Sept 21
If it's Friday, it must be shopping day. Bert picked us up about 09:45 this morning. We are not going to go to the produce market today, just the IGA. Hopefully by leaving at this time, we may beat the rush of the cruiser bus and the college students. Sure enough, when we got to the IGA, there were plenty of carts and the place wasn't packed yet. Bert took another fare somewhere while we were shopping, and said he would be back by 11:00, so we took our time shopping. For a Friday, there was less than usual in the fresh isles, like diary. And, the employees were still stocking the shelves. Perhaps the container arrived later than usual. We still found everything we needed, except the brand of local rum that I usually buy. Of all things for them to be out of!
We were getting ice cream, so we delayed checking out until just before 11:00. That way we could snag the ice cream from the freezer just before checking out. We did our usual routine at the checkout, where I unload the cart and unload all refrigerated items first, and Barb packs them in our insulated travel bag so they stay cold on the ride home. We got everything checked, and I gave the girl my American Express card as usual. This is one of the few places I get to still use Amex. For whatever reason, they have machines to process VISA/MasterCard at each register, but they have to carry an Amex over to the service desk where they use a different machine to process it. When the girl came back she handed me back the card and announced to me and the others in line that my card was declined. She handed me a little slip from the machine with the error printed on it. It clearly said COMM ERROR, which means their machine couldn't communicate with American Express, not that my card was declined. I said to her, that it wasn't the card, but their machine. She stood there and stared at me, without response, clearly not caring why it didn't work. In the interest of not being the guy who was holding up the line, I gave her my VISA and paid the bill. (I prefer to use Amex when I can because the points program is better.) Barb had already taken the groceries out to the front lobby while all this was transpiring, and Bert wasn't there yet, so I immediately walked over to the service counter to complain. When the girl behind the counter acknowledged me I asked to speak with a manager. She immediately responded that he wasn't there, and asked what I needed. I briefly explained the problem, and she said "well he couldn't help you with that anyway", and turned to the next customer, just dismissing me. I was pissed. This is not the kind of attitude we have experienced anywhere else in Grenada, and certainly was not expected in the store that tries to emulate a US store and caters to the visitor and student community. Rather than continue to make a scene I left angry. While steaming in the lobby waiting for Bert, I noticed an e-mail address on the front glass. So when we got back to the boat, I shot off an e-mail detailing my experience. Later in the afternoon, I got a reject e-mail back because their mailbox is full. So much for that avenue.
While at the mall, we picked up Chinese take-out food for lunch. We got a shrimp Lo Mein and a chicken Chow Mein. They were good, but a little different than in the US. I also picked up a c-clip that I needed for the boats steering wheel at the hardware store next to the grocery. It isn't stainless steel, but neither boat parts place carries the clip I need in stainless, so we'll give it a try.
We relaxed for the afternoon doing some reading. Without the wireless, I actually read instead of sitting at the computer all day. We both have evening plans tonight, but not together. Barb is going over to Fat Cat for a girl's night. There ended up being seven ladies there, and they enjoyed cosmos, key lime shooters, wine and snacks, while watching several episodes of Sex In The City and talking. Barb didn't get back to the boat until nearly midnight, and reported a good time. I went with Steve from Liward and Ira from Lone Fox over to the Prickly Bay Marina, where a guy named Barracuda was playing his usual Friday night gig. Steve had heard him before and has been invited to sit in with him for a couple of songs. The bar and restaurant at Prickly Bay Marina is known for their pizza. We were met there by Sean, the local guy who has been doing varnish work on both Liward and Lone Fox. Barracuda was already playing. The band consisted of two Rasta guys, one on bass and one on drums, and Barracuda on an electric guitar and vocals. Barracuda is a middle-aged Italian guy who has lived here for some time. The drummer, we learned, is the drummer for the pan band that won Panorama. We got a table and ordered beer, two pizzas and salads. The pizza here is reputed to be the best on the island, and if you like a thin, crispy crust pizza, it probably is. Personally, I prefer a little thicker crust, but then again I never met a pizza I couldn't eat. After the band took their first break, Steve joined them onstage. Barracuda had told him he could sing two songs. At the end of the second one, Barracuda just yelled the key of the next song over to him and they went into another song with Barracuda singing and Steve playing rhythm guitar. After Steve played, a young girl from NYC got up and sang a couple of songs with them. She was quite good, although Barracuda kind of lost control of the show for a little bit because she was just improvising lyrics to their back beat. After a while, he cued the band and they gracefully segued into Bob Marley's No Woman No Cry and Barracuda took over the singing. After her a guy named Cappy got on stage to sing a couple of songs. Cappy has some financial connection to the place, that we aren't exactly sure of. But, he apparently recently bought the new sound system that the band is using, so he gets to sing when he wants to. This guy should not be allowed on stage. His singing is mediocre, and he gyrates and makes faces like Joe Cocker when he sings, even though he's not signing a Joe Cocker song. (If you're not familiar with Joe Cocker, suffice it to say it ain't pretty.) We left about 10:00 and headed back to the boat.
This was only the second time I think that I have been outside the marina after dark. Being Friday night, everything was hopping. There must be a dozen little rum shops along the road between Prickly and Clarke's Court, and they were all open, full of people, blasting music, and cooking something on a barbeque outside. There were pedestrians everywhere (there are no sidewalks), and you had to wonder how much each driver coming at you had to drink already. We made it unscathed though.
GPS N 12-00.639 W 061-44.360 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 9539.
Sept 22
We had a quiet morning, although we both felt fine after our party night. Mid-morning I went up to the bar to plug into the Internet and found Bob had his local computer guy working on the router. He had just gotten the wireless working again. He had done this by doing some undocumented base level reset on the box and then setting it up from scratch as if it were brand new. Bob was thrilled, even though he already bought another new router that is on it's way here form Canada. The computer guy asked Bob to go get the original box that went bad a few weeks ago. He did the same reset to it, and it worked too. So now Bob will have two spares, thus ensuring that he will never need one.
Mid-afternoon, the power to the boat went off. Given that Bob thinks he has all the power problems sorted out, this was not a good sign. I thought perhaps we had blown the breaker on our pedestal again. I went outside and looked at the breaker and it was not blown. I started to walk up the dock to see if Bob had turned our dock off intentionally for some reason, and I noticed that our neighbors a/c was running, indicating the power to the dock was on. I went back to our pedestal and noticed that the power cord has sagged under it's own weight just enough to not make contact. It hadn't fallen completely out, which is why I didn't notice it at first. I re-secured it and we were back in business. Wish all fixes were that easy.
The weekly pot luck tonight had a lighter attendance than usual. There were only sixteen people there, but we still had plenty of food and everybody had a good time. I helped Bob tend bar, but since the crowd was small, we both got to sit down and eat with everybody else. Of course we had some karaoke after dinner. Amanda, who usually plays DJ, is not here for a couple of weeks because they have gone to the boatyard for their haulout. So, I got to be DJ tonight also. Since Dave and I usually sing more than half the songs, and Dave is out of town, I thought it would be a light night of singers. The very first singer was quite a surprise. The guy is an older English gentleman who I think is a single hander. I don't know his name or his boat name, but he dinghies in from the anchorage almost everyday to use the Internet at the bar. He has a severe stuttering problem, so bad that it can take him thirty seconds to tell you if he wants a Coke or a Carib, and you can't guess since they both start with C. However, just like Mel Tillis, who also had a stuttering problem, the guy sang great. He sang a Beatle's song first. After several other songs had been sung, he came up to me and asked if he could sing something we didn't have on the list. I said sure, and he did an a cappella rendition of Ave Maria. I think everybody there was stunned. The evening ended relatively early, about 22:00, since there were very few people and we were dealing with an amplifier problem with the music. The amp was doing the same cutting out problem it did a couple weeks ago when the band was using it. We had it setup so that even when it cut out, you could still hear the music come from the karaoke machine itself, just not the big speakers, so we were able to deal with it but it was annoying.
GPS N 12-00.639 W 061-44.360 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 9539.
Sept 23
We had a quiet morning. About 10:00, Barb made us a real breakfast, which we haven't done in quite a while. We accomplished one boat chore, and that was defrosting the freezer. We hear other people talk about what a chore it is to defrost their freezers, because most of them are built in units. Since ours is portable, it's a piece of cake. We put all the contents into two coolers, which we could probably skip since the whole process takes about five minutes. We then drag the freezer over in front of the galley sink and use the spray nozzle with hot water to melt all the frost in just a couple minutes. We then drag the freezer back to the middle of the main saloon where we open the floorboard to the bilge and tip the freezer over to dump out all the water. Slide the box back in place and reload. Less than ten minutes from lid open to lid closed. And nothing else got broken in the process!
In the afternoon, we played dominoes with Sue. In the evening, Paul & Ginette on Sol Magique hosted happy hour for us, Sue, Ernie from Joat Mon, and Bill & Roxanne from Raven. Paul & Ginette have discovered Cosmopolitans and even went out and bought six martini glasses to serve them in. We visited there for a couple of hours before returning home for leftovers and an early evening.
GPS N 12-00.639 W 061-44.360 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 9539.
Sept 24
I started the day by playing computer games and reading while Barb exercised. Mid-morning, I decided that we really needed to work on something and not just sit all day. So, we attacked the storage area. We have all of our storage in the v-berth and the forward head that we don't use. Last summer, while we were in NY, my brother helped me build two shelves, one for the front half of the v-berth, and one for the head. These enabled us to better store stuff so it was not just all piled in. Over the past year, these shelves have worked very well, but we discovered in very rough seas, things could move off the one in the head. And the one in the v-berth was sagging a little on one corner where we had left it unsupported. The fixes for both problems are relatively easy, but it means unloading nearly everything from both areas, which we haven't been looking forward too. But now that we have both air conditioners running, we'll tackle it. The first task was to unload stuff from the v-berth to the main saloon. We did that and I measured to cut a leg for the front corner of the shelf. Remember that old adage about measure twice, cut once? Well, anybody can do things right that way. It's much more challenging to cut after the first measurement and then figure out how to correct the fact that somehow you were short by two inches. Fortunately, this piece is never going to be seen by anybody, so the screw up is not critical. (My brother should be laughing his ass off about now.) We repacked the v-berth and were amazed at how things fit back tighter when you repack. On to the head shelf, I need to add a fiddle to the front edge of the shelf so stuff can't slide off. I did this one without screwing up, and now there is a one inch edge on the front.
In the course of all the digging and repacking, we found a spare dive regulator that I had, and the fifty-foot hose I bought two years ago to make a boat cleaning device. By putting the long hose on the regulator, I will be able to clean the bottom of the boat without having to don all my dive gear. You simply lay the tank on the deck about amidships, throw the hose in the water and dive. Now that I have the regulator and hose dug out, I will assemble the pieces so next time I need to go under the boat it will be easy. I also found a brand new mask in the bag of stuff I got when my friend Tilton died that I didn't know I had. I'm going to give it try next time I go in to see if it seals better than the old one I've been using.
GPS N 12-00.639 W 061-44.360 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 9539.
Sept 25
We didn't do much of anything today. The morning was spent reading and playing on computers. Afternoon was dominoes with Sue and Ginette. In the evening, we had Steve & Lili from Liward over for dinner. They have been hauled out in St. David's for a week already, but they have a car, so they welcomed the opportunity to not have to worry about cooking dinner on the hard. Barb made lasagna, salad, and garlic bread and we had a nice evening.
After Steve & Lili left, we turned the TV on. You never know what you'll find on the local channels. They take mix miscelaneous stuff off the satellite, play DVD's, and do some local programming. When we turned it on at first there was a Court TV show about dangerous high speed chases that all end of course with a big crash. When that was over, Barb went to bed, but I stayed up and watched a bad movie until 01:00. It was about organized crime, bad cops, and a DA who killed his wife. It was just interesting enough to keep me watching, and trying to figure out how all the loose ends could be resolved at the end. Well, they weren't. I hate movies that don't end the story.
Before I went to bed, I decided to empty our holding tank. I think I have explained before, that there are no waste water pumpout facilities in the islands. That means your sewage goes overboard. Some people pump directly from the toilet overboard each time they use it, and some like us pump to a holding tank and then empty the holding tank when you are away from an anchorage and other boats. That works fine except when you sit in a marina for four months. Here, we primarily use the marinas bathrooms, and only use the boat's head for those middle-of-the-night pees. The tank only holds seventeen gallons, so every couple of weeks we have to pump it out. Pumping it out simply means flipping a switch for a minute or so and listening for the pitch of the pump to change when the tank is empty. I turned the pump on and it didn't sound quite right, but I let it run for a minute or so until it suddenly made a bad noise and stopped. This can't be good. Something to dream about tonight and deal with tomorrow.
GPS N 12-00.639 W 061-44.360 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 9539.
Sept 26
Today promises to be a crappy day. Pun intended. To remove the macerator pump you need two things. One, you need to close the thru-hull valve to keep water from coming in from outside. Also, you need the holding tank to be empty so when you disconnect the hose between the tank and the pump, you don't dump sewage in the bilge. It also would help if I switched the Y-valve at the head so it is going directly overboard. That way we can still use it if necessary. First I tried to turn the Y-valve. Of course, since it has not been turned in years, it wouldn't budge. I learned the hard way in the past that forcing it just breaks the handle off, so I disassembled it instead. Once I got it apart, I scraped out the crusty calcification that plagues boat heads due to the mixing of urine and salt water. After a bit of nasty scraping, I was able to reassemble the valve with it in the position that directs output directly overboard.
Next I had to deal with the pump. The first thing to figure out was if the tank had been emptied before the pump broke. To do this, I had to remove the large inspection plug from the top of the tank. I did this with great trepidation, fearing the smell I would encounter. Those of you who live in rural places may have had the pleasure of pumping out a septic tank. Imagine doing that in your living room. By the way, the tank and pump are located under the seat I usually occupy in the main saloon. I removed the cap and found the tank full. I quickly replaced the plug while contemplating options. I decided to close the thru-hull valve next. This thru-hull valve is conveniently located down alongside the holding tank where no adult can possibly get their hand, and if they do, they have no leverage to move the handle. Since the valve is in such a place, it has never been moved in fourteen years and of course is frozen in place. I tried in vain to move it. Barb's arm is smaller than mine, so she tried. She could reach it better, but couldn't move it. I decided that we really should have better access to this valve, so I drilled a four inch hole through the wall under the nav station so I could get my hand on it. Once I had this access, I still couldn't turn the valve. I managed to get one hand through the new hole and the other down from above so that I could use the strength of both hands to turn the valve. That's when I snapped the stem off the valve, just like the one I broke a couple of weeks ago. This really complicates the job, as I will need to remove the holding tank entirely to replace this valve. To remove the holding tank, I'll need to remove the whole seat assembly. This shouldn't be a big deal, except for the infinite wisdom of the engineers and/or builders at Catalina. The fiberglass box that covers the tank and makes the base for the seat is held in with eight screws that I could find. I removed those screws but the box didn't budge. I kept looking for more screws but couldn't see any. On the side that abuts the nav station wall, I saw that there seemed to be a sealant squirted between the two. I tried using a razor knife to cut the sealant, but realized it was way too deep. I used a ten inch Ginseng knife to try to saw my way through the sealant. In the end, I found they had used probably a whole caulk gun sized tube of sealant on an area about 12" x 18". Between the knife and liberal amounts of a product called Goo Gone, I finally seemed to be able to run the knife the along the whole side. But, while the box would move some now, it still seemed to have something holding it on one side. I kept prying, thinking it was glued at the bottom edge where I couldn't possibly get the knife. Eventually, using brute force, the box popped loose. I found there had been two more screws that I couldn't have possibly gotten to without removing the whole nav station desk and wall. The idiots who put this together this way should be forced to repair boats for the rest of their lives instead of building things that will eventually need to be removed but are impossible to get to without doing damage.
With the box out of the way, I was able to get to everything. Now came the fun part. I opened the inspection port and Barb used our dinghy hand pump to pump the contents of the tank into a bucket. I then took the bucket outside and dumped it. Since the tank holds seventeen gallons, and I didn't want to risk splashing any from the bucket, we did about three gallons at a time. After six buckets, we should have been done, but the tank seemed to be refilling. Apparently whatever is wrong with the pump is also allowing water to bypass it and come back in. Since the valve couldn't be closed, I got in the water with a wooden plug to plug the thru-hull from the outside. This thru-hull is just below the waterline, so I was able to get a plug in it without actually diving under the boat. We then pumped out about half a tank full again. But there still seemed to be water coming in. I disconnected the hose from the thru-hull valve and found water still coming in even though I had plugged it outside. I stuck a plug in the valve itself and stopped the water. We then emptied the tank yet again. I disconnected the input and output hoses from the tank and took it outside. With the inspection port open, we could see that there was a couple inches of solid sediment in the tank that was never getting pumped out. With much fresh water, I finally got everything out of the tank. Now I took out the pump. That was the original problem remember? I took it outside and disassembled it. What I found was an impeller blade had broken off and jammed it. This would explain the water being able to backflow with a blade missing. In hindsight, I think what probably happened is that the solids in the tank had reached a point where they were blocking the output flow, and the pump ran dry long enough to break the impeller. That would explain why it didn't sound right.
By this time, it was 16:00 and I had been working on this project for about seven hours straight. Time to quit for the day. I was quite sore from all the odd twisting and bending, and my back was killing me. I loaded up on Advil and started the intravenous rum. Barb made us dinner of salad and left-over lasagna.
At 18:00, Steve and his little band are playing up at the bar. We went up and Bob immediately grabbed me and asked me to bartend. I told him I could while he went and did whatever he had to do, but I couldn't do it all evening. I was behind the bar for about fifteen minutes, when Ginette from Sol Magique offered to relieve me, and Bob was back, so they could handle it and I could sit down. We had an enjoyable evening listening to the music and visiting. Mike & Kylie from Meggie, who are over in St. David's had ridden over with Steve & Lili and it was good to catch up with them. We haven't seen them since we were all in St. Lucia together. We were back at the boat around 21:00, and turned in tired and beat.
GPS N 12-00.639 W 061-44.360 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 9539.
Sept 27
To continue the crappy story, I was considering replacing the hose that runs from the Y-valve in the head to the input of the holding tank. The reason for this consideration was that at the tank end the line was about half blocked with calcification, just like the hose I replaced in the head a couple weeks ago. To replace this hose will be tough. I drilled two more four inch holes in discreet places to assess if we could pull a new hose through or not. After much puzzling over the actual route of the hose, we decided it ran downhill all the way from the Y-valve to the tank, except for the last foot or so at the tank where it was level. Maybe it hasn't clogged up through it's whole length and is only a problem at the end. I took my very long screwdriver and scraped out the crap at the end. Sure enough, about a foot in, it doesn't look severely constricted. So, we decided to forego the challenge of replacing this hose. I made a list of parts needed to put things back together, but then made an executive decision. Instead of calling Bert and making a special trip to the parts store, I'm going to wait until tomorrow when we are going grocery shopping anyway, and get the parts then. I need a day of rest.
We had lunch and then met Sue for a game of dominoes. The evening was spent with a nice dinner of beef quesadillas, Radio Margaritaville, and catching up on my writing.
GPS N 12-00.639 W 061-44.360 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 9539.
Sept 28
Today is grocery day. Since I have a list of parts to get, and I can probably count on one store or the other not having everything, we'll hit Budget Marine first. Sure enough, they didn't have the pump I need, but they had the inspection covers I want to install over the several four-inch holes I've cut to access things and the ball valve. From here we went to the IGA and dropped Barb & Sue off. Bert then took me on in to town to Island Water World. There I got the pump and hose clamps. I then went next door to Ace hardware where I got a new putty knife/scraper and a new razor knife, but they didn't have the weather stripping that I want to put behind the inspection ports. So, back to the IGA it was, where I walked next door to the Do It Hardware store and got weather stripping. It took four stores, but I had everything on my list. The girls were just about done shopping, so I was in the grocery store just in time to help check out. As we walked out the door with our baskets, a couple dozen students from the medical school came pouring in. We timed it perfectly to beat their rush.
After stowing the groceries and eating lunch, I started the reassembly process. The first thing to do is replace the ball valve. I unscrewed the old one and quickly realized that I had purchased the wrong size to replace it. I mistakenly thought the size of the valve referred to the inside diameter of the threaded part. It doesn't. It refers to the inside diameter of the hole in the valve itself. Thus, a valve marked 1" (which I thought I needed) really has a threaded hole of 1 1/4". Turns out I needed a 3/4" valve which has a 1" threaded part. The reassembly project came to a screeching halt. Sue has an appointment in town at 15:00, so I piggy-backed on her taxi ride and went to Island Water World to get the right valve. Bert knew that due to construction, the regular route to town was congested, so he took a route we had never been on before. When we came out of Woburn, the town near the marina, we turned away from St. George's instead of towards it. The road we took basically went up and over the mountain instead of around it. This way was a little longer, but Bert felt it would be much faster. Since we pay him a flat rate, we didn't care. This route took us past many very nice homes and the view was spectacular. We came to a point at the very top of the mountain overlooking St. George's and the prison where the remaining prisoners from the uprising in 1983 are kept. Bert mentioned to us that Oct 25th is a holiday here to mark the day that the US invaded Grenada to put down the military coup that had taken over the country. It will be interesting to see what goes on that day, and how we as Americans are affected. When we first got here a few months ago, we encountered many people who just came up to us and said thank you for rescuing them. And that was twenty-four years ago.
Bert dropped Sue off at her appointment, and took me on to IWW. This put us in some of the screwed up traffic, but we had plenty of time. I got the valve needed, and with the help of the guy at IWW, I now understand how they are sized. We still had time to kill, so we drove down to the Carenage and parked. We went in to the Ocean Grill, which is a nice restaurant right on the water and sat at the bar. I had a couple beers and Bert had a Coke while we visited. The Coke Bert got was in a 20oz plastic bottle, which you almost never see here. Coke here is always in reusable large glass bottles that we haven't seen in the States in decades. Bert explained that the glass ones are bottled here, and the plastic ones come from Trinidad. He didn't understand why they brought any in from Trinidad. They see the plastic as just more garbage, and the imported ones cost more per ounce. He said the plastic bottle would cost over $3EC, while the glass bottles cost about $2EC and you get $.50EC back when you return the bottle. While we visited Bert also told me about his experience during Hurricane Ivan in 2004. He had been working at a local hotel up on the mountainside when it came. He was holed up in the kitchen along with other employees. When the eye came, they stepped out on the patio to look around. Bert said he had to tell the others to come back in before the other side of the eye got there. Most of them didn't understand how the eye of a hurricane works, and they thought the storm was over. At this point the bartender, a forty-something woman, asked us to explain the concept of a hurricane eye to her. I found it amazing that people who live in a place that deals with tropical weather routinely didn't know this. There seems to be very little done by the government to promote hurricane awareness. When storms have threatened this year, the resources boaters use were the only mention of the approaching storms. There was nothing on the local TV about them at all. Anyway, back to Ivan, when the eye passed, the wind went from dead calm back to 150mph in a matter of seconds. That's why people get hurt when they go outside during the eye's passage. The next morning, after the storm was past, Bert had to use a machete to cut branches from fallen trees and make a path from where his car was parked to the main road. He then slowly made his way around downed trees and power lines to his home on the other side of the island. Along the way he saw people looting stores and refused to give rides to several people who were carrying stolen stuff. We talked about the mentality of looting, and it just doesn't make sense to us. It may be justifiable to take food to eat, especially if it is going to spoil due to lack of power anyway, but what are you going to do with that big-screen TV when you don't even have a roof on your house to keep it dry? It took Bert all day to get home and he was exhausted when he got there. He was renting a small apartment on the first floor of a two-story house. He found the roof gone off a corner of the house, but it was the corner opposite his apartment. Once he climbed over debris and got to his apartment, he found everything in it was soaked from the driven rain. He took the wet mattress off the box spring, put a dry bedspread that had been in a plastic bag over the box spring and crashed for the night. Eventually Sue called to say she was done, and we went and picked her up.
I installed the new valve with no problem. I then installed the new pump and put the holding tank back in. As the factory had done, I not only used Teflon tape on all the threads, but I sealed the assembled cap and fittings with a bead of sealant also. You don't want even a drip of a leak in this area. I set the seat in place so I can sit there, but won't bolt it down until after I have tested the whole system. I won't do that for a day or two to let the sealant cure. If none of my descriptions of this whole chore make sense to anybody, I documented the reassembly with a few pictures.
GPS N 12-00.639 W 061-44.360 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 9539.
Sept 29
This morning Dave brought over some stuff he had brought back from the States for me. He got in late last night after two long travel days made worse by dealing with the absurdities of airport security. In a nutshell, since he was carrying two bags of boat parts, he drew some attention at the security checkpoint. The x-ray showed lots of stuff they weren't accustomed to seeing. They asked to check the bag and did the test for explosives where they wipe a little cloth on things and put it in a machine to see if there is any residue on it. The machine tested positive, which bought a very excited response from lots of people. They further searched Dave personally, as well as the bag. They then filled out a bunch of forms and sent him on his way - with all his stuff. Now what sense does that make? They never determined exactly what item had residue on it, nor why the machine went off. They just filled out their paperwork and carried on. This was all in Albuquerque. Dave flew from there to Dallas where he spent the night. When he checked in the next day for his flight here, he had all the same stuff in the same bag, and nobody so much as raised an eyebrow at security. Nice to know everyplace follows the same standards.
One of the things Dave brought us was our mail. It was much cheaper to forward it to him in New Mexico than to ship it here. The most important thing in the package was my new earring. When I first got my ear pierced, the plan was to get a shackle earring. This is the most common earring you'll see sailing guys wear. When I did the piercing, I had no idea how hard it would be to find a shackle earring. I searched all the jewelry stores in St. Maarten and found none. I then checked a couple of mail order sources and found them out of business. I finally went to AGA Correa's website and ordered it. I knew I could get it from them, but they are quite expensive. They were very cooperative though in that they had no problem selling one earring instead of a pair. They shipped the earring, in it's nice little box and with a catalog to my brother. He repackaged just the earring into a letter sized envelope that he mailed to my box in TX. All this was done not only to save space in the forwarding to me here, but also to avoid any duty that might be due on the purchase. Since I don't think I could convince Customs that the little gold shackle was really a boat part, there would have been a 37% duty on it. So now I'm an international smuggler. I went to put the earring on and couldn't do it by myself. The shackle really works, in that the pin screws in to the shackle. So you have to hold the hoop part in place, and then slide the pin through the tiny hole in the shackle, then the tiny hole in the ear, and hit the tiny hole in the other side of the shackle. And then screw the pin in to secure it. Barb helped me get it on, and it wasn't easy even to another person to do. I don't think I'll be taking it off an on very often.
I installed five inspection ports over holes I have had to drill in the boat. One was in one of the bathroom cabinets. I drilled this hole years ago to get access to where I had to pull some wires. Another was behind the toilet seat in the head where I had to cut last year to remove the clogged hose that was conveniently clamped to the backside of the fiberglass. The other three were cut as a result of this latest project. All of the holes except the one behind the toilet are in out of the way places where you would have to look for them, but it looks much more professional to have covers over them instead of just leaving holes. I'm going to wait another day before I start moving water through the system to check for leaks.
This evening was our weekly pot luck dinner. Again, we had a fairly small crowd of about twenty-five. There is a new boat in the marina with Tony & Mary aboard, and there were also a couple of new people from the anchorage who joined us. After dinner, it was on to karaoke. I ran the karaoke again this week. With Dave back in town we had our usual handful of singers, and a couple of new ones. As the evening was winding down, Roxanne from Raven arrived by taxi from the airport. She and Bill had gone to the States to look at a boat, and Bill went on afterwards to visit family. By about 22:30, the singers were dwindling and we just turned on some music. We were home by 23:00.
GPS N 12-00.639 W 061-44.360 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 9539.
Sept 30
Today's boat project is to test the new plumbing. The sealant has had two full days to cure, so here we go. The first order of business was to remove the plug from the outside of the thru-hull. I thought perhaps I could do this without getting in the water, so I moved the dinghy around to the spot and reached under as far as I could. The plug is not far from the waterline, but I couldn't quite reach it. All I had on was an old pair of shorts that tore yesterday and are headed for the trash, so I just jumped in from the dinghy and got the plug out. Back inside and dried off, I opened the new valve on the thru-hull. So far so good - no leaks. Then I switched the Y-valve by the head so it would pump to the tank instead of directly overboard. Barb then pumped the head a whole bunch while I watched the holding tank end of things. After several minutes of pumping, I turned the pump on and emptied the tank overboard. No leaks! The only remaining issue was that the vent hose seems to be plugged. I can't easily replace this hose since it's hidden like everything else. I went outside and removed the cover from the hole where the vent comes through the side of the boat, and used a screwdriver to clean some crap out of there. I then squirted vinegar into the hose from the outside, and we will let that sit in there overnight.
In the afternoon, I went up to the bar to see if we could watch the NASCAR race on TV. I enjoy NASCAR, and there is another couple here, Kelton & Doris on Isle Escape that are longtime fans. We found that as was the case last week, we could get the broadcast on ABC, but the sound was turned off. There must be a licensing issue with either Direct TV, or the region or something. NASCAR is carried on Sirius Radio, but if you access it through the Internet like I have to down here, all you get is the music channels, not sports and news. So, we just had to watch and rely on the on-screen graphics to know what was going on. Since I was going to be at the bar for awhile anyway, Bob took off for a while in his boat. He rarely gets the chance to get away from the marina, so I was happy to give him a chance. Bob returned a little after 18:00, and I went back to the boat where Barb had dinner just about ready.
We watched local TV for a while. They were carrying Court TV, and on Sunday evenings Court TV shows several shows that are police chases caught on video. At 19:30, the program switched to local news. There was a story on the news about the Port Louis marina development in the lagoon in St George's. The lagoon had many derelict and sunken boats in it, and the point of land that will be Port Louis had lots of squatters living in ramshackle huts on it. When the development company bought the land and started clearing it, they apparently gave $1.5 million US to some government body to relocate the squatters. Seems to me that was pretty generous since the people were on the land illegally in the first place. The actual movement of the squatters to their new homes took place a week or two after we got here, and the land has since been cleared. The story is that the squatters aren't happy with their new homes. They showed a row of houses on a new road somewhere. The houses are very basic small buildings that look like many of the tiny homes we see people build in the hills around here. The complaints were that the utilities weren't working right, and the people weren't happy with the location. I'm not sure where they are, but they're not right in town on a bus route anymore. On one hand, I found it hard to feel sorry for them, since they had been living in squalor with no utilities before, but the real question was where did the money go? The stuff they built couldn't have cost more than $110k max. The TV reporter interviewed a spokesman for the development company who said basically, we generously paid for the peoples relocation. If there are problems with the relocation you need to talk to the agency we gave the money to. I guess corruption happens everywhere. After the news came the obituaries. After the third dead guy, I turned the TV off.
GPS N 12-00.639 W 061-44.360 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 9539.