Today we had lots to do, so it was an early rise for Rita to catch the train to Moissac where she had a series of meetings arranged in connection with the house renovations and also for the Fêtes des Plaisanciers to be held next year. For me, today was the day to get the new vinyl cover onto the wheelhouse roof.

But first I needed to find a bricoclage to pick up some hardware that I needed for the job. So I did a Google search and found very few bricolages in Agen - the nearest seemed to be in the outlying suburb of Boe. So I jumped on my bike to ride to Boe along the canal towpath. But despite lots of searching and further references to Google Maps, I couldn’t find anything. So with the noon lunch break rapidly approaching, I dropped into an Intermarche on the way home to at least pick up the essentials of screws and gaffer tape, which I knew I would definitely need, and leave the rest for another day.

When I got back to the barge, I removed the aluminium straps that covered the joins between the three sections of the wheelhouse. Most of the securing screws were totally rusted, so should have been replaced anyway.

As I was sitting on the roof removing the straps, Rosa cruised through the basin on the her way to points east.

I then got on with cleaning the “gunk” out of the joints and then taping over the joints with gaffer tape. Since this tape will be fully covered with the vinyl covering it doesn’t need to be fully waterproof, but being out of the weather should help it remain in good condition for longer. If ever it needs to be replaced, it will just be a matter of peeling back the vinyl cover and replacing the gaffer tape.

The next job was to screw the Velcro to the edges of the wheelhouse roof. I experimented with various configurations and spacing of the screws (based on how many screws I had) and got all sides done in a couple of hours. A few days later, I bought more screws and reinforced the Velcro fittings along the lower edges. I think the screwing will last much longer than if we had used glue.

While I was screwing the Velcro to the edges, Rovi arrived in port and moored near us along the bank of the basin.

The next job was to put the vinyl on the roof, but first I had to drop the bimini to half-mast, since the vinyl had to go under the fittings that attach the bimini to the wheelhouse roof. Since we got so much practice lowering the bimini when we did our trip down the Midi this year, I was able to do it by myself pretty quickly this time around.

The next thing was to do was lay the vinyl across the roof. But when we rolled the vinyl onto its roller (a long piece of 2x1 pine) at Terrie's after she did the sewing, we rolled it up the wrong way, with the Velcro strips on the inside. So the first thing to do was to clumsily reverse the vinyl on the roller, to make it easy to then position and roll it out on the roof. It was then just a matter of stretching it out and adjusting the edges overhangs, and sealing the Velcro edges onto each other.

The final job looked pretty good to me; now i’ll just have to clean the top of the bimini so that it's the same pristine colour as the wheelhouse roof!

The only thing that we need to finalise is the design of the corners, although one of them turned out pretty well, and should prove to be a waterproof solution. We’ll wait till we get back next year to finalise the corners.

The final job was to return the bimini to the roof - but I soon realised that this was a 2-person job, and decided to wait until Rita returned to finish the job. And then it was beer o’clock, and I enjoyed a cool one on the rear deck.

Around 1900h, Rita arrived home on the train from Moissac, we put the bimini back up and then invited Rob & Cherie from Rovi across for a few sundowners (an Aussie term for drinks at sunset). A nice way to end a productive day.