Back to Charlotte Amalie and off to the stores.
21 March 2017 | Charlotte Amalie, US Virgin Islands
Bill/Partly cloudy
We're back in Charlotte Amalie after a non eventful trip west along the south coast of St. Thomas. Took off early, about 0830 to avoid as traffic and adverse swells that frequent the area. As the south side is exposed to the open ocean, it can get very rollie along the coast. Pulled in by 1000 and dropped anchor which set promptly in the sandy bottom. With snubbers attached, we made plans for the day. So far, only one cruise ship(Norwegion Escape) was in town with its 4300 bodies. Safari tour busses were all over the place. Carnival Glory came in about an hour later adding another 2300 to the mix. It was going to be a busy day in town for all the stores.
We launched Puff and headed for town taking a big bag of trash with us. Normally, when we buy things at the store, we get rid of as much of the packaging as we can. Cereal boxes are one of the first to go. Still, we do make trash and it has to be gotten rid of. The Yacht Haven Grande charges just $1.00 per bag and we've used that service many times since we've been here. As we got in to shore about 1130, we hiked over to the local Wendys for lunch and then I took off for the Post Office while Tracy hit the Pueblo Super Market. I had parts coming in for our Yamaha generator and they needed picking up. For the first time, someone actually asked to see identification when I showed them the tracking number. Never happened before. Had the package a few minutes later and took off for Kmart. Picked up some snack foods(cheaper there) and then on to meet up with Tracy at Pueblo. Bought another $190 worth of food and headed back to Puff with all arms loaded with bags and carts. Into Puff it all went and back to Zephyr where we unloaded piecemeal as some of the bags were quite heavy to lift from the dinghy. Now came the challenge of finding places to put it all. Our cabinet aren't full and they sure aren't empty but we found places for all of it. Behind settees and under the floor boards. It all got stowed. Time to sit back and stare at the two cruise ships that loomed over us. We were a bit closer than we normally anchor but they made for good swell stoppers so that's just fine. By the time they normally leave, the swell is just about gone and we should have a quiet night. It's now 2230 and all is well.
Tomorrow, we are off for the propane filling station, about 3 miles down the coast. Tracy already knew where it was but I stuck the info into our navigation software on the IPad and it showed me right where it to go. We want to do it early as again, the later you go, the more wind and swells will make the trip harder and far wetter. Once we get that done, we will probably head back to shore and head up the hill to the laundromat to get our clothes washed. We are both running out and it's time. It's about a mile up the road but we can load all the clothes onto our cart and hopefully make it a bit easier. We will see tomorrow.
We expect to be her a few days before heading back out. Biggest job we have is to take the lids off our diesel tanks and clean and filter all the fuel that in them. It's been years since it was done and my primary filter continues to show that there is sediment in the bottoms of the tanks that needs to be gotten rid of. While in South Africa, I made a filtering system that might do the job. I bought a Racor filtration system and added on a 12 volt diesel pump and a bunch of hoses and filters and we should be able to get the job done. Pump out the fuel, filter it while running the end of the hose along the bottom of our tanks till it comes out nice and clean, changing the filters from time to time as needed. Once we get that done, we'll take Zephyr to the Crown Bay marina where we can get her tanks filled once again. Not going to be a cheap stop as we carry about 210 gallons and the tanks are about 15% full so at say 185 gallons at $3.15 per gallons, I need to make sure I have a wallet with me and a very good credit card. Fuel at the Yacht Haven Grande, runs $3.45 so the small trip we have to make at .30 cents cheaper is worth it. I'll let you know.