This morning we took our school supplies over to the school. They have 42 students. They are also raising money for a trip to Orlando, FL.

After a busy morning at the laundromat, we left for Staniel Cay to meet back up with Bruce and Chris. They were tucked away in a remote anchorage which required navigating some shallow water. At the end, I had to eyeball my way in because the chart did not show the path in with the water depth. At low tide, I have 6 inches to a foot under my keel. We are surrounded by a bunch of islands, so there are narrow openings all around.

Coming in, there was one part of the channel filled in with rocks which you had to go around. In the Bahamas, a navigation marker looks like a 4" PVC pipe stuck in the ground. I went around to the left, which was very disconcerting, because on the chart, it showed me going right over the rock pile.

I tried to pump out my holding tank on the way here. Nothing doing. The switch kept clicking off and the pump would grind to a halt, sometimes with a terrible noise. After I anchored, I worked on that (after a beer). Replacing the pump would be unbelievably messy - the boat would smell like crap. Nothing was getting past the shut off valve, and I wasn't going to replace the pump only to find out that wasn't the issue. So I took apart the shut off valve and ran the pump for a second. Success up to the shut off valve! Then I verified the valve was opening and closing. Success again! So I put it back together and everything worked perfectly. I don't know what was wrong, I only care that now it works - and the boat doesn't stink.

After this, we all went to the beach for some cooling off time in the water. Another day in the Bahamas.