Last Sunday I returned to the Herrington Harbour North boatyard near Annapolis where my boat Phywave had been sitting for a year. I was happy to see everything lit up when I turn on the batteries despite an unusually cold winter here. Many small projects remain, like removing the non-toxic antifreeze from water and cooling systems, and a few big projects like blasting the hull to remove the blue antifouling paint that was poorly done in South Africa and replace it with the original black antifouling paint. Antifouling paint on fiberglass hulls can contain metal, typically copper, to inhibit marine growth but you can’t have copper on an aluminum hull due to dis-similar metal corrosion. Special ablative paint is needed. I’m also considering replacing the AGM batteries with lithium batteries for more capacity and faster charge times. However, lithium batteries on boats require more monitoring and careful use, not as robust and resilient as the AGM batteries I now have so I’m becoming a little reluctant about this project. Reliability comes from simplicity and redundancy, not complexity.