A few months ago, I didn't even know how to spell Philippines, now we are off to spend around 6 months there doing the "fit out" for our 48' catamaran. Silver Tern is now right side up and ready for Steve to start the interior framing. We leave for the Vancouver airport today and will be in Cebu, PI on Wednesday. We are excited to begin our new adventure.
Last February we visited the Harwood yard in Cebu, PI. We stayed at a local lodge and were picked up by Harwood's driver for the half hour ride to the boatyard. Juju, the driver was thrilled that he was the first Pilipino, pronounced Filipino, that we met. When he arrived at the lodge he asked for Steve and Fat. That was the first of many laughs we had with him. He later drove us up to the Mumby beach boatyard about 2 hours north of Cebu City which turned out to be right by his home. He lives in a one room house with his daughter and mother, having lost his wife a few years ago. The Pilipino people are small and very few are overweight, so I feel a bit like an amazon women next to them.
The designer of our catamaran, Tim Mumby, has developed an informal boatyard on a private mangrove beach in Carmen, an hour north of Cebu City. Several new Mumby 48 catamarans are here being fitted out. We hope to put our boat here after one of them leaves and use his workers to finish off the interior of our boat.In Cebu, we hear that there are two seasons, the hot and very hot ones. Yesterday,June 12, I looked at the weather forecast while in Canada and it said 30 degrees C but feels like 40. The humidity is 80%. Anyway, we are now on our way and will find out soon enough. I am looking forward to wearing shorts and sandals again but feel nervous about the enormity of the project.
