Puerto Rico
26 February 2008 | Boqueron PR
Capt Chris
Christa and crew safely dropped the secondary anchor today at 1:30pm in Puerto Rico. I am most pleased to have this leg over with. All in we travelled 269 nautical miles since Saturday night. We did the trip in about 55 hours or so.
Last night the conditions remained nice with 10 knots of east wind which allowed us to continue motor sailing at about 5 knots. I slept very little as we had some shipping traffic in the Mona Channel and I didn't want to saddle up Tony and Laura with that responsibility. Again the AIS unit was extremely useful. Speaking of helpful both Tony and Laura were great to have aboard. As they told me today at our late lunch ashore they really did have a great time. Laura had much more worry about the trip than she lead on and was pretty sick the first night which was by far the worst night.
The bay surrounding Boqueron is beautiful with post card like white sandy beaches with hundreds of mature palms swaying in the breeze. The town is a University type town with the college bohemian crowds piling in on the weekends. I have much to do during this stop. You all know I lost my main anchor and am now using the secondary anchor (33lbs Bruce) as my primary. I need to shop around and then figure out a way to get all the chain aboard. I also will replace my starter with a new spare that I have aboard. Having adequate spare parts aboard is really critical. I also experienced fuel filter clogging action again. I haven't experienced that since Florida. Bad fuel in Luperon? Maybe, but I changed out the filters the day before leaving Luperon prior to the due date. In hindsight this was smart as it prevented me from having to change the filters underway. In a seaway changing filters is difficult and very messy. So I will work on finding a company that polishes fuel tanks. I also will find a certified Yanmar guy to conduct the 1200 hour service on the plant. I ran the engine for almost 2 days straight without a rest and the rear seal in the transmission clearly is the correct size. So anyway I'm heading to bed for my first night's sleep ever in Puerto Rico. The anchorage is filled with about 15 other cruising boats, all of us very tired. Goodnight.
Capt Chris