11th December

12 00 N
61 46 W

Weather; sunny but with cloudy skies looming, wind n/a, waves n/a

We had just a small amount of rain during the early hours this morning, enough that we had to close our hatch over the bed and it probably put a few cups into the water tank but certainly not the down pour we are hoping for to fill the tank. Never mind, every little helps and we'll take whatever we can get! It was still looking overcast and likely to rain when we got up and moving but the sun came out and we have had sunny skies ever since. Gerry started the water maker up again, we've got to fill those tanks somehow so we ran it for the rest of the day once more. I spent the morning making up a batch of homemade baked beans, why bother? They are so much better than any that you can buy from the store. Gerry checked the bilge to make sure that it wasn't filling up on the quiet - it doesn't seem to be, fingers crossed. We had plans to go in the dinghies around to the next bay, True Blue, for a long, late lunch or early dinner (very early even considering that Dale and Lorie like to eat in Florida geriatric time slots!) in fairness I have to say that none of us want to be dinghying back to our boats when it gets dark, it's far too dangerous even though we both have nav lights for our dinghies. As it turned out the wind was a bit fickle and although we would have got around to the bay with little problem, coming back would have been a case of it being like The Disney ride - " Mr. Toad's wild ride" and we would have gotten wet from sea spray anyway so we said we would do it another day. Lorie and Dale then invited us over to their boat for steaks tonight, that's always a treat as steak has been in limited supply here but I suppose we are comparing it to those awesome steaks that we eat in the USA! Dale wanted to do a trip into the dock as he needed something from Budget Marine (there's always something that you need from BM) he asked Gerry if he wanted to go or if he needed anything, stupid question really and just after we finished lunch the pair of them set off for the dock. Gerry came back with new tins of epoxy and hardener along with a new block to replace the one on our outboard hoist (I think). Because Dale had decided to BBQ tonight he forced the hand of the rain god, no sooner had they returned from Budget Marine than the skies opened and the rain began, not too heavily but we are squarely blaming Dale for even thinking of BBQing tonight! Steamed steaks are on the menu! The good thing was that it was putting more water into our tank and we opened the valve between the two tanks so that it flowed into the newly repaired tank, thankfully the repair seems to have worked and the tank is filling up gradually with clean water, long may it continue. I was given the task of making a dessert for tonight so I set about using up a few apples that we had bought last Friday which, when we opened the bag up, appeared to have been dropped at some point (not by us) as almost all of the apples had bruise marks that hadn't been visible through the bag, I find that most frustrating but I was determined that we weren't going to waste the entire bag. I chopped out the bruised bits and stewed up the rest of each apple, there was enough to make a pie or something similar, I chose the something similar which turned out to be a French apple cake which had a slug of rum in the mixture (how could I not make that!) it turned out just fine especially as I added a doctored can of cream, turning it into a rum pouring sauce, to go over the top! The rain showers stopped late afternoon, improving our chances of a grilled, not steamed steak. We packed up our drinks and dessert into a bag and dinghied across the 100 feet gap between the two boats (yes we could swim that far but not as we had the bag to carry). Yes, we managed to have grilled steaks accompanied by one of Lorie's famous Paula Deen vegetable dishes and sauteŽ potatoes, all in all a good dinner. We chatted about forward looking plans and decided that we are all going to be here until the new year as both boats are awaiting the arrival of replacement parts from the US. We are having a replacement water maker control panel shipped to us as Gerry thinks ours is having an issue producing the quantity of water that it should produce. The same part was meant to get to Dale, in Florida, before he returned to Grenada but thanks to UPS it arrived there after he had departed (it was paid for overnight delivery but took 5 days to be delivered, no fault of the company supplying it who are equally upset about it, but of course it had to be returned to them before they could send it on to us in Grenada - thanks for the stuff up UPS!) now we have to wait for it to be shipped to us here (using FedEx!), have a clearing agent and then Gerry will finally install it. Dale is waiting for three gauges which were damaged during their power surge incident, they are of course not in stock at present, even in the States, so who knows when they will arrive! The point I was getting to here is that we are going to have to extend our cruising permits and our visas for another month as they run out on December 25th and I'm pretty certain that none of the offices will be open that day for us to do it then so we are planning ahead for our next hire car day when we will try to get all of that stuff done - it's likely to be a busy and frustrating day! Our plans are looking more positive - Curacso is a definite first stop with reasonable Covid rules at present and Colombia has opened up and looks to be good as well. Dale and Lorie's plans for heading back to the US are still all over the place, they haven't agreed on a route as yet and I'm sure it will change depending on the rules at the time as well as the weather. We finally headed back to our boat before it got too dark to find it, even with our anchor and party lights on, watched a bit of TV before heading to bed.
Today's advent photo is of our hydraulic control station. It's located in the cockpit just underneath the companionway stairs. Gerry wants me to write a very complicated explanation of how it works but I've tried to keep it simple so as not to confuse you too much. Its purpose is to hydraulically pressurize the backstay tension adjuster (which holds the mast in the desired position) and to hydraulically tension the boom vang. The boom vang pulls down on the boom to tension up the leach (the longest edge of the main sail, furthest out from the mast) giving it the best sail shape possible. The operation is achieved by inserting the pump handle, shown at the bottom, into the hole on the board, turning the three way valve for which ever function you want and pumping the handle until the desired tension is achieved then putting the valve in the locked position. I hope I haven't confused you too much - a little confusion is good enough!
Watch this space for another exciting photo tomorrow.