Stringing us along

 

                                          Moving a houseboat by hand out into the channel

My next door neighbor Keith was getting new stringers -- these are the long rectangular pieces of Douglas Fir like you'd have supporting a deck, that sit on the big float logs. But Keith's stringers were cross-ways under his houseboat, with no room to insert new ones between my house and the one on the other side. When the guys from Harbor Services [(503) 453-7317] arrived, I asked them how they were going to get the stringers in and was astounded when they said they would be moving out Keith's houseboat! More than that, they would be moving it out in the river current and tying it up to my houseboat!

The Harbor Services guys -- owner Jesse and Chris, Todd, and Ben -- had been doing a lot of work on a tenderhouse down the way. We are all amazed at the hard, dangerous, critically important but mostly unsung work that they do. It's heavy work on wood underwater, gritty, slimy, and then for the most part hidden. But our houseboats couldn't stay afloat with them.

Here's the drama that unfolded at my house that day ...

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Moving out Keith's swim float

  

Three of the six stringers.

The stringers are roped to the side of Keith's houseboat and they form a working deck for the crew to detach his houseboat from the walkway. They have to disconnect the electricity, the water pipe and the sewer pipe.

 

Detaching the chains connecting the houseboat to the moorage.

   

 

 

The houseboat is roped up and pulled out of its spot by guys positioned on the adjoining houseboats. Little by little it comes out into the river.

 





 

 

Keith's houseboat free-floating in the river channel.

Coming around to the front of my houseboat.

Attached to my houseboat at the deck.

Here's how they add the stringers. They take one of the ones roped to the side, attach it to the little towboat and move it into position.

 

 



 

Then the stringer is positioned under the houseboat and put into place. Previously the guys had sawed notches into the float logs in the spots where these stringers would go.

 

How long does this take? I asked. They said it would be about two hours from the time they moved the house. After all six stringers were put in place, they used the little towboat to push the house back into place -- now it's going upriver -- while two guys pulled with ropes to maneuver it into the slot.

 

 

 



 
 



  

Keith's houseboat is back along the walkway.

 

 

 

 

Finally Keith's swim float is moved back into place.