I built the hull to her planned lines, only raising the height of the cabin by about 2 inches. I use her as a daysailer, so I decided not to cut the companionway, since the cabin is only a storage area for the infinite amount of boat junk that finds its way aboard. Also, I was inspired by another Nancy's China project to step my mast on-deck inside a small support which I built from some scrap lumber. My mast is a hollow box-mast which I constructed out of sections of 1x4 arranged in an overlapping pattern, then wrapped in bands of fiberglass. The mast has two shrouds plus the forestay for the jib. It has held up very well, and I've even shimmied myself up to the top to retrieve an errant halyard without any protest from the mast.

I also added a short bowsprit, partly because I like the way it looks and partly for sail-trim, and I've only run it into one bridge pier so far. LOL! I decided to gaff-rig her, and I must say that this kind of rig is quite beautiful and functional on a boat like this. I can't point into the wind quite as far as I could with a bermuda rig, hence my tacking suffers a bit, but I gain an advantage off the wind and I can use a shorter mast. And with so many Bermuda-rigs out there, it's neat to be one of only a handful of gaffers out on the water. The gaff rig adds a bit more complexity, but even so, it only takes us 20-30 minutes to rig and launch her.

I originally made my own sails from white tarp with a PolySail kit I found online. That was only to be a temporary thing until I could afford to have a professional set made. My homemade sails worked decently, but my new sails work better, look nicer, and improved our light-air sailing. I also now have the luxury of a reefing point on the main. How novel!

I've added navigation lights (for those accidental evening boating experiences), a small store-bought electrical panel, and a couple of used aircraft batteries from work for an electrical system, however, I will be replacing those shortly with a better deep-cycle Optima battery. I also plan to add a solar cell for battery charging.

I painted her with one-part Interlux "Brightside" paint. It's simple to roll on, not too expensive, and since we ding up the boat quite a bit with our excellent displays of seamanship whilst docking, it's easy to repaint. She is white on the hull, and a light beige on the topsides to reduce glare. We are blessed here in Southern CA with a lot of sunshine, but it does strain the eyes greatly when it gleams off of a bright-white surface. I used a light-brown for the mast, some miscellaneous items, and the lettering\numbering. I was amazed to find that choosing colors was the hardest part of the building process.