Debt.

It’s a fact that saving our wreck of a tug cost an absolute fortune. And we’ve grown so used to dealing with the consequences that for us it’s usually just a fact of life, like furniture, or cheese. All that welding and all that time in a big shipyard cost serious money.
Occasionally however the stark truth gets up and bites one, or other, or both of us on the bum. In rebuilding Wendy Ann 2 we committed financial hari-kiri and plunged ourselves into massive personal debt. I shan’t trouble you with the details, but suffice to say that between us both we must raise £2053.77 each and every month simply to cover the repayments. Some people don’t believe us, but it’s true. Next time you’re wondering why progress might seem a bit slow, this is why. It’s also why I get a bit annoyed when people accuse us of having had ‘massive financial backing’. Er yeah- and we’ve got to pay every penny of it back with interest. This is not to say we haven’t had help from parents as well for which we are hugely grateful, but a trust fund it was not, and again every penny will be repaid as soon as we are able.
But I’m not complaining. Somehow or other we keep our heads above water, even if it is a desperate scrabble sometimes. All we can do is keep chipping away and work as hard as we can. In the meantime we constantly have to be very careful in balancing what we can spend on actual boat building, and when.
Why am I writing this now? Well, getting that foam in and all its associated preparation was an expensive task for which we worked, saved, and worked some more. Now it’s done, and it suddenly looks like winter is outside the window. Yesterday I sort of dropped the ball and got quite depressed, having become overawed (see above). Becky reminded me however that we’re always working to a plan. It is this; Earn money, split it proportionally in three directions starting with daily survival, then debt repayment, then boatbuilding. By doing it this way our situation is slowly but definitely improving.
So what next for the boat? Well, to all things a season. Over the years we have squirreled a fair amount of materials together down on the farm and now the insulation is done we can start to use them, which means that unlike a year ago this winter we won’t have to mothball our project. Instead I’ll be getting on with preparing and fitting these materials. This should enable us see a fair amount of progress on board without the need to invest any large sums of money over the next few months.