We've Made Contact (Paper)

Now that the boat is painted on the inside, it's time to start moving things in. The galley countertops really needed a make over but with funds lacking we needed a quick, easy and cheap fix, even if it is only temporary. While searching for ideas online I came across a post from Impatiently crafty about how she redid the laminate counter tops in their boat for only $28 by using granite looking contact paper, bar top epoxy and polyurethane. From her pictures it turned out great and was easy and cheap. So we gave it a shot.

Here is our $3 contact paper from walmart, the first strip down over our ugly, damaged old countertop. 

Our "veggie hole" as we call it, a little opening that leads down to the water under the aka, we assume it was intended for a quick dump overboard for food stuffs while underway.

While I was busy DIYing it in the galley mark was cutting holes through the compartments under the v berth to make room for our new 52 gallon flexible water tank. It's the big blue thing in the corner of the picture. All that cutting and sawdust was enough to bring a tear to my eye, all I could see was my perfect paint job being chipped and scratched up. Sigh.

Back to the countertops. The contact paper was really easy to work with, I've actually never used the peel and stick kind of stuff to line cupboards before so this was new to me, but it was easy as pie, line it up, flatten it out (I used a plastic putty knife) and then trim off the excess with an exacto knife.

The veggie hole.

Easy.

And here is the contact paper completely laid out. I am amazed at how good it looks and it only took me about an hour to do. The granite style works best because it blends so easily, you can't see where one piece ends and the other starts.

I haven't done the epoxy and urethane part yet to finish it off, the Home Depot here in Oak Harbor didn't carry bar top epoxy, or any epoxy actually, except the gorilla glue kind that comes in a tiny syringe which wouldn't have been enough to do the job and was the too expensive to buy enough. Our West System epoxy we have been using all over the boat has a yellowish finish when it dries so I didn't want to use that.

After I finished the countertop I sat down and looked around and realized the backsplash needed to be done too.

While I waited for Mark to be done cutting and banging and generally causing a mess I fixed a small problem with the aka cabin openings. Every time I crawl into one of the side cabins over that lip of plywood it hurts my knees. It doesn't seem to bother the kids but hey, I am almost 30, so I need some padding. Nothing a water noodle from the buck store can't fix. Actually doesn't look to bad and it works.

Once mark demolished the v berth, he moved in to the galley to cut out the spot for the fridge. Thankfully this should be the last major cutting and mess making project inside the cabin for a while, this should have all been done before painting but we hadn't purchased the fridge and water tank and didn't know the sizes when we started painting.

And there it is, new countertop, new fridge.

2.7 cu, it's going to be a big downsize.