Firefly Update 2026

It’s not new to anyone that we may have let the work on Firefly slow down to a halt over the past months. Rest assured though, we do still love her, and we will absolutely be the ones to sail her. If you’re frustrated that she isn’t finished yet, imagine how we feel. We desperately want her on the water.

I could go on about why we haven’t been working on her, but that’s not what this post is about. This is about progress.

She is finally dry. After literal years of battling the never ending stream of water that poured into her, from seemingly nowhere, we have finally got to a point where she stays dry on the inside now. We spent ages chasing and replacing and resealing everything that could have possibly been a problem, including the escape hatch, and even remaking the main hatch and door. Our hard work has paid off though, and we haven’t had to pump water out of her for months.

The only place that is still holding an excess amount of water is the engine bay, and I’m being rather generous when I say “excess”. We think water is still getting in somewhere that needs resealing, but it’s nowhere near the amount of water that was previously leaking into the engine bay. This is of course, somewhere that will eventually be tackled.

The most exciting thing however is that we now have internals! Because Firefly was previously sunk; when we got her, there were no internals to speak of. Our earliest photos and videos of Firefly show a bare, soaked shell. The head and the v-berth, even though they were technically furnished, needed completely re-doing because the wood had been so badly damaged due to water and mould.

The v-berth, and head were completely ripped out and redone from scratch. The galley wasn’t too bad so we were able to restore some of the wooden structures and had to replace some smaller shelves. The main parts of the saloon, and the area used for the control panel were all, also, rebuilt from scratch. In those areas now sit a large main seating area/berth and back panelling and shelves, and the control panel sits above another berth that we made longer. We’re unsure whether we’re going to keep this as it is, as we want to install a navigation desk too, so the design of this area is still in the air a bit.

The wardrobe/storage in the head has also been finished and completely redone. Inside was painted, a shelf added to the bottom, and a stainless railing installed at the top. There are also hooks just on the outside of it, for added storage, and special hangers designed to not fall off the rail, inside. If you’re interested in seeing the before and after shots of all of these areas, we have a page just for that, and you can see them HERE – Firefly Comparisons.

Something that we’ve spent a long time complaining about is the location of the boat in the yard we’re in. The yard is surrounded by trees which in the colder months, tend to shed lots and lots of leaves, seed and dead fall, that block up drain pipes and areas around the deck, and it is a general nightmare to get rid of it all. A lot of our work in the earlier years of this restoration, was just us chasing our tails trying to get rid of the never ending algae that grew because of the debris from the trees.

Thankfully though, we were recently moved to an area of the yard where the trees are too far to affect the boats underneath them. Since we’ve been placed here, we’ve been able to action real change and haven’t been mentally bogged down by having to constantly clean her. It was probably a main contender in why boat fatigue got to us like it did. (Edit, she’s since been moved back, and we’re fighting to have her moved again).

Since being moved, the deck has been properly jet washed, and part of the cockpit has been painted. It needs finishing, of course, and the rest of the deck needs painting too, but she’s already looking so beautiful. The compass has been installed in the cockpit, along with the cradle for the winch handle. The toe-rail has also been re-sanded and is prepared to be stained when we get decent weather. We have also remade the companionway hatch again, installed the mainsail and a cover on the boom, and we’re getting ready to make the outside look as good as possible before winter, when we will hopefully finish off the inside.

There is obviously a lot of work still to be done, and everything I’ve listed doesn’t even scratch the surface of the things that need completing. We are, though, moving forward, and work on her isn’t stagnant any more. We have to check ourselves periodically, as it can still feel like we’re moving no-where fast. But in fact, more than a few jobs we’re getting to now, were once firmly in the realm of “can you imagine when we get to this point”, etc. So we are progressing, even when we feel like we’re not. It doesn’t help repeating jobs, as we learn.

Some of the large jobs we have coming are, installing a diesel heater, safely of course (after renovating the locker it will sit in). There’s still a few more large woodwork jobs to do, including building the main table, and the navigation table I mentioned earlier. There’s all the electrics, that need routing throughout the boat neatly. The engine and engine bay needs sorting completely (which scares us, as we have no idea on the condition of the prop shaft), and we of course need a floor eventually. We will also at some point install lights on the roof, along with night vision ready red lighting throughout the boat, and then we will carpet areas of exposed hull to make it warmer.

We aren’t blind to the amount that still needs doing, but we are happy that she’s finally having work done to her again. Not only that, but we’re hopeful that if we can keep up the momentum, we could have her in the water sooner than we think. Do the outside of the boat during the nice weather, finish the inside and engine etc during autumn, winter and spring, and hopefully launch! Providing we’re not still fighting the trees.

We’ll see…

Make sure you’re following the YouTube channel and Instagram to follow along with the progress that is slowly, but surely, still going. You can also see our working flow chart, and jobs list in the menus above.

Cerys