Cygnus Vedrae, our home

Hi everyone,

Kath and I are new to this forum and would like to say 'hello'. We are long term live-aboards and wouldn't change it for the world. The boat we share is pictured below, Cygnus Vedrae. The photo was taken in 1972 and shows her crossing the Wash, an area of the North sea in the east UK off the Norfolk coast. We didn't own her then but I keep the photo because it's the only one I have that shows her under sail.

She was built by Geo Wilson, a firm that is now more than 100 years old, in 1950. She was launched on the river Thames, London, in 1951. She was number 3 in a class of 5. The first one in the class was sold to the government of the Shah of Persia. I have an article somewhere, if I can find it I'll post it in the future.

Cygnus Vedrae. 30 feet long with 9 foot 6inch beam. She draws 3ft 3in. The engine is a Coventry Godiva 4 cylinder diesel in perfect running order. The drive train is hydraulic. She is built from mahogany on oak connected with thousands of copper nails. The sails that came with the boat were brand new and made from terylene. I haven't used the boat at sea so I've never had cause to use the sails. They are still a bonny red, as a previous owner descibed them.

I found her in 2001. She had been neglected for some time and needed some TLC. The work still carries on and we still have a lot to do. However, if you make the decision to take to full time life afloat you need to be comfortable and warm. We're based in the north of England which is an area not known for the best weather, in can be very cold. As I write this we're in the middle of a cold snap and temperatures have been down to -10C. Apart from the essential hull integrity, which has been maintained, most of our efforts have been inside the boat. I must add that prior to buying Cygnus I had never had a wooden boat and had zero experience in working with wood.

We moved aboard in September 2001 and the only heating on the boat was a single gas fire, 1950's vintage. The amount of condensation over that first winter was crazy, but I'll come back to that.

What follows is not in date order, it just seems easier to start at the stern and tell you what we've done to make our home civilised and warm. What we've done we've done for us, your own needs may be different.

Stern. When Cygnus Vedrae was built she was a 'gentlemans motor yacht' and kitted out to suit. In the stern was a full width bunk / seat. We took that out to make room for an automatic washer / dryer and a 3 foot freezer. Apart from everday wheelhouse kit the stern is also where we keep the fridge. The chart table doubles as the stand for an electric combi oven/grill/microwave and the toaster. If you look at the picture above it's easy to imagine the 45 degree PVC sheet that was used to close the boat up and keep the weather out. We ditched this and had a new cloth one made which utilises an aluminium support frame. The effect of this is that we have headroom of about 6 feet across the whole of the stern, which gives us about 4 feet more boat, brilliant.

Salon. This is where most of the internal expense was. The original layout of this cabin was pretty much as you might expect. To enter the cabin, from the stern, you step down through beautifull mahogany doors on the starboard side between a narrow wardrobe and the engine enclosure. There were bunks down both sides. On the starboard side against the shower bulkhead is a ventilated cupboard over the gas fire. At the side of this cupboard is a bookshelf.

The first thing we did was to replace the dangerous old gas fire for a modern catalytic heater which is much safer but doesn't prevent condensation. On the port side we completely removed the bunk and installed a solid fuel stove. Condensation problem solved. We haven't used the gas fire since. The rest of the port side is cupboard and drawer space. Now we can put stuff away. We've had to use modern cupboards here. When I checked the price to have the same thing as we have now custom made for the boat in mahogany I nearly fell over, and quickly decided that this was a compromise that had to be made. Looks okay though. As well as living aboard we also work from the boat, so made space for 2 standard computers. Laptops would have been better and we may well change when we have more money available.

The head. When we got the boat she had a sea toilet fitted with a 16 gallon holding tank. We took the whole thing out because I wanted to install an extra water tank. I've not done this yet but need to get it done because our existing water tank is only 16 gallons. It was suggested by some bright spark that we could use the toilet holding tank, given a proper clean. I imagine that you can guess where I told him to go.

We replaced the sea toilet with a portapotty, tiled the head area and fitted a shower. It works fine, enough space for both.

Galley. The galley was stripped out completely and new units fitted, modified to suit the hull shape. With a new sink and drainer and a new 4 burner stove we were finished, but as it turns out, not quite. On a camping trip a couple of years ago we were invited to a neighbours BBQ. This is where I first came across the Cobb grill. What a piece of kit. I won't go into this any deeper here but I strongly recommend you have a look. It can be used at home, on a boat or camping. One of my websites has video and recipes for the Cobb, take a look.

Bow Cabin. This used to have 2 'Vee' berths. Apart from the dozens of hours spent stripping and painting the cabin, we've only really done 2 things. On the starboard bulkhead we installed a Morco gas boiler. It's the only bit of kit I've regretted buying, it's been nothing but trouble since it was [professionally] fitted. I couldn't send it back because I'd actually had it, brand new and in its box, for more than a year, before it was installed. I got it while we had the cash knowing we would need it. I don't know if others have had problems with the Morco or maybe we got a rogue unit. It'll have to go.

We left the 'vee' bunks in and simply bridged them to produce a very large double bed.

In future posts I'll go into my experience of having to learn woodworking from scratch. Chopping a hole in a wooden boat is a very scary thing to do, if you've never done it before...

I should point out that as part of my business I act as an affiliate of Amazon.com. I was genuinely so impressed with our Cobb that I added it to our product list. I hope you'll not hold this against me.

Thanks for reading, Stu and Kath, Cygnus Vedrae.