Yesterday I rented a car and ran over to Philipsburg to pick up our outboard engine. The problem of leaking gear oil was solved with just some silicon to keep a rubber stopper from popping out. The original problem of a cracked impellor housing was fine as the new housing that was installed in February is good. This was an easy and inexpensive fix.

I also stopped by the Ace Hardware store and bought a Mr. Coffee coffeemaker. Our current coffeemaker is leaking and needed replacing.

I also scheduled us to go over to FKG to have our mast removed and shrouds replaced. They said they would have everything ready to step down the mast if we came over right at 0800. We said we would be there so I spent the rest of the day rescheduling our diesel mechanic, our electrician and scheduling the dock master to help us leave a few minutes before 0800 and then returning late afternoon.

Of course, once everything was set up, a major storm blew in with heavy rains and 30 knots of wind. The strong winds would prevent us from leaving the dock since we are crammed into a slip with little room to maneuver and the strong winds would blow us into the other boats as we would try to squeeze our way out of the marina.

Mary Margaret and I spent last night listening to the wind and the rain in hopes of it abating. Finally, around 0400, the storm blew itself out and the winds returned to their normal 10 to 15 knots.

Thus, at 0750, we threw off the dock lines and motored out of the marina and over to FKG. When we arrived, we discovered that they had left us very room to slip past a number of boats tied up to their quay so we had to edge our way past boats and mooring balls and we just barely slipped into our docking spot without hitting any boats. Fortunately, the winds were kind and we did not have to deal with much windage.

Once we were tied up, the work crew scrambled onto Leu Cat to get the mast ready to be taken down. It was at this point that we learned that the crane was not coming until tomorrow morning since FKG had screwed up its scheduling. Grrrrr. This means we will be spending the night here. It is really not such a big deal but we will not have Internet access and the mosquitos are pretty bad.

We did meet some nice people from South Africa, Elsa and Wayne. They are making their way west in hopes of returning to South Africa in two years. They need to get charts for their 2002 Raymarine C model chart plotter for the South Pacific and Indian Ocean. Unfortunately, they are stuck with the old card format for their electronic charts which is no longer made. Fortunately, we use the same type of card format and I have all of the charts cards that they would need. Therefore, tomorrow morning I will be going over to their boat and we will try each of the cards in their plotter. If they work, they will buy the chart cards from us.