Today (Tuesday)is Thanksgiving here in Grenada. It marks their date of independence, not some Pilgrims sitting down with Indians. Just about every store on the island is closed. If you had any projects to do today, you needed to buy your parts yesterday and just how I spent a great deal of my time yesterday.
First, I went up the mast to check the connections to the anchor/nav/flash fixture up there. I pulled off the connection and reattached it. I also found that the zip ties that are screwed the mast that keep all the wires up there and not falling inside the mast were in really bad condition. One had snapped and the second had cracks in the plastic. I came down and took off for shore looking for a replacement. Nothing at Budget Marine, nor at a refrigerator/electricians shop. I hiked down to True Value and Ace with no success. On of the people at Ace recommended a shop near where I started so after another nice hike, I found they didn't have any either. Back to Burger Marine where I picked up a smaller size and some bolts to attach them and came back. Back up the mast and installed one of the new zip ties and bolts and added some other zip ties to keep the nylon protective cover on the wires. So far, it's working fine and seems to be even brighter.
Back to Budget Marine to get some line to replace what we use on our Lazy Jack system. These are a set of lines that are stitched together to form a grid that goes up on either side of the mainsail, so when it comes down, it stays on the boom and doesn't go all over the deck. One side of ours has frayed and needs replacing. Now we can get that job done.
Today was "stitch the mainsail day". The cover on the back side or leech of the sail had torn on our trip up from Trinidad and it needed restitching and some replacing. I started early in the morning and it took me till noon to get the job done. We had to layout the sail on deck so we could pull the line that runs down the leech of the sail under the cover I'd restitching back in place. Once that job was done, we decided to wait to put the main back on the boom till it got cooler, plus I needed to sand down the ends of the new battens so they will fit in the cars they ride in on the sail.
As we pulled the sail forward along the deck to get it back on the boom(at 1700), another section ripped!! The fabric is just getting to flimsy and we have to be careful. Tracy grabbed some adhesive backed sail clothe and we put it on. I'll be adding some stitches to the patch tomorrow before we get the sail back on the boom. Once we get it up there, we have to reinstall the battens and run the reeling lines back on the sail as well and we want to do this during rather cooler section of the day. From 1300 on, it just gets nasty with temperatures and humidity well into the 90s. I also got a lead on finding the proper size zip ties so once we get the mainsail fixed and reattached, I'll be heading for shore and doing some more hiking. We still have a few more jobs to get done but hope to be moving on by early next week.

Well, it's now Wednesday and it's been raining on and off since 0400. I know since I've been up since then. Just not a good night sleep. I've actually been awake since just after 0300. Blue was thrilled that I was up as I removed the door to the companionway and she rushed out into the cockpit. She came back below about 30 minutes later wet from the rain since she got caught out on deck when it started raining. Running back to the cockpit got her nice and wet. She made sure to crawl up on my chest when she came back below. Oh boy, a wet cat siting on my chest.

I took some time between rains and got another section of the seams on the mainsail restitching. With the sail soaking wet and much heavier, we'll be waiting for more sunny skies before we try and get it back on the boom. Since I was stick below, I took some time and cleaned out the Racor filter housing as well as the the filter. It's been a while since I changed it and it was looking a bit dirty. I carry a couple dozen on board.
We'll be heading in this afternoon,rain permitting, for Grenada Train Dominoes. We got a call from one of our friends(Johanna) that they have delayed going into Grenada Marine for repairs for a week or so. We weren't sure she was going to be there but knowing she is, we will definitely be going in.