CURRENT LOCATION: Anchored in Ensenada Honda
18 18.318' N, 065 18.008' W
It was another social weekend for team Prudence. Despite my lousy play the previous Saturday night, we were invited back to play cards this week. This time the venue was to be Chuck & Pam's house (named Blue Skies). Their house is up high on the hill, about halfway between town and Punta del Soldado, and the views are simply breathtaking. This was our first time to visit them in the evening hours, and we could clearly see the lights of Vieques, St. Thomas, and the main island of Puerto Rico from their deck.
This week we were introduced to Tom & Dotty, who joined the players from last week: Abbie & Billy, Nadeen, and our hosts for this evening, Chuck & Pam. Again, teams were gender defined and the final results were, unfortunately, similar to last week. The ladies nearly doubled our score.
After a late night (at least for us) on Saturday, Sunday morning came all too early and we nearly slept in past breakfast. Between the sunshine, crowing roosters, and planes taking off overhead we did manage to wake with just enough time to dinghy into town. We met the usual crowd for a lingering morning repast at Mamacita's, followed by a day of computer work and Algebra studies back on the boat.
The plan for today is to move the big boat out to Dakity. Sheryl is taking a break from turtle watch, and I shouldn't be needed at the school until mid-August. That means we can make our trips to town a little fewer and farther between. Dakity offers clearer water, which can be used for a daily dip directly off the boat and to facilitate cleaning the bottom of
Prudence (yes, she is due for another scraping). Despite that chore, it will be nice a little vacation from harbor life.
The short trip will find us heading southeast toward the exit to Ensenada Honda, then turning right before we reach the cut between the two reefs. This will put us comfortably moored behind the reef where the tradewind breezes are strong and the chop is minimal.
By the time we get out there, we hope that the crowd of boats from the long holiday weekend will have departed. That should leave open a number of mooring balls from which to choose. Since we are currently at anchor, I spent a few hours on Saturday afternoon scrubbing our anchor chain in preparation for this move.
Although it has only been three weeks at anchor, the growth on the chain was substantial. Fortunately, it occurs only on the portion of the chain which is suspended in the water. Chain lying on the bottom in the mud remains unfouled. Since we are at a depth of about 15 feet, we have that much chain suspended, plus an extra loop of chain which we hang slack after the snubber is tied off. Overall, there was about 30 feet of chain which needed to be cleaned. And, it is important to get it
very well scrubbed, as we learned the hard way following our last trip out to Dakity.
On that occasion, we had been anchored in Ensenada Honda for nearly a month, and we pulled up the chain and left it on deck for a day. When the growth had dried it was a real chore to try and scrub off, resulting in a semi-clean chain being stored in the anchor locker. Our anchor locker is right at the foot of our bed and ventilates into our sleeping area. The smell in our bedroom that night could best be described as the aroma one might expect from a week-old pile of rotten fish. It was strong enough to drive Sheryl into the salon for the night. It slowly diminished, but took the better part of a week to finally dissipate completely.
This time, I did a much more thorough job. I cleaned while the chain was still wet, scrubbing and spraying (with our deck wash) a few links at a time as I drew it up and over the bow roller. It took over 2 hours to do the full 30-feet. As a test of the effectiveness of the cleaning efforts, I shortened our scope to leave some of the cleaned chain in the anchor locker, and no fragrance of dead fish was detected that night. I simply hope that the intervening two days is not enough time to get any significant re-growth on the chain remaining in the water.
We have a few things to get from town before starting the engine and hauling anchor. I think we'll take a leisurely approach to the day and strive to be at Dakity sometime in the mid-afternoon. We hope that
your Monday will ease you leisurely into your plans for the week as well, dear Reader.