Did you miss it?

Back in June we were able to gain access to Waiouru whilst it was in Ben Harp’s compound.  I seized the opportunity to take a full set of photo’s which have proved to be very useful in supporting our insurance claim.  This is one of the photo’s from June.

When we implemented the High Court order and recovered Waiouru I was stunned by the stripping of the interior and the wanton defacing of the exterior.

I didn’t notice it…… Did you?

Today I was removing a length of timber battening running down the full length of the ceiling.  It had to be removed as it was occupying the channel that will be used for the 12v DC wiring. 

Although the interior was stripped back to spray foam there was a sheet of thin plywood on both sides of the rear cabin walls above gunwale height.  I hadn’t paid much attention to them, but today I needed to remove the left plywood panel in order to remove the last of the ceiling batten.

And this is what I found behind it

You probably noticed it in the first two photo’s.  Sometime after June the rear cabin portholes openings have been filled in and the exterior panel carefully repaired and repainted.  I assume the plywood on the inside had been installed to disguise the exterior work. 

I removed the plywood from the opposite side of the boat and found the following.

I then counted the exterior and interior porthole opening and finally checked the plans.  Yes, we are missing the two portholes in the rear cabin. 

I guess it was part of Ben Harp’s strategy to disguise the boat and sell it as a sailway!