Anchor dragging contest

Yesterday evening the games began.  First a really strange Canadian boat drug down past what looks like a Hans Christian - luckily both boats were manned and crews were able to fend off.  The big test was trying to recover and reset the anchor that drug as the boat was no calmly at anchor about 5 feet behind the other boat.

Next a metal boat drug from up near shore - several boat boys and anchored cruisers climber aboard to try and reset the anchor - this boat was not manned but the crewed showed up during the event and was able to participate in recovery and re anchoring.

Then a Bavaria from Grenada (US Registered) came in and tried to anchor, anchor, re anchor, etc.  A fellow on a boat near the action went over and appeared to help unjam the windlass then assisted in the re anchor effort.

We had dinner marinating (Korean Bulgogi), so well after dark we finally put the finishing touches on a wonderful dinner.  Bulgogi cooked on skewers on the new grill, shredded cabbage, pickled cucumbers and steamed Japanese rice.  We even used our chopsticks.

A bit blustery

A blustery/rainy overnight but a free boat wash is always welcome.  The winds are still up this morning but the rain showers have stopped for now.  Running the water maker now and plan to go to town and pick up a spiral sliced ham for New Years dinner later this morning.

More of my pet peeves yesterday evening - late arrivals at the anchorage and folks who do not run an anchor light - or light of any kind at night.  What can I say - some folks insist on using a red/green/blue/white alternating light others use lanai wiki lights, but at least they are using a light of some sort.  Then I run four strings of Christmas lights to mark the holiday season and my anchor light!

D' Gud, D'Bad, D'Ugly

We took a bus to Hillsborough this morning and did a little shopping.  Picked up a few bottles of Chardonnay, some veggies at the Farmers Coop, and a frozen pork tenderloin and some roast beef at Patty's Deli.  We talked with Peter and Cyndi about New Years eve dinner and have decided that we are going to pick up a spiral sliced ham at Patty's tomorrow and have some home made rolls, scalloped potatoes, steamed mixed veggies etc.   We already have some champagne on board as this is the celebration season!

We are going to try and hike to the top of  Chapeau Carre (945') and get some pictures of Hillsborough and Harvey Vale (Tyrrel Bay area) tomorrow.

After the trip to town Lesley waxed the transom and tried some new wax from Collinite - will update after we see how well it works.  Then with the hot job finished we took the dink ashore and hung out in the water at the edge of the beach for awhile.  This island life is hard work!

The title of today's post was the name on the windshield of the bus we took to town!

Carriacou

We left Grand Mal, Grenada yesterday morning and had a nice trip over to Carriacou.  Winds were generally favorable till we were most of the way over then they shifted to more on the nose and the current and opposing swelss became worse.  We plan to stay here through New Years Day then move on to Bequia.

Will take a bus to town this morning and pick up a few fresh vegetables and perhaps a few other items at Pattys Deli.

Grand Mal

Anchored off Grand Mal with borrowed WiFi from some nice sort ashore.  On to Carriacou in the morning.  Passed through Prickly bay to drop off an item and passed close by Traa Dy Liooar and Seabbatical for a quick chat.

Christmas Dinner!

"Man, this sure tastes better than bacon, once we finish this lets go find some veg"

Christmas Eve - Hi Greg

We had a great Christmas eve, with visitor Greg (IP 350 Ei'Lean), just in from an interesting transatlantic crossing.  We sat around and got reacquainted, had a few beers, then I cooked dinner.  Even though we had canned veggies - they were veggies all the same.  We shared stories from our recent trips and marveled at the situations that you can find yourself in.

Merry Christmas from Grenada

Engines serviced

Got up this morning and installed the new home made mixing elbow on the genset then ran it for awhile to make sure everything is OK.  Changed the oil and raw water loop zinc and everything is fine. I'm hoping that the new elbow, made of 316L stainless, lasts longer than the last two that I've had.  After lunch replaced the fuel lines on the dinghy and changed the Racor gas filter.  Then, being that I was on a roll of sorts, I serviced the Yanmar auxiliary engine.

We've pretty much gotten everything back together and completed provisioning so hope to go sailing, perhaps to Carriacou, early next week.

Tonight Lesley is making chicken etouffee and we are having foccia and a salad.

Shower time!

Monday Morning

We had another long day yesterday but with great success.

The new water maker is installed and working.  Total dissolved solids of 160PPM which is far better than the old unit and much better than I expected.  The pressure vessel is much easier to work with for membrane changes and all of the supporting plumbing is now mounted away from the pressure vessel.

Line diagram

System in operation before amp meter shunt was connected.

We tried out our Magma Chefs Mate grill for the first time last night and I am very happy with it.

We had a small water leak in the aft cabin and could not identify where the water was coming from.  Till yesterday that is - there is a small shelf area in the stbd lazarette that is part of the overhead at the foot of the bed in the cabin.  Water was getting onto the shelf and then running down on the inside wall.  I'm going to seal the joint with 5200 and then start looking for the source of the water.

I also serviced the outboard and have the dinghy ready.

Sails on and watermaker installation progressing

Between showers we were able to get all of the sails on today and also nearly completed the installation of the new watermaker.  I plan to post some pictures in the next several days but at this point I have all of the plumbing completed and have a small amount of wiring to do to finish the installation.

Lesley is stowing all of the stuff that we brought with us this year and inventorying and noting stowage locations.

Putting the boat back together

We spent the first full day with the boat back in the water by cleaning, putting provisions and spares away, and desperately searching for four Right Hand thread "T" bolts for our new lifelines!  We had four new lifelines fabricated this summer using the old lifelines as templates.  Since we did not need new turnbuckles  we got just the lifelines - seems that Seco South has changed the way they are making lifelines.  The original lifelines have swaged ends that are Right Handed (RH) threaded to fit the turnbuckle - and the "T" bolt side has left hand threads.  The new lifelines we got had swaged ends with Left Handed (LH) threads so we had a crisis - new lifelines could not be attached to the stanchions!  There is only one rigger on the Island (Turbulence) so we borrowed a car and headed to the rigger.  Turns out the lifeline ends they use here are not the same as used on our boat so we were out of luck, almost.  I checked the scrap pile and found the ends we needed and asked the shop manager if we could scrounge them.  He said yes, we did, and after 2 hours in some Spotless Stainless our new lifelines are in place.

Tomorrow we will put the dinghy back in the water, move our frozen meat to the boat, and continue unpacking and stowing stuff from our barrels.

Have penciled Greg in for a visit on board for 24 Dec after his arrival from Spain.

We are whipped but the boats in the water

New record for us - we flew in Friday, spent Saturday doing some shopping and staging then started working on the boat Sunday - Lesley did a major portion of the hull and I did the bottom paint and a few other projects.  My stomach is still tender so any heavy strain creates a problem - I can rely on Lesley to help and that makes a big difference.  This year simple things broke - but due to the logistics of finding parts simple is not simple here.  We fixed the broken parts and we tried again to confirm our launch time - BIG QUESTION AM or PM on Thursday? 

No answer - regardless of who we talked to - Lesley said that we are ready so why not ask if they could launch us today - SHOCK OF ALL SHOCKS they did - we were in the water by 3:30 and moved to Le Phare Bleu shortly thereafter. 

What a shock - all systems go, freezer was at 16 degrees when we left and we are now looking at a nice calm schedule to get things sorted out on the boat.  All of the additional work we did in the spring to get the boat ready for haul out and summer storage paid off - we are back in the water and ready to start loading the material the we shipped from Florida.

Looking forward to hooking up with Greg when he arrives here later this month - party time for sure!

Boat Prep continues

We continue to make good progress getting the boat ready to launch.  We've had a few small setbacks - yesterday the sink drain in the head decided to come apart.  I tried several times to put it back together but the 1" elbow that threads into the sink drain insert was very flexible and kept popping apart.  We finally bit the bullet hopped in the rental car and make the circuit looking for a better fitting.  Again, Island Water World saved the day and we found what we were looking for.

We stopped and had pizza for lunch then came back to the boat and continued prep work.  We brought a new name/hailing port decal back this year as the old hand painted name was fading very badly.  We used Easy Off to remove the old paint and then cleaned the transom.  The new decal went on very easily and really looks nice.  Lesley is going to take a few pictures on the transom later today.

We are scheduled to launch tomorrow (yard will not confirm if morning or afternoon) then we will move to Le Phare Bleu Marina to finish re commissioning the boat.

Today in the Boat Yard

We had some pretty heavy showers overnight and then early this morning so I was skeptical about getting any outside work done on the boat.  We got to the yard about 8:30 this morning and there were lots of puddles and standing water.  I used a 1 gallon bucket and moved some cinders up near our boat to help give us a bit drier area from which to work.  We set up a small scaffold and Lesley started cleaning and waxing the hull while I started on the bottom paint.  I finished on the starboard side and had just move to port when a Dutchman on the boat next to us lifted his awning and dumped a load of water on me, in the bottom paint, etc.  I dumped the water and bottom paint and wiped up the roller pan then dried the hull cussing the hole time.  The neighbor apologized and I said no problem - that the paint was going to get wet anyway in a few days.  I might haven even spoken a few foul words in German!

Things continued to dry and Lesley finished waxing the starboard side as I finished the bottom paint>  We had a few light sprinkles but no downpours so were able to finish.

Tomorrow we finish waxing the hull and then reinstall the GPS, 12 Volt monitor for the NAV computer and test start the engine.  Looks like we are well on track for our scheduled AM launch on Thursday.

Back in Grenada

We left the house today at about 9:00AM and took a one way rental car to the airport in Miami.  Stopped and had a nice lunch in Pembroke Pines and then drove on to the airport and returned the rental car.  The plane was about and hour late but the flight over was good and after a short trip thru Customs and Immigration we were on our way back to the Yellow House.

All of our checked baggage (2 roll aboards and an ice chest of frozen meat) made it safely.  The meat has been transferred to the apartment freezer and we are relaxing now, 12:10 AM.

Will start getting the boat ready to launch again tomorrow.

Shrimp and Grits

I worked on a friends Island Packet 31 today and then came home and Lesley had made homemade shrimp and grits for dinner and key lime pie for desert.  I'm in heaven!