30th January

12 03.520 N
68 51.216 W

Weather; sunny, wind n/a, waves n/a

How wonderful it was to sleep through the night without rocking and rolling all over the place. We both woke up feeling somewhat more human then we have for the past 3 days. Today was the day to sort out the legal stuff first and get ourselves cleared in, our 24hrs grace was just about up! We had breakfast in the cockpit as it was a nice calm sunny start to the day, from there we decided to get the dinghy into the water and ready to go ashore before we got ourselves ready. So we lowered the dinghy into the water and Gerry jumped into it to get ready to guide the outboard motor into place and secure it whilst I put the hoist in place and prepared to hoist the outboard down to him. With both of us just about in place I began to move the outboard off of the stand and lower it slowly towards the stern of the dinghy, then all hell broke loose, the outboard dropped rapidly about 3 feet. My first thought was that I had let it go too quickly but this was not the case, the strapping which encircles the outboard had given way, knocking the cover off of the top of the outboard into the water and leaving the outboard motor dangling at a precarious angle over the water. Gerry yelled something - I'm sure his first thought was the same as mine - it was my fault! He tried to grab the outboard cover but it was drifting away from the dinghy just out of reach and was beginning to sink so he shouted for me to keep the outboard from dropping in the water and jumped into the water to chase down the cover before it disappeared for good, managing to retrieve it just before it sunk out of sight and handed it up to me, still hanging on for grim death to the hoist line. It was then a case of how was Gerry to get back on the boat - the stern ladder is at a height that is only really accessible from inside the dinghy but luckily the safety ropes that we have hanging to assist with getting out of the dinghy are long enough that Gerry could reach them and haul himself onto the bottom step of the ladder (brute strength and adrenaline playing their part), I couldn't help in any way as I was keeping the outboard from vanishing into the depths by hanging on to the hoist line and keeping the outboard from hitting against the side of the boat - thank goodness it was calm in the harbor with little swell and wind or we would have been in deep guano. Once back on board Gerry quickly made his way back into the dinghy by jumping over the side of the boat, then it was a case of straightening up the hanging outboard and gently lowering it into place without dislodging the bits of the cradle that it was handing by. We achieved this and breathed a collective sigh of relief, a total disaster had been avoided. The cover was then replaced and luckily it hadn't broken the clips that hold it on - God alone knows how! The strapping was taken off so that we could see what had happened and fix it if possible. Gerry returned to the boat and made his way to the shower and got ready to go ashore. Once we were both showered, dressed and had all of our documentation we were ready to go ashore. We had read that customs was only open from 11am to 1 pm on a Saturday so we had to get there in time to meet the opening hours. We found the dinghy dock and scrambled off the boat then went looking for a taxi to take us to Willemstad where customs was located - some 9.5 miles away. You would think that there would be Taxis at the dock but no, we were directed to a bus stop a few yards along the road, apparently no taxis came out here unless you phoned for one. Why didn't we just phone? We didn't have a sim card that worked here - it was on our list to get one after we had checked in today. The next issue was there was no bus timetable so we had no idea when the bus would come, or where it went to, plus it would require a fare and we had no guilders to our name but we had heard that they would take small denomination US dollars - we were hopeful! As we stood at the bus stop looking at the directions to get to customs a couple out for a morning walk stopped to ask if we were OK or in need of directions. They told us that there was no chance of a taxi and that buses were a law unto themselves making our plans look unachievable however the couple were good Samaritans of the very best sort, they told us that they were heading towards their car and would circle back this way and if we were still waiting they would take us into Willemstad. Less than 10 minutes later they reappeared and very kindly took pity on us and drove us into the center of Willemstad where we just had to cross the pedestrian bridge to reach the customs office. We asked how we could repay them and were told to just enjoy our stay in Curacao, they gave us their phone number and told us to call them if we had any problems or questions that they could help out with. It turned out that they live close to where they picked us up back in Spaanse and they had no need to go into Willemstad for any reason today. We are forever in their debt, I just hope we can do something similar if the need ever arises in the future. To add to the story, today was election primary voting day and the roads were unusually busy with traffic backed up all over the place, so to have gone so far out of their way was truly a good Samaritan act. We walked across the pedestrian bridge and arrived at the customs office at 10.30, it wasn't open yet so we left a message on their intercom that we would return at 11 am and headed towards the ATM that we had spotted a few yards further along where we managed to acquire some local guilders. We appeared to be in a shopping area and asked a local if there was a place close by where we could get a sim card and was pointed in the right direction - a few yards further along. The sim card was acquired, we were now a bit better set up for a stay here but we still had to clear in to be legally here so back to the customs office once more. Again the door sign said they were open but the door was locked with no sign of anyone inside - it was now 11.10am. Gerry spotted a sign for a McDonalds - something we hadn't seen for over a year now and decided that we should go there and see if we could get internet (well that was the excuse anyway) it was a fair walk around the blocks but we arrived and decided that as it was close to lunchtime we would have lunch before trying the customs office once more. The fries were the best McDonalds fries I've even eaten and they were hot! We walked once again to the customs office were we were met with the same result, wondering if they had changed their hours we sat on a nearby seat and began trying to find a phone number to find out. As we sat there two Customs' cars turned up and Gerry went to speak to the drivers. To cut a long story short we finally had access to the office and went and got our clearing in done. Our next stop was to be the immigration office to get our visas for the stay, yes you would think that it would all be done in the one place but no, the immigration office was across the other side of the water and a fair walk down the dockside. We asked where the taxis were stationed and organized a taxi to take us first to the immigration office and then back to the Spaanse fishing harbor to return to our boat, we had had enough excitement and frustration for one day! The immigration office had more form filling, despite the fact that we had filled out pre arrival forms which covered the same stuff but we were shortly given the stamps in our passports - we have 90 days to enjoy the place. One last bit of legal stuff that we needed to do was to acquire a compulsory, but free anchoring permit from the harbour master's office which was next door to the immigration office - easy you would think; however this office wasn't open on a Saturday so we will have to go back there on Monday to get this essential bit of paper! It's such a shame that all of the offices couldn't be in one place and the whole checking in process isn't streamlined. The taxi took us back to the fishing harbor dock, we peppered him with questions about the place and how to do certain things and when and where things were open etc. coming away with a better idea of how to do stuff here - hiring a car seems like the best plan for getting around as the buses are unreliable and the taxis are expensive. We made our way out to our boat where I spent the next hour or so "fixing" the outboard cradle, it turned out that one of the snap clips had suffered from sun damage and had broken. Luckily we have a few spare clips on the boat, they were slightly larger and it meant a bit of fiddling to get the new one stitched into place and operational but I got there in the end - the proof would come later when we put strain on it!
We had thought that we would dinghy over to the yacht club to check it out late in the afternoon but we had had enough excitement for one day and just wanted a quiet drink so we stayed on board for the rest of the evening. Before we had our sundowner drink we decided to test out the repair as we needed to put the dinghy back on the davits for the night - not being too sure of the security of leaving it in the water here. I'm happy to say that the repair held up well, phew! We are so glad that we didn't try to go ashore the same day that we arrived or we would have been trying to deal with the outboard issue when we were over tired and not thinking very clearly - it could have been a total disaster instead of just an oh crap moment! One last thing to add to the story is that I had said to Gerry, some time back, that we needed to get a spare cradle for the outboard as I thought the strap webbing might be getting friable from the sun exposure - I hadn't considered the snaps, he had ignored my thoughts and gone with the "she'll be right" attitude - just shows you should never ignore she who must be obeyed!