Good News Day!
06 July 2016 | Marina de Papeete
Hopeful Bill
We awakened at our 0800 and read a bit. I prepared for caulking the mast collar, a metal fitting that surrounds the mast hole. The inner edge of the mast collar is sealed around the mast itself, so that’s good (Conni and I installed a new “mast boot” this season), but the outer edge sits on the deck and we’ve had some rain leaks there. I washed the area in acetone, and Conni used a tube of 4000, an excellent adhesive sealant that we use for the most crucial tasks both above and below the waterline Unfortunately, I bought the tube here and it was beginning to cure in the tube: this stuff has a definite shelf life. She fought with the tube and thick caulk for an hour, growing more frustrated by the second, but finally got the task completed. It was completely my fault for not having checked carefully enough the condition of the caulk. She returned below looking like the cruising woman that she is: hands covered in white caulk. A bit of acetone and she was as good as new.
I departed a bit later to make rounds in the dinghy. We need a copy of our entry-into-French-Polynesia form that I completed when I returned from Fiji and entered at Bora Bora last year, and somehow we’ve misplaced it. We’ve ordered, as I mentioned, a second injector pump from England and we don’t pay duty on it if we are a legitimate “vessel in transit”. That designation allows us to import parts and supplies but not pay duty since we are not allowed to sell them: they’re for yacht/personal use only. It’s a very reasonable attitude and saves us a lot of money. There two big reasons that we arrive with the big blue boxes of supplies are accessibility and no duty. Otherwise, we’d buy the stuff here and save a lot of lugging around of heavy boxes.
I prepared myself for an unpleasant task and to accept a certain amount of bureaucratic abuse for requesting a document that we should have had, but when I found the proper office, the lady there could not have been nicer. What a relief! I spoke my poor French to start, but her English was so much better that we switched to that. In any case, she found the original in one her file cabinets, made a photocopy, stamped it to make it official, and we were in business. She almost pressed me to accept a duty-free fuel permit, a truly money-saving document when filling 120 gallons of fuel. Fuel is heavily taxed everywhere, and we’re exempt. Now, we’re fixed on both counts.
Then I motored to SOPOM, the mechanics whom we’ve hired to fix our engine. Being something of a regular in the office the past two weeks, I was allowed to go upstairs to see Bruno LeBlanc, the main guy. He greeted me in his usual kind way and asked if I had received his email. I had not. “Well, good news!”, he said. The Bosch injector mechanic had called and told him that the he had found an obstruction in the pump, he had removed it, and now the pump operated. He was measuring the distribution of fuel from the four pump pistons to see if they produced the same fuel amount for all four cylinders. Hurray! Bruno did not know what the nature of the obstruction was, but we’ll learn today sometime. I also made arrangements for the Daniel, the mechanic, to install it tomorrow morning. We’ll be ready in so many ways!
If all goes well, the pump is truly repaired, we can get it installed, and the engine started several times, then we’ll be back in business. Those are a lot of “ifs”, but not unreasonable. If possible, we’ll depart Papeete under our own power, sail to Huahine for the night, then motor/sail to Raiatea on Saturday. The Huahine destination removes 20 miles or so, and will make for a more relaxed trip. Wings will be pulled on Monday morning and we’ll start our long decommissioning. Still, it’s within the possible.