Jan 20
More things were done today to start cruising again. Barb got the urge to wash the boat. The big winds that happened last weekend while we were gone, caused enough churning of the water that the boat is covered with a salt film just as if we had been underway. So Barb spent several hours washing down the deck and then polishing the stainless. While she worked on this, I changed the oil in the engine. Unfortunately, I discovered that we may have an oil leak either at the oil drain hose or maybe the rear main seal. I'm basing this on the fact that there is oil in the sump under the engine, but there are no signs of a leak anywhere on the sides of the engine. I'll have to keep a close eye on that. Meanwhile, I put two oilsorb pillows in the sump to avoid getting the oil in the bilge.
I also filled the diesel tank from the jerry cans and then refilled the cans from the pump. The boat tank only needed ten gallons, so doing it this way was easier than moving the boat to the fuel dock.
We walked down to Abaco Gold to retrieve my necklace that was being repaired. I had been prepared to spend $250-$300 to replace the necklace, but was surprised to find that they could repair the six spots that had links missing out of the double link braid. Total cost to repair - $35.
On the way to Abaco Gold, we stopped at a place called the Snack Shack for lunch. The Snack Shack is a typical island take-away place. It's just a little building where you step up to a window to order. Most of these places don't have visible menus. Since they deal mostly with locals, the customers know what they have. In the case of the Snack Shack, we knew from friends that their specialty was burgers. So, we both ordered cheeseburgers and sodas. The burgers were good and the price reasonable, so I checked off another thing we had been told we had to do before we left. The soda I had was Bahamas Goombay Punch. This was another thing I wanted to try before we left. It is a fruity, carbonated punch. It was ok, but I probably won't take a case with us. But it was another thing off the list of things to try.
Another culinary thing on my list was conch salad. There is a guy who has a stand right by the marina where he makes conch salad. He comes in with a boat load of conch every morning. He just has a small flat bottom boat and he must have at least fifty conch each day. He spends the morning getting the conch out of the shells, dicing the conch and onion, bell pepper, and tomato. The resulting mixture is then put in a lime juice that "cooks" the conch. This is the same thing that our friends Brian & Tammy made themselves, with conch Brian caught himself. Buying it on the street is a lot easier. Maybe on down the line we'll do some ourselves, since our going away present from Brain & Tammy was all the tools required to make your own.
In the evening we joined some dock friends at Snappa's for Friday happy hour with the free snacks. While we were sitting there, we started to hear a sound over the crowd noise and music. We suddenly realized it was pouring outside, and the boat was wide open. There had been no forecast of rain, nor indication in the sky when we came up here just before dark. I ran from the bar to the boat as far as my fat old ass could go. Unfortunately the damage was done. The comforter on the bed absorbed most of the water in the rear, although about a six-inch spot was wet through to the mattress right in the center of the bed. I got the hatch closed and pulled the wet bedding off the bed before it soaked in the mattress more. In the front, the main stream of water was pouring into one of the crates of foodstuffs. Fortunately it was all canned goods, so no damage was done, but the cushion under it was pretty wet. Of course the rain stopped just as I got the hatches closed. I walked back up to the bar, soaking wet and had another beer. What else could I do?
GPS N 26-32.806 W 77-03.207 Miles made good this leg 0. Total miles covered 3693.
Jan 21
Today's major project is topping up on supplies we need before departing Marsh Harbor. We don't need much, since we brought six months of food with us. We first went to Priced Right grocery and got a few perishable things and produce. We had to keep reminding ourselves that the goal is to get back to the States in June with no food. So, this shopping is not to replenish what we have already used. Just the perishable stuff and one or two things we miscalculated on, like coffee and creamer.
From the grocery, we went to the soft drink store down the street. This store sells nothing but soft drinks and juices. We came from Florida with 210 cans of Pepsi for mixing with the rum, purchased at Sam's for $.21/can. In the grocery stores here a six pack of Pepsi costs about $4.25, about $.70/can. At the soft drink store, a case was $12.25, or $.51/can. We are nowhere near out of what we brought, but it's not going to last until June. So we picked up three more cases.
Now that we had heavy stuff, we called Taxi 75 on the VHF. Joe picked us up in a few minutes. On the way back to the marina, we stopped at the liquor store and got a case of rum. This store gives a 20% discount for six bottles or more and you can mix and match. We have been told that the prices are not going to get any cheaper in the Exumas, and may even be higher, so we are stocked up for quite awhile now.
At the marina, we loaded everything into a dock cart, including our propane tank which I had dropped earlier at the place across the street to be refilled. As Barb loaded the cart, she saw a couple of roaches. Roaches in the islands are a constant threat. One way of trying to not get them on the boat is to never bring cardboard aboard. So, when we unloaded the cart, the rum got passed to the boat bottle by bottle, leaving the box on the dock. The Pepsi cans were grubby from soda being spilled on them, so I took the six packs out of the cardboard flats and hosed them off good. I figured I would rinse away any roaches that might be hiding, as well as get the sticky off them. After they dried some, I undid each six pack and loaded the cans into a plastic milk crate we have. In that process, I found one can that was almost empty and had a pinhole in it. That would explain the soda on the outside of the cans.
We spent a few hours reading this afternoon, and dodged another light rain shower. Tonight is steak night at the Jib Room, but I'm not feeling 100% since I think I'm catching the cold Barb had in New Orleans. So instead of steaks, we checked off one more culinary delight and ordered pizza from Abaco Pizza. They deliver. It was pretty good. Now to enjoy a movie on TV. Only another day or so to enjoy the cable TV.
GPS N 26-32.806 W 77-03.207 Miles made good this leg 0. Total miles covered 3693.
Jan 22
Barb did all our laundry today, in preparation for leaving the marina tomorrow. Finding good laundry facilities in the islands is a challenge. Of course you can do it by hand in a bucket, which may be the method after this nice stop. Or you can do it the easy, but expensive way, when you are in a marina with good facilities. This marina has brand new machines, and several of them. The price though is $4 per wash load and $4 per dryer load. And the machines are standard household size.
Our plan is to leave Marsh Harbor tomorrow and head south to Little Harbor. That is just a few hours away. We plan to spend two nights there seeing it's sights and then proceed south to the north end of Eluthera. We didn't coordinate this with anybody, but we heard a couple of boats yesterday leaving with the same plan, and a couple more today who plan to leave tomorrow with similar route plans. Once away from Abaco, I expect our Internet access will not be as readily available as it has been. So, logs will probably only come every week or so, and e-mail will be a once a day thing at best. This is what we expected all along and were pleasantly surprised at what we found here in the Abacos.
GPS N 26-32.806 W 77-03.207 Miles made good this leg 0. Total miles covered 3693.