It's now late Sunday evening and we've been experiencing power outages for several hours. It's on then it's off, over and over. Started about two days ago with the entire complex going dark. The marina office kicked on their back up generator but it only supplied power to the marina and not out to the yard. It's been going on all afternoon and we've been having fluctuating power since I got back to Zephyr about 1730. After a while, the power just shut off for an hour or so with it currently being on and the AC running(thank God) so we can get through the night with out the heat and humidity that Panama brings.

Once back to the boat, I took some time and pulled up the floor board in the stern cabin and got out my Allen wrench collection and took out the size Allen wrench that fit in the bolts that hold the propeller to the Aqua Drive that then holds it to the transmission. I'd sprayed PB Blaster on the heads and sides of the threads that keep the two sides of the fitting together and keep the prop attached to the transmission. While Tracy held the flashlight, I fit the Allen Wrench on to the bolt and gave it a big push and the first bolt came free. On to the second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth and each one came free. Amazing as this fitting is down where humidity, saltwater and corrosion are major players. We were both amazed that they came loose. Now if Victor shows up tomorrow with the new Cutlass Bearing, we're closer to getting the prop shaft out. Just a few other fittings on the shaft that have to be loosened or taken off and it "should" come out. We'll see how it goes tomorrow--Cutlass Bearing or no Cutlass Bearing. Meanwhile, I sent an email to our agent here in Panama keeping him updated on our progress. Once this is fixed, we will be that much closer to going through the camal. Once Zephyr is back in the water, we will need to test and inspect everything we've done since should this fitting fail, we could easily sink Zephyr. It's a big hole straight down into the water.

It's now Monday afternoon and I feel like either Moses or Noah. We talked to Victor this morning and he's picking up the cutlass bearing after work this afternoon so we made plans to take the bus back to town and restock things that we feel we need to feed the line handlers and pilot that will be with us on the canal transit. Leaving here at 0745, we got to the store at just about 0900 and a few minutes later, it started to rain. Now not your normal shower but an all out downpour like we have rarely seen in all our travels and it didn't last just a few minutes. Oh no, this storm lasted till 1400 and it's still sprinkling outside. Having spent a good bit of our cash to buy the paint we put on Zephyrs bottom, we stopped in at the ATM at the 4 Altos store(grocery store). I asked for $500 and was declined as over my limit. Tried $300--same thing. OK fine, we were off for another bank/ATM. Next one was the same--over limit. Next bank wouldn't help us but we did find an ATM that would take Tracys card but not mine. After trying several more banks, I started getting the dreaded "we can't read your card" splashed across the monitor screen. Well, shucks and darnies. I've used my card with no problems since South Africa where its predecessor had gotten stolen and now it decides not to work. The credit card in the adjoining slot in my wallet still works fine as we used it to pay for our groceries. Just glad we took Tracy's card as we'd hoped to double dip the account to get back what we had spent on the paint. Not going to happen. We walked back to a covered sheltered area and waited for the bus to show up. He was due at 1100 but showed up before then so we dashed across the parking lots, avoiding the cars and buses and all the pot holes in the lot and we nice and soaked when we got to the other side. It was going to be a damp ride back to the marina. The air conditioning in the bus made it that much colder on our already chilled bodies. It was still raining when we got back to the marina and we decided to try and wait out the rain by having lunch at the restaurant. Of course, by the time we were done, it was still raining but since we were already quite damp, we just bit the bullet and loaded all our food in one of the marinas carts and waded out to Zephyr through lots of huge deep puddles and a steady downpour. As it always does, once we got back to the boat, the rain lessened substantially and I could even return the cart to the marina area and not get that much wetter.

I just got back from talking to Victor and he says he will be working on us tomorrow afternoon, so I'm going to pull the prop shaft in the morning when it just might be drier. Guess we will see.

It's now Tuesday morning and I just checked my bank account. One of the ATMs we tried to use that was turned down processed the transaction as complete so I'm out $510 till my bank can straighten it out. Boy, we love Panama!