Chris -

We have a dilemma.  A nice dinghy with a 15 HP is a tempting target for the "Dinghy Thieves Of The Carribean".  These vicious bastards are far more prevalent and annoying than their soft hearted drug running friends who are only interested in murder and mayhem.  We have heard multiple horror stories of dinghys snatched while folks are ashore having dinner.  We have even read about folks who wake up to find their only means of transportation lifted off their davits while they were sleeping!

In an attempt to counter this threat, I thought that we would make our dinghy less attractive to thieves by scuffing it up and generally making it look old and nasty.  Erin decided the best way to do this was to paint something on the dinghy engine.  I agreed, and was thinking rust colored paint and oil colors - she was thinking "Pelican".  As the evidence below points out - Pelican won.  I am not sure if this makes the engine less desirable to thieves - but we can certainly identify ours quickly!  Erin spent several hours transferring the pelican with transfer paper, then painting him with acrylic paint.  We then mixed up a batch of clear epoxy and spread it on top in an attempt to make him last a while.  (Note that if you hover over the picture - I figured out how to make a "tool tip" text show up).

Note how Erin has named our Dinghy "Trouble" so we can jump out of the boat and "get in trouble"

Now all we have to do is make some fake patches on the dinghy itself to make it look less seaworthy.  Hughie, I suppose you will know that the pelican may just end up becoming the gazelle with the orange horn, but lets hope not!  Below we have a couple of action shots of the Pelican in motion.