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Diane's DiaryMay 7 Saturday It's been a long week and we are all tired so quit working at 4:30pm today. I should mention we invite Elias to have a few beers with us after work every day. We hardly drink beer at the dock since it's so fattening but here we are drinking it every day. It helps to unwind. Anyway, with drinking 6 beers a day we are going through a case of beer every 4 days so that's one of the things I had to buy when I went out shopping. It's a good thing beer is so cheap here- about $5 case for the larger beers. Elias helped Larry remove the wind vane off the boat. That was the biggest waste of $3000USD- we never even used it! I hope we can sell it when we get back to the US. Unless you are crossing oceans, I think it's better to have 2 autopilots - with one for a spare! May 8 Sunday Happy Mother's Day. I called both Mom and Aunt Mary although it was very hard to get through by phone. I guess a lot of people were calling their Moms! I finally did get through and it was nice to speak with both of them again. They both liked the flowers we sent them. It is difficult not seeing your family and friends for holidays though and is one of the things I miss most. Also, just picking up a phone and calling from the luxury of your house! Larry worked on the prop today. I entered all the finances into the computer. I made a meatloaf for dinner and a wonderful new recipe called hot fudge cake. It was fantastic and definitely a keeper except the dish I made it in was too small (although the recipe said use a 9" pan and I used a 9" pie plate) and the dish overflowed. Well, sticky fudge went all over the oven so this was not fun. I tired to get some of it off but had to wait until the oven cools down first. Looks like I will have to use oven cleaner on it though. May 9 Monday I have to get the oven cleaned before I use it, as it is unusable in its present condition with all the sticky fudge all over it. The can of oven cleaner I had was bad so I desperately needed some. I didn't want to have to take a taxi to the store just for that so wanted to borrow some from someone on the dock and just replace the can when I go to the store later this week. I was able to borrow some from a local Venezuelan charter boat S/V Koala. They were extremely nice people and had come on the hard while we were there. Anyway, they charter their boat in the Roques so we hope to meet them out there. Well, the oven was so bad it took me the entire day to get it cleaned. I squirted the stuff on, let it soak for a while then wiped it off. I had to do it around 6 times letting it soak for at least 30 minutes each time before I wiped it off. Boy, next time when I make this dish I will definitely make it in a bigger pan! I also did a bunch of emails while waiting to clean the stove in between soakings. We had to get an insurance survey so got it from Cris Robinson. He didn't do much of a job and we weren't very impressed with his work. He just took the old survey and basically just copied it. He didn't even take pictures of the boat. However, we had to get a new survey, as the insurance company requires a new one every 5 years. I guess they want to make use the boat is still in good condition. May 10 Tuesday Today is Mom's 70th birthday! Happy Birthday Mom! Wish I could be there to celebrate with you. Next year is my parent's 50th wedding anniversary so I want to make sure I am home for that definitely. Anyway, I called Mom and we sent flowers to her. We also sent flowers to her and Aunt Mary for Mother's day. Larry started working on filling the blisters this morning- we have about 1000 of them so it's quite a lot of work. Larry didn't want Elias to help him so he was going to do all of this himself. We had a big fight over it as I told him to teach Elias how to do it and he can help. If Larry continued doing it himself we'll never finish as he is progressing very slowly. I know Elias catches on very quickly and I am sure Larry can teach him how to do this work. So, Larry agrees to let Elias try to do the work with Larry working alongside and I will clean all the holes first. If Elias didn't do well, Larry won't have him continue to do that. Anyway, it worked out very well with Elias- he caught on very quickly and was able to help Larry a lot. I'm glad Larry finally listened to me and used him as the work is progressing much more quickly now. Elias finished putting Cetol on the small hatch and 2 small blocks of wood for the boarding ladder. He also finished compounding and waxing the topsides but still has to wax it again. May 11 Wednesday We worked on the port side blisters this am and in the pm when the sun shifted, we worked on the starboard side. On the port side we finished all the blisters except for the keel as the sun was already hitting that part of the boat when we finally got to that part. We'll just finish it tomorrow morning when it's back in the shade. We went to the Syrian Club for dinner along with Fred on S/V Global Ombaka. He had just gotten married to a Venezuelan lady and we were anxious to meet her. Unfortunately, she has gone to Valencia- an inland city where she is originally from- to have some surgery so wasn't around. It was nice to catch up with Fred and we were sorry we couldn't meet his new wife. She speaks Spanish only and Fred doesn't speak much Spanish so I don't know how they communicate but apparently they must or else I guess they wouldn't have gotten married! May 12 Thursday Elias finished compounding and waxing the hull near the water line in the am. In the pm, Elias and I sanded down the blisters we had already filled on the starboard side of the boat. It was super hard work, as you had to scrub very hard- the Interprotect we had applied gets very hard. By the time we had finished, I was thoroughly exhausted. Arnoldo was supposed to come drive me to a few stores this afternoon if he had time but he never came. S/V Lady Hawke told us about another boat store called Ralph Gonzalez that we had never heard about. We needed an underwater metal kit to paint the propeller. Vemasca wanted 230,000B and R. Gonzalez had a slightly used kit (one of the cans was only half full as it had spilled but we had another one of those) and the kit was only 100,000 so we really saved a bundle. I just needed a taxi to go and get it. May 13 Friday Larry did the net again this morning, as Patty from Xanadu Marine never came on the air. She later said she thought it was Saturday so missed it- how stupid! Anyway, Arnaldo had promised me he would take me shopping this morning but he called and said he couldn't make it until this afternoon. I didn't want to go in the afternoon so I just went with a local taxi from here. They charged 15,000B an hour compared to all the regular drivers for the cruisers who charge 10,000B. Plus the regular drivers for the cruisers are very honest and trustworthy- you can trust leaving your bags in their cars as you go from store to store. I'm not so sure I would trust these other drivers though as they could just take off with all your packages so I prefer to use one of the regular drivers. But I wanted to go this morning so did. Larry came also as he wanted to go to the R. Gonzalez store as he had never been there. We got the underwater kit for the propeller that we needed. May 14 Saturday We lost power very early in the am- it's amazing how hot it gets in the boat without the AC on even just for a little while. We run the AC 24 hours a day here - we really get our moneys worth out of it! Frankly, in this intense heat I don't know how anyone can live without the AC. \ We spoke with Plenum last night via SSB radio - they are in transit to Margarita with heavy winds and seas. Elias cleaned the through hulls this morning and than put the first coat of paint on the propeller. Larry wanted to put more epoxy on the blisters, as some of them are not completely flat so he redid all of those - it took them both all day to do. Today was Elias' last day working for us - we still have more to do but we've already had him for more than 2 weeks and don't want to pay for a worker any more. We'll have him finish the rest of the varnish when we go up to Merida. Elias didn't get to finish all the wax on the topsides as the dinghy was in the way and he didn't have enough time to finish it. The boat work is almost finished so hopefully we'll finish sometime next week and get launched. Anyway, we celebrated with Elias today by having our usual 2 beers each after work. We'll miss having him help us- he was a great asset and we would not have finished this soon without his help. May 15 Sunday Very quiet day in the boatyard, as the workers are not allowed to work on Sunday so it's just us here. There are no other cruisers living on the hard. Larry put the first coat of bottom paint on the propeller. He also sanded down the keel some more and worked on the blisters on the keel. I made some excellent huevos rancheros for breakfast- they were great! May 16 Monday Elias is gone and we really miss having him around. Larry put MORE Interlux 2000 on all the blisters- I think he is getting a little carried away with all of this. He did 2 coats today and one more coat tomorrow and than we can finally start painting the bottom. Looks like the end of being on the hard is finally in site! I tried to get a hold of my friend Janice- she promised to bring some items back from the US for me. She is an American whose husband works for the oil company here. Anyway, we are almost out of peanut butter and it's very expensive down here and not a good name brand. She's going to bring a few other things. Anyway, Janice is leaving for the US this weekend so I need to get a hold of her and bring her the money. May 17 Tuesday I helped Larry put another coat of Interlux 2000 on all the blisters this morning- you have to follow a rigid schedule before you apply the bottom paint by strictly following their drying timetable- if you don't, you have to sand between coats and that is very difficult as the Interlux is very hard and difficult to sand down. We have to wait 3 hours before we start the bottom paint so we'll start it this afternoon- it will be cooler out also and we know it should only take a few hours to do the whole boat with both of us working. I made a big pot of spaghetti sauce during lunch so I wouldn't have to do it tonight when I am tired from painting the bottom of the boat. May 18 Wednesday Late yesterday afternoon we started painting the bottom of the boat. We used the same rollers we have been using for the last several years- they come from the US. However, the rollers started disintegrating when we used them. This is a different brand of paint than we normally use so maybe this type conflicted with the rollers. Anyway, we were both upset because if we didn't get the coat of paint on that afternoon we would have to sand down each of the blisters due to the drying time on the Interprotect. Fortunately, we spoke to Victor in the marina and he was kind enough to give us several rollers- he said we could just replace them. This was great of him- it didn't cost him anything but boy did he score some big brownie points with us. This was excellent service and is the difference between a good and bad marina- it's little things like this that make you want to keep going back to the same yard. Anyway, this morning Larry did the second coat of paint while I took a taxi to Vemasca to get some more rollers and to replace the ones we borrowed from Victor. Both of us put another coat of paint on the bottom this afternoon. Now we have 2 coats on the entire hull and 3 coats on the water line. We thought 4 gallons would be plenty but actually we probably could have used 1 more to do another coat on the hull. We have one coat of paint only under the poppits and the yard moved them this afternoon so we could put another coat on this part. We finished for the day at 5pm and were both totally exhausted. We saw S/V Miss Gayle on our way to the showers- they were coming to see us and wanted to know if we wanted to go out to dinner with them. We would have but we were totally exhausted and weren't in the mood to socialize or go out to dinner. Anyway, Miss Gayle couldn't make it another night as they were going to the US tomorrow and won't be back for several months. Sorry guys we'll just have to see you when we get back! May 19 Thursday Larry did the forth and final coat of paint on the water line this morning. We probably could have launched this afternoon but Larry wanted to give the paint some more time to dry so we'll launch tomorrow. In the meantime, I paid the marina bill. Victor was very good with us- we should have paid for 21 days on the hard but Victor only charged us for 17 days. We got 3 days free on the hard with our haul out. We also had Elias for 14 days but only got charged for him for 10 days - we had to pay the marina 5000B a day to use him. We were very happy with these price reductions and is another reason we were so happy with Victor's services. He really made our stay very pleasant and we were very glad we hauled here instead of Bahia Redonda. I took it easy in the pm- both if us are just exhausted from all this constant work. I tried to take a nap but couldn't sleep with all the noise in the boatyard. I went to the pool around 5pm and meet a nice teenage girl- it turns out her father is part owner of the marina. I told him how happy we were with Victor. Anyway, we celebrated by going out to the Syrian Club for dinner. This is our last night on the hard- tomorrow it's back to having a working head onboard- yea! May 20 Friday Victor said we could launch at 9am this morning but late yesterday the yard manager told us he had another boat to haul out at 8am and we could launch around 9:30am. This was no problem for us- as long as we launched in the morning we could be back in our slip in Bahia Redonda before the afternoon winds pick up. Anyway, at 8am we noticed no movement of the travel lift- did this mean the boat was delayed in hauling out? Larry had gone off to the bathroom so I went to find out. It turns out Victor told them to let us launch before they hauled the other boat as we had to connect our backstay and this would take some time. So why didn't they say something to us? I guess they were waiting until we asked. Anyway, the lift came at 9am and hauled us to the pit where we put the paint on the bottom of the keel- this is the part we can't reach while the boat is on the jack stands. The yard lets all boats sit in the pit for an hour for free while the paint is drying- if you want to stay longer you have to pay for it. So, we went into the water around 10:15am. Larry had a very hard time getting the forestay connected- he needed 2 of the yard workers to help hold the jib down while he connected it. I wasn't strong enough to pull it down myself. We were back in our old slip at Bahia Redonda around 11:30am and it was great being back. Potter is the new dockmaster now and we sure missed Arnaldo. Potter told us we could just go into our slip ourselves. No Potter it doesn't work that way- we need help getting the lines attached through the mooring balls. Well, Potter is new to the job- he's never been a dockmaster before. Anyway, we were both tired and didn't feel like doing much. I spent the rest of the day just talking to our old friends again. We really enjoyed our experience at Aqua-Vi and think it is a great yard and highly recommend it. The yard workers all seem content and you can really see the difference from the disgruntled staff we hear about in BR. I have only heard one person ever complain about Aqua-Vi- and this person went home and let the yard do the work while they were gone. However, we have heard about a lot of complaints about the yard at Bahia Redonda- it's a shame also as they are getting a bad reputation and this will affect the marina. May 21 Saturday We wanted to rest and take it easy today although I did waterproof the bimini and 4 curtains that attach to it so we could put it back up. I waterproofed the dodger also but just did the frame- the 5 windows have not been washed yet. We were both tired and generally just took it easy. After lunch I worked on my logs- I would like to get them updated before we leave for Merida next week. The May Compass came out and my article about the Polar tour is in it. The article looks very good and I'm happy with it. We watched the new DVD Triple X at night - it wasn't very good and not nearly as good as the first one- I'll definitely trade this one. May 22 Sunday We're both still tired so want to take it easy today. I made some cheese omelets for breakfast. After we ate and I finished all the dishes around 9:30am, I worked on my logs until lunchtime. After lunch I played dominoes. I hadn't played since before we went on the hard so I missed playing. I was doing great and had about 180 points after 2 rounds but got clobbered on the last round with about 250 points so wound up with about 430 points total- not very good! Oh well, I still had a good time anyway. I walked 2 laps around the marina and than came back and made Chicken Italiano for dinner. May 23 Monday I had to do a normal search for money again today calling various people looking for the best rates. Seems like 2500 is the going rate and I can get this with a check from Arnaldo so I will. The USD has been going down lately so we're not living as cheaply as we once did. I also checked the bus times to go to Merida. S/V Quietly gave us the 4th season of the West Wing- we are now enjoying watching them. I spoke to Pam on S/V Anything Goes at 5pm as they had just come back from Merida and had some good information to pass on to us. We had a bad thunder, lightening and rainstorm from around 7-8pm. I guess rainy season is really upon us now. We lost the electric for about 1.5 hours. It's amazing how the boat gets hot so quickly without the AC on. May 24 Tuesday I gave Arnaldo a check for $1000 and he'll give me the money later today. We'll leave Friday on the bus for Merida. We'll spend the next several days getting the stuff out for Elias to continue varnishing when we leave. Plus, Larry has to take apart the cockpit table, and lots of other things inside so Elias can varnish. Everything has to be taken off the floors also so it's a lot of work for Larry. May 25 Wednesday I made some phone calls in the am - to Larry's doctor to see if he was there today. He is so we'll go later this morning. I tried to call the posada in Merida but couldn't get through. We went to Larry's urologist this morning and Larry was pleased to get a good report. His prostate size has decreased substantially. He wants him to get a PSA test now but said we could do this when we come back to PLC from Merida. We got to the doctor's office at 11am but it was so crowded we didn't get in until noontime. He must be a good doctor though- his office is always crowded. However, he did say the medication Larry is currently taking is very strong so he's going to have to come off of it for awhile - around 6 months before he can go back on it. We went to Plaza Mayor afterwards, had lunch and hung around until 3pm to see the new Star Wars movie - number 3 in the series. It was great and we both really enjoyed it. It is the type of movie that needs to be seen in a movie theatre to capture the full effects of the movie. I know we will eventually want to buy it but first we wanted to see it on the big screen. Anyway, the movie theatre only had about 6 people in it so it wasn't very crowded. We got back to the boat at 6:30pm still with plenty of daylight left. Arnaldo took us to the bus station in Lecheria to buy our bus tickets for Friday. May 26 Thursday We spent the day packing, getting the varnish out and getting everything ready for Elias to varnish. I packed but Larry didn't have a chance to until late that night. We also had Elias stop by to go over all the work with him. Jeffrey from Panache stopped by also - he's going to buy our leftover Interprotect 2000 from us for $25USD. We'll leave tomorrow for Merida. |