Every boat owner knows that it’s inevitable that you need to haul out your boat for regular maintenance. For some, it may be every 2 years for others maybe longer. It all depends on the environment your boat is in, it’s bottom paint as well as how it is cared for on a regular basis. We last hauled out Blue Turtle 4 years ago shortly after we bought her. At that time, she needed a lot more work than just a paint job. We replaced most of the the thru hulls, repaired blisters, replaced a hose for the stuffing box as well as removed a dinghy lift from the swim platform that we didn’t want to use. It was out of the water almost 2 weeks and cost a pretty penny. This time around, we only needed the bottom paint done since we had done most the other costly repairs last time. She was only out of the water 4 days and we thankfully, didn’t rack up the bill we had last time.

We took Blue Turtle to Olsens Marine Service (same place as last time) while we stayed with my parents for the few days she was out of the water. We got to get hauled out on their brand new travel lift that they assembled the week prior. Since it held up so well last time, we went with the same bottom paint, Interlux Ultra Blue, which is a hard paint . We also had our running gear painted as well. They paint the moving parts red so it shows up better under water for the divers. Even though our bottom was cleaned 2 weeks prior to the haul out, I was amazed at the hairy growth already on the bottom and props. For some reason, in our location on Fort Myers Beach, we have an accelerated growth of barnacles and it has to be dived every 3 weeks in the summer.

Now, she is back in the water is looking great. Hopefully, we can get 3-4 years out of this bottom job like the last one. With the cooler temps, we are ready to get off the dock and anchor out somewhere.