All the trimmings

Fortunately, you can't tell the two bent pieces don't quite intersect under
the bow deck. Note the two slightly off-sync holes drilled yesterday.

What was going to be just a few minutes' work tonight turned into a few hours adding important cosmetic pieces to the ship. In addition to the stern board and a bow deck (two pieces I prepped last weekend), I also installed African walnut waterways on the main deck and quarter deck. (I previously referred to this as the poop deck, but the instructions use the term quarter deck -- and, I'll yield to them.)

The walnut adds a few nice touches. For one, aesthetically, it's nice to have a different hue to give the ship more texture and color. Additionally, these pieces go at the intersection points between different pieces, and they cover up those tiny gaps that really throw off the sense of solidity and scale.

The pieces on the main deck soaked for about an hour to become pliant. Alas, I cut them a little too short; they don't quite stretch the full length of the deck. However, they come about a quarter-inch of connecting at the bow, and the bow deck handily covers that small gap. The quarterdeck pieces were pretty easy, although the two parallel runners required some attentive sanding to get a good fit. The back piece also soaked for a while and needed sanding on just about every face to wedge in. Frankly, I'm not satisfied with the sternmost quarterdeck piece: it doesn't quite sit flush on the deck (which you can see in the picture at right), and the combination of its small size, sanding five of its six faces, and slippery wetness were very frustrating.

My wife said yesterday that Albatros is "starting to look like a boat," and that's certainly true from the deck. However, she's also quick to point out that it'd still sink pretty quickly: no hull, after all. Well, planking the hull is the next step. I'm feeling more confident about it now, having had success with the bulwarks and today's bits of walnut. There's still some plotting and scaling to do, so it might be awhile until I start with the hands-on.

Some of the decals for my next model

Planning further ahead: a few weeks ago, I bought my next model kit. It's about as far from Albatros as possible: it's plastic, a much smaller model (~5 inches) of a much larger vessel, and far removed from Albatros in time and space. Today, I ordered several Testors Model Master paints for the kit. The painting is optional, but I'd like to go back to basics and do right something I skimped when I was a kid -- and, in fact, this is a different iteration of a model I poorly built several times as a youth. It's decal-heavy, and that's something I used to struggle with, too. Might as well see whether I can do both or either right.

Another reason for this difference in the next kit is the expense of doing the wooden ships: easily $75 minimum for a kit, and often twice that or more. Before jumping into my next wooden ship, I need to make sure I get the best one for me and my wallet, and that includes even making sure there's a good spot for it at home. The little plastic fellow, less than $20 (the paint came out more expensive than the kit), will be a nice stopgap while I figure out my next big project -- or perhaps just a side trip in case Albatros drags and I need a distraction. But, even though I'm coming up on a month with Albatros, I'm not feeling even the slightest hint of ennui. I said it before, but always with a hint of wishful thinking behind it, and now I'm saying it with certitude: this was a great, thoughtful gift; I love it.