Company for Chiquita

In the early 1980's, during my dreamer phase and well before I even thought of learning to sail I purchased a ship's steering wheel at a long-gone shop named Carels in Fremantle.  It's the real deal which would probable cost a small fortune today.

For years the wheel was mounted on the wood panel in the living room above the fireplace, where the TV screen is now mounted.  My plan was to mount the wheel in the office above my desk but the big problem was that the gyprock wall was not strong enough to sustain the weight and I would have to find a wall stud which would give me a narrow 2-inch wide target for a heavy bolt.  To complicate things I would be drilling through a double wall, with the new gyprock glued and nailed over the original plaster-horse hair wall.

Wall Mounts

Nautical Corner

This morning I told Brenda that I had given up on the idea of mounting the wheel on a gyprock wall because it was too risky, so we assessed other locations on the various jarrah walls.  We settled on the back porch because the juxtaposition with the Chiquita panel looked pretty good. After my three visitors left for home I got to work.

I used the same mounts that I had used before, with new brass size 5 cup head screws 15mm long.

This may be the start of a nautical theme for that part of the house.  I'm thinking of large color photos of Chiquita, my second boat Angie, and my present boat Pachuca.