There's treasure on them thar beaches!
28 April 2017 | Brewers Bay, St. Thomas, USVI
Bill/overcast with sprinkles
As I wrote in the last post, we are back in Brewers Bay waiting for the Carnival season(all of April)to end so we can go back the a quieter Charlotte Amalie. We tried yesterday but we're greeted by so much noise and what looked like chaos, we turned around, went to the Crown Bay fuel dock and spent a bunch of money($592.00)to get our diesel and gas tanks filled. I checked my receipts from earlier fill ups and I was wrong in yesterday's post. It's cheaper in Trinidad to get fuel. Since we are hoping to avoid another trip to Trinidad(hurricane season)it's just as well that we got the fuel here. We even put a biocide in it to kill any bugs that might decide to grow in it and Stabil in the gasoline.
Today, we launched Puff and headed for shore to off load several bags of trash that we have been accumulating since we left Francis Bay weeks ago. There is a nice park there along with a very nice sandy beach that's pretty much a place for locals to hang out. It even has restrooms and showers to get clean when you're done playing in the sand and water.
Once done on shore, we returned to Zephyr and loaded up our snorkeling gear and headed for the north shore of the bay. Lots of rocks and that normally means decent coral. As we neared shore, we saw something red up off the back off the rocky shoreline. Gas tank maybe? We didn't know but once our little anchor was down, Tracy put on her gear and took off for shore. Sure enough, it was a nice, slightly dirty five gallon can for gasoline. Looked in good shape so she brought it back to Puff so we could take it back to Zephyr. There's gold on them thar beaches!!!
We did some snorkeling (not that good really but good for exercise), climbed back in Puff and returned. It was about time for lunch(nice hamburgers)and running the Yamaha generator to recharge the batteries. Once lunch was done, I grabbed the "409"cleaner, a sponge and a screwdriver and went to work on our new gas tank. Apparently, back in 2009, the EPA made it mandatory that portable fuel tanks be made so they won't leak or spill. This is one of those cans. It's something new for us so I had to do some research on the internet to see how the heck these silly things work. It used to be you unscrewed the nozzle, took it out, reversed it and screwed it back on and poured. Not any more from the looks of this thing. There are plugs and fittins and all kinds of springs involved in this new "save us from ourselves" filler spout. Luckily, the internet is full of ways to get around these new regulations for spouts and I utilized what I saw on the internet and now our "new" 5 gallon tank will fill my outboard and generator with no problems. No more fittings and springs. It nice and clean now too with the help of "409" and some sponges. I even poured in some fresh water and am letting it evaporate before I put it in storage for filling later. I already have five spare tanks for gas so this one is sort of an extra but you just don't say no to a free tank.
As the forecast told us, we would have some rain(90% chance), it rained just after lunch making us put up a tarp over the generator so it could run and eventually, when it got really windy and the tarp was full of water, it got properly covered and shut off(not in that order). Once the rain was past us(at least for a while)I restarted it and now our batteries are nicely full.