into.

It was a slow day on the boat that day and no lovely refreshing ale at midday could make things any better. Not a lot said either.

These are just two insignificant examples in a long string of unfortunate First Night Burnouts. I’ve suffered first day hangovers snapper fishing, marlin fishing, in fishing competitions, on big boats and small.

There seems to be no way round First Night Burnout – at least until we decide that a couple of days of hard-out fishing with mates is not fun and is not something to look forward to with a burning desire. Without the excitement and the “not quite there” frustration, there will be no First Night Burnout.

I have had a taste of that day. I went away for three days with guys who didn’t drink, who went to bed early (and who brought along green things they called food and actually ate them!)

Fishing trips have never been so dull…