These sailboats you see in Panko Marina have sailed the high seas to get here. They come from around the world and each one has its own uniqueness. They tell a tale and if you're willing to listen, there's much to learn from the owners.
Today, we have the opportunity to speak with a couple who built their own sailboat and went on to spend 30 years sailing together. Everything they learned is in their sailboat. 30 years ago, Hank and Lucy built their steel catch named Gentle Lady on their front lawn. The build took them 4 years and they have been sailing ever since.
When the pandemic hit the world, they were hauled out here in Panko Marina. After 2 years of boat work, Hank and Lucy are ready to set sail again. And this time, they make their way to the Mediterranean.
We chose to feature this couple because of their age. They're now in their 80s. In this video, they give us a boat tour and share much of their wisdom.
My name is Hank Plasia. Yes, I'm Lucy Plasia. This is about Gentle Lady. She's a catch. She's made of steel. She's 12 metres and it's her home. How long have you been sailing? Well, we've been sailing on the boat for 30 years. She sailed to 2007 rally to Indonesia. The first stop was Kupung. We spent three months with the rally. After that, we went out on the road and we've been out on the road ever since.
How did it all start? We were sitting on the beach in Akha in Geraldton. Our children were all married. And then the question came up. She says, what are we going to do with the rest of our lives? I've never ever spoken to Lucy about building a boat. But I've always wanted to do that from a child, a young boy onwards. I said, I would love to build a boat and sail the world. So, some months went by and then one day she said to me, when are we going to build this boat? She says, we're going to build it right now. So, we investigated for two years and what material we use, what sort of boat and so on and so on. So, we got some plans from a company in Sydney. So, we built it in front yard. I built a hole upside down. We eventually had the hole turned around. Then we did the main superstructure on the top and then we started on the inside. And we had the boat sand blasted and we did the whole thing in a day. And then we started on the inside. It took me two and a half years to build the inside with the help of Lucy. Well, it took us four and a half years to build this boat altogether. It was quite a challenge. I don't recommend it to anybody. But if you really want to, it's a big achievement after you've finished.
This is what they call a bow spread. And that's the roller furler which actually dust the furler. These are the two anchors. One is a Bruce anchor, one is a plow anchor. That's the anchor winch. That is actually the winch that will take you anchor up. We've got a spotlight on the top there. It's got a camera on top. So, we can turn around and at nighttime as we come into an anchorage, we can actually see where we are.
All right, this is our dinghy which we used to go between the anchorage and the shore. It's just got a small motor on the back which is a six-horsepower engine. Got to have it otherwise you stuck on the boat forever. These are our fuel drums. We carry spare diesel, 125 litres in here. We use water, we carry water, a hundred litres of extra water. And petrol for our gencet and for our dinghy motor. That there is our live raft. In emergency we've got a raft which we can put overboard and then use it the mast.
It's where all the winches are on and what we've got, heliots to pull up the sails. It's a discontrols our sail system. This is a clear view. When it rains, we actually set this to work. It's got electric motor in it which spins all the water off it and we have a clear view of what we can see out the front. This is the crank. These are the cranks that we use for the winches. These are the main winches for our jib.
This is just that a normal home garden and kitchen air conditioning which we use here on the boat. This here is what we call a 100, 3.5 kV gencet, which provides us with the voltage which we need for all the appliances and all the things that we have on board the boat. We use about a tank for which is 10 litres a week. But that doesn't only just run the air conditioning. It also runs the battery charges which are our main batteries. We don't have solar power because I haven't got the room.
Another safety device which hangs onto this live raft is we trade a live raft over board. This will go with it because it's attached to it and there's a drop in the water that clicks off and on the light. So once it goes over board we'll keep in contact with the people. The sear is what we call a tuner unit. We actually hooks on to the antennas here. We've got a couple of big antennas here. It's for the radios. That's our six Hosspeyour Outboard which goes on the back of the dinghy.
This is the spare outboard engine. That is our weather station. It tells us the speed of the wind. It tells us the temperature. It tells us all the things we need to know when we do sailing. And of course that's our what we call a flight. The steering wheel which steers the rudder manually. That's the compass. And it's seen it's a steel boat. We've got what we call compensators. There's these two balls on the boat which compensates for any magnetic flux that is in the wrong place. They keep the compass in order.
This here is the forward and the acceleration for the main engine. That's the stern, that's forward and that's the speed. Okay, now this little unit here when you're sailing and you're not using the motor, the prop keeps turning. Which is not good for the gearbox because the makes the gearbox or a hot. What we've done on the propeller shaft is the same thing as you got on the front of a motorbike. The motorbike brake, the front wheel brake and this is the plate which is actually sitting on the, these are the calipers which actually holds the clamps onto there and stops the prop from turning.
Alright, now this is an echo sound there which tells you the depth of the water that's on on the boat. Got an alarm on it just in case you don't have enough water on the boat. I'll turn on the radar for you so you can see the radar. The radar will tell you at night time if there's any ships around the place. I've talked about the spotlight on the front there. It can switch it on here and then we've got a camera on the top which will give you a picture there on the screen and you can go left or right.
That's the normal radio which we can play music on. This is the satellite system which we can put onto our phone, onto what we've got a hot spot on the phone and that's how we can use, we can ring people up to what every day sort of. I want to talk about this. This is a phone, this is actually an intercom. When somebody's sleeping out the front I can actually pick this up and go and say hello, wake up. Instead of shouting down. Instead of shouting down. We don't want the shout on the boat. We actually got little radios which we can put on and we can actually talk to one another way we do the anchor.
We have a Faruno unit which is a neftech which tells us if there's any containers falling overboard, bogged big ships in the area of the rent. It works fairly well. I want to speak for the sound system and that's just the build alarm. This unit here is your remote for your automatic pilot. You want to switch on the pilot, you don't have to do any steering, you do it with this little knob here. Normally there's a communication computer up here. The computer goes, it's hooked onto the AIS and it gets the signal from the GPS system over there. Oh you have a special camera in the engine room? Yeah and that's where it comes out and when we're navigating.
Hey, welcome aboard. Thank you. This is my galley. This is my microwave which is very popular. And this one here, that's an electric cooker. I don't use it a lot when we're sailing because you've got to be careful with hot water and all that sort of stuff. This is all for these lockers. This is my pot and pan. We'll keep all my pots and pans and stuff. This one here is where we keep our cool drink and so on. And this one. And of course we've got to carry lots of food. And these are my own like knives and forked synivrity and all the rest of the stuff that you normally carry in the house. And details and everything in there. And under here there's a little oven. And there's also a little gas stove that we keep as a backup as well. This is a rubbish bin. But it's bolted to the floor otherwise. It's also your seat. Yes, it's a hat comes in the back. I love this spice rack. And of course you safety things you always have here. Here you galley. And that's an e-curve that's always handy here. If in the emergency we grab it and go. And these are flays in here. All these things are here.
It's going down here. Which has got food in it. And the next two or three cabbages are full of food. They're after cabin. Where we don't sleep now because it's part Hanks workshop. And it's also for storing. When you do long trips you've got to have plenty of room to store your food. We've stored quite a lot of food. Well this is not any part of it. This is just part of it.
So how much food can you store for how many months? Well we like to have at least three or four months or something. So you've got to have variety of everything. And then this cabbages here. That's the pump for the pumps. There's a pump in there. Okay and the locker you're standing on is all hoses and spare parts.
So this is all the extra food you have? Yes so far we've got to get more yet. Really? Oh yeah.
所以这就是你们所有的食物吗?是的,到目前为止我们还需要更多。真的吗?是的,肯定的。
What is in there food where you're going? Yes but when you're doing long distances and you don't always can find what you like to eat you know when you go to places. So you like megy I can see there. Oh yeah I like that. But you can play the one. And stuff.
So this used to be where you slept. Yeah. Thanks Hobbie. How did you keep me there? He's a radio emitter and he's also been in electronics. TV's and all sorts of stuff. And so he has just this workshop. Yeah a lot of stuff sitting here and under the bed and sound of his cell.
Okay it's a lovely surprise about how cool the air conditioning is. It's flowing through the place even though it does coming in from one area. Yeah it's cool in here as well. Does it stay cool in the afternoon? Yeah all day. Well see we've only got it turned on low at the moment. So when we turn it up higher at night I usually sleep under a duner. Oh and that's nice. That's lovely.
Yeah. Normal home circuit breakage which I use in the houses. And they work perfectly well on the system on the boat. It's an inverter. It's actually three inverters and battery switches and an anchor switch. And that's average. This is the communication side of the HF radios. If we can turn around and sit here we can actually. That computer is hooked on to that. We can send emails and so on and so forth. There is just some more communication system on different frequencies. You can see it.
Hello Hank. How did you keep this engine from so clean like this? Purely by making sure that everything is in order. If you have an oil leak fix it. Don't leave an oil leak and so on and so forth.
I don't know if I would turn around and go back into a normal lifestyle. I'd be very worried for myself that I would fall into a hole and you know and don't know what to do. When we go back to Perth, when we go into spend with time with the kids and we go into a supermarket I can see so many gentlemen sitting there on benches. And they they lost. They are lost people because they've always worked hard in their life. You can see that on them and then all of a sudden there is this retirement thing and that whole bit of that lifestyle falls away and they fall into a hole. And they're just sitting there in air conditioning watching the crowd go by. Now I can't do that. I don't know if it would drive me totally crazy.
How is everyone watching this video? To our family. To our family especially. I love you and this is a great opportunity to say keep an eye on us and so on and so forth. We miss you but this is the sort of thing we need to do to fulfill our lives.
Oh okay I'll say I love you dearly to my family. I do miss you especially you know the great children, great great children and everybody. But you're always in the air. And to our friends we love you too. Merry Christmas. Have a lovely Christmas. And a happy new year. And we'll be in contact anyway. And those who go sailing who start sailing or want to build a boat, best of luck. Absolutely. It's not a challenge but once you set your mind to it and keep at it you'll accomplish it.
For those of you who watched till the end we hope you take something with you. Sam and I would like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a happy new year. Thank you for watching. Please remember to click like, comment and if you haven't already subscribe. Bye bye.