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Larry's LogWednesday, we didn't feel to great, either of us. It was probably due to too much dink last night but it lasted longer than a hangover. I did fix my glasses by putting the tiny screw back into the frame. I then put on the new chain markers, 5 inch lengths of ½" webbing sewn onto the links at 20 foot intervals. It was very hot work in the sun but there was no place in the shade to do it. We had planned to go to the Maremares cocktail party tonight but we both didn't feel like more partying. I also wanted to mount the new Racor filter before using the new dinghy, and I wasn't up to doing that. During the afternoon, I went up to the marina building and saw that there was no power - the woman who runs the little market was very worried about her freezer food but a cruiser brought over a small generator and saved the day. No power in the marina also meant that there was no water available. Fortunately, it came back on around 4pm. It meant we could take showers in the marina rather than on the boat. Interestingly, there had been power at the dock with no problem. The following day, I still wasn't feeling great but did manage to do some things. After soaking the stern anchor line for 3 days, I finally managed to splice the new stainless steel thimble in, although it took all morning to do it. I relaxed for a few hours after lunch since I was still feeling blah but then I installed the new solar powered vent. I was underf the (mistaken) impression that the tube to go through the deck was the same size as the old one but it turns out (of course) that it's a little bigger. Luckily, when I took off the old trim ring, the opening on the vent housing was big enough, except there was a spur of fiberglass that I had to get off, so I had to dig out the Dremel tool and attachments. After getting a good fit and using some silicone to seal the trim, I let the silicone dry a bit and then drilled the 3 holes to attach the housing of the vent. Attaching that with silicone too, I made sure the vent was on and open and screwed everything down. Considering it was a different size, not too bad a job. While I was doing my jobs, Diane worked on doing an inventory of the provisions, so she would know where everything was and what exactly was left. She had this spreadsheet done before but hadn't been too careful about keeping it updated. I still wasn't feeling well the next morning but Diane continued her inventory of the boat's provisions and washed some small things. A bit later, I did organize the stuff in the forward head and moused the main anchor shackle. Irma La Douce returned the final 20' length of chain from being regalvanized but I just left it in the cockpit, to be put away later. Since our boat insurance was expiring soon, I wrote some emails to insurance brokers and even managed to get connected, via SSB, at midday to send them. We had tried making all the arrangements while at home but it just didn't work out. Part of the problem was that many carriers were not continuing with insuring American boats in the Caribbean. We also talked about not getting insurance again but in the end, decided to since the boat was such a major asset. Of course, having a loan required us to maintain insurance but we could have paid that off with the proceeds from our house. That night we watched a video that some friends had given us while home, "The Longest Day", but found we only had part 1. Oh well. Saturday I went to the Internet place and downloaded some financial stuff for Diane to see but on the way back, saw there was a small swap meet in front of the little mini-mart. I stopped to look and almost didn't buy anything but one of the cruisers had made bread pudding that they were 'selling' and so I bought a piece that was excellent. Back at the boat, Diane said Guilio called on the radio and said they would call later after coming back from some errands. We saw them briefly at around noon and they said they would come back for us at about 3pm and asked if we wanted to go sailing. We said sure and then all of us would have a barbeque with another boat that was moored next to Sotavento at CMO. While waiting, we just did some small things (I organized the books a little better) and then they picked us up and we went sailing. The wind was a bit up (for around here) at 15 knots or so but still pretty flat seas since it's so protected. We were out for about an hour but it clouded up and started to thunder with some lightning so we headed back. We just made it back in without getting wet by about 30 minutes. We just talked until the rain stopped and we finally made the barbeque at around 7:30. The meat they brought was called 'punta' and was flavorful if a bit tough. The other couple, Phil and Christine from Anju, originally from Wales, brought some veggy skewers that were very nice. We ate fairly late since the meat was very thick but Phil eventually cut it into slices and cooked the slices. We talked about politics most of the evening, a potentially 'dangerous' topic, but it was generally friendly and we didn't leave until very late, almost midnight. We woke up pretty late, around 9:30, and Guilio and his family stopped by an hour later to say goodbye. He reminded us about an email he had sent a while ago about some people we should look for on Tortuga and I remembered it. His friend was a fisherman there who could bring us fish and lobster if we wanted it and was also just a nice person. Diane worked on updating her provisioning spreadsheet the rest of the day and I wasn't going to do much, but I wound up attaching some quick pins to the new solar panel braces, worked on my logs for a while and then after lunch, changed the air cleaner on the engine, checked the oil and transmission fluid, checked the motor mounts, cleaned the bilge area in front of the fuel tank and generally looked over the engine and systems. The raw water pump seemed a bit corroded but hopefully its OK. Monday I worked on getting the new dinghy ready. After breakfast, I put it back in the water, got it around the port side of the boat and Diane helped me put the engine on. I needed to see how it fit on the transom in order to get the new Racor filter mounted. The new one was bigger that the old one but had a plastic bowl at the bottom so that you could see any water or dirt accumulating, and with a drain, you could empty it easily. The old one was also getting very corroded although I'm sure the inside was fine. With the engine in place, I placed the new filter against the transom to see how it would fit. The connector for the engine's fuel inlet is on the port side of the powerhead but the outlet connector on the filter was on the front. Unfortunately, the length of hose already in place wasn't long enough if I put the filter housing on the starboard side of the transom. Since I thought the filter would go there (where the other one had been on the old dinghy), I had put the outlet hose connector on that side. Before I started changing things though, I connected the engine and the gas tank and made sure it started and ran with the new filter. I was a little concerned that the suction demand was going to be too great to pull fuel from the tank, through the filter and then into the engine, but everything was fine. If the filter stayed relatively clean, the vacuum would probably be close to zero. I had bought 2 spare cartridges when I bought the filter so that wasn't a problem (unless I got a really bad batch of gasoline). Once I knew that the filter would work with the engine, I emptied the filter through its drain back into the tank and moved the hose connectors around. I then carefully drilled the 2 holes in the transom where the mounting bolts would be. Unfortunately, the 1/4" x 2 1/2" round head machine screws I was going to use were too short to fit through both the transom and the filter mount. The only longer ones I had were flathead so I had to use those with finish washers. This was one advantage of Trinidad - there I could have just walked over to one of the chandleries and gotten longer screws very easily. In PLC, I would have had to go into town by bus and search for the right store, and hope that they had what I wanted. So I used what I had on board and make a note to try to find the right ones later. I used some Lifecalk with the screws and left that alone to dry. I then attached the new small fenders that I brought back from the States to the dinghy sides where the fiberglass oarlocks were attached, to protect the hull from dings. Finally, in order to hoist the dinghy by the side of the boat using a halyard, I measured for new wire straps and cut the old security cable for those. I used my nicopress tool and the sleeves I had on board that fortunately were the right size. Diane had gone shopping at another supermarket, Exito, for most of the day, and at about 3:30, John, from the boat next to us, Sundowner, brought his wife, Anne, back from the hospital and I got on board and helped 4 other guys bring her up from the dinghy via a bosun's chair. She had fallen down the companionway and broken her ankle. As I was getting off Sundowner, Diane was walking down the dock with lots of packages so I helped her get them onboard. After putting everything on the boat, Diane made some beer bread for the potluck that evening and I continued getting the dinghy ready. We went to the potluck later that evening, as usual for Thursday night. I finished getting the dinghy ready the next morning while Diane and Janice, from Plenum, went shopping at Plaza Mayor, the large shopping mall on the other side of the canals. Our friends on Sweet Lou, Frank and Louise, came into the marina this morning, on their way to the western Caribbean, and after Diane and Janice left and I finished with the dinghy, I went over to the internet place but the server was down so I walked over to say hi to Sweet Lou. After we talked for a bit, I went back to the boat and reattached the thermostat inside the refrigerator - it had come off so this time I screwed it down. Finishing that, I tried out a program that Geoffrey from Panache, the boat next to us, loaned me. It was a 'Hurricanes' program that provides tracks and strengths of all the Atlantic hurricanes for the last 150 years. Brian, on a boat now in Margarita called Full Monty, developed it. A little later, Orient Canvas came by to pick up the dinghy to make the new cover for it. They had done a nice job on replacing the foam in some settee cushions and after looking at some of their other dinghy covers, and comparing it to Simone's work from Margarita, I thought their work was better. They promised to have it back in 2 days. That evening we went with everyone from Plenum, Sweet Lou, Odyssey and Anju back to the little shrimp restaurant. We almost didn't go since it was raining so hard but we had ordered the shrimp before and didn't want to 'stick' the restaurant owner. We got a bit wet, and the restaurant roof was leaking but it eventually stopped raining. The dinner was pretty good but I didn't think it was as good as last time. |