Why Are You Guys Still Here?

Our home for the last several weeks.

The title says it all:  Why are we still at the dock at Peakes?  I could go into all sorts of existentialistic reasons,  but essentially we are still waiting for the water pump motor to arrive . . . and something else broke.

Well not really, but after having the cutlass bearing go out after just three years I felt it would be wise to have the engine alignment checked. If the engine isn't in perfect alignment with the propellor shaft, the shaft will vibrate. If the shaft vibrates, the cutlass bearing will wear. See, so simple.

To realign the engine you essentially undo the coupling between the engine and the transmission, then see how the shaft lines up with the engine. If it doesn't you loosen the nuts on the four engine motor mounts and gently adjust the attitude of the engine with the propeller shaft.  Unfortunately in our case, the motor mounts had no more adjustment left in them. The rubber that makes up the mounts was compressed as far as it could be, meaning  no adjustability and no vibration dampening as it was rock hard with age.  The good news was I was due to repaint the mounts since they were so rusty and I had been putting off it because it's a dirty, messy, and difficult job. So there.

Our trusty mechanic Falco has managed to find some motor mounts at about double the price in the U.S. (at one point I was going to have Meryl fly to Houston to pick up four new mounts) and will replace them this Tuesday. It involves putting a jack under the engine, and under the assumption that he can loosen the old bolts, then jacking up the engine, replacing the mounts, then aligning them to the shaft. Not fun given the very limited space in the engine room. But what's another $1,500 at this point?

We've escaped from boat captivity and venture out into the real world at West Mall.

With most of our boat jobs completed, we decided to take our first day off in three weeks and head to the mall.  After hiking out to the main highway in a pouring down rain, we flagged down a MaxiTaxi and for $.90 each rode about 25 minutes to the very modern West Mall.

I was actually very impressed, not Bellevue Square but not bad.  We found a computer store and replaced a dead mouse and a pharmacy where we asked everyone about mineral oil (it's used as a laxative down here so I'm sure people thought there was some urgency to our request). After several drug stores we found they call it Liquid Paraffin B.P.  We needed it to coat Meryl's cutting board which I recently refinished. So now you can understand the sense of urgency.

We went to the Food Court (with the omnipresent KFC and McDonalds) and had a good local lunch, found a clothing store to get Meryl an early birthday present, and a supermarket to finish out our provisioning.

The supermarkets, when you can find them, are interesting. Very similar to those in the U.S. but stocked with foods from around the world.  Some of the good deals were the incredibly tasty KerryGold butter from Ireland, Anchor cheddar cheese from New Zealand, Danish cookies, and my favorite, Cadbury King Size chocolate bars (but Meryl wouldn't let me buy one).  They had a great selection of spices, but on the other hand, U.S. goods such as Woolite and Resolve were almost twice the price as in the U.S.

Since a tropical wave was passing over the island, we hustled out of the grocery store and back to the highway where, amazingly, the same MaxiTaxi pulled up just as we got there.  For an extra dollar he drove us all the way back through Peakes Boatyard to the guest dock, 100 ft from our boat. Given the pouring rain that was a real plus.

Getting on the boat was another issue, however, since waves from the storm were crashing into the dock and the bow of our boat was raising and falling with each passing wave. To get on the boat we had to wait until the bow went way down, then we made a jump for the anchor hanging off the front and tried to pull ourselves up to the bow pulpit as the boat raised in the air. It was like jumping on to a bucking bronco. Getting the heavy grocery bags on was another matter, but somehow everything made it to the foredeck in one piece. Once the groceries were stored I had to jump in the swimming pool (the dingy was full of water almost to the top) and bail it out.

As you might image, it felt good to finally get back into the boat and realize no mater how much it rained, we'd still float on top of it all. Of course I was still stewing over the Cadbury's bar. A chunk of chocolate would have tasted really good about then.