The Big Blow

We are the red arrow

It was not our intention to spend three weeks in the Abacos, but here we are and here is our status:  We are anchored outside of Calcutta Creek (the name, I know, and I am NOT making this up!) on the northeast corner of Great Abaco. We are strategically positioned here because it is only about a mile to walk to the FedEx Office once we’ve tied our dingy up at the fuel station in the boat yard nearby which won’t have fuel until Monday...probably.  We have already walked to the FedEx office once, this very Saturday morning, because Google listed their hours from 9am til noon M-S, which we questioned, but of course they never answered their phone to confirm.  We discovered that their ACTUAL hours are 9-5, M-F, so closed until Monday.  We might have found them open Friday (yesterday) afternoon if we had known.   And so it goes.

We would have been here a week earlier but for two reasons.  Firstly, our Fedex package containing the circuit board for our new water maker that was due here two weeks ago, is still held up in customs in Nassau so there was no rush and secondly, we found ourselves in the middle of an early tropical depression that settled in over the Northern Abacos last week, a real BLOW that virtually kept us indoors for a couple of days bouncing around like drunkards!  Not that we WERE drunk, it was just hard to move around on the boat in the choppy bay.  While we still managed to be productive, we are looking forward to some fairer weather.  The part for the water maker is less of a concern now that David managed to make the circuit board we have work last week and we are happy to report that we now have the ability to desalinate sea water to 150 PPM or TDM (Parts per Million or Total Dissolved Minerals) in any case, far better than the close to 400 count water we had to buy in Green Turtle Cay which we have now diluted to a better margin, but we still WANT our circuit board out of principle and for a spare but will quite possibly leave behind.  The other good news is that after a failed calibration on our auto helm, a potential mechanical culprit was discovered in the motor which drives the hydraulic arm to our rudder bar and the new motor we ordered HAS cleared customs and we should be able to pick it up on Monday....hopefully, along with the two boxes of stuff from Miami that is waiting for us already...thankfully.

More bad news was a shocking discovery of a considerable amount of leaked oil in our port engine room which had to be cleaned up before we could investigate its origins.  It was quite a setback emotionally as we were already frustrated with weather and customs and I was genuinely worried that my next blog would be dara and david SELL India.  The liquid in the engine hold turned out to be mostly water and calmer heads prevailed the next morning when the problem became evident in a front main crank shaft seal that leaked and a manageable salt water leak from the engine’s sea water cooling system and not an actual leak in the hull.  The good news is that the boat yard where we have been staging our forays to Fedex had the seal!

In addition, the new main sail has a different pocketing system for the upper two battens which require new boxes.  We located a supplier and our new boxes are also sitting in customs in Nassau only this time our carrier is UPS.  David likes to say that I didn’t TRY to warn him about the importation fuckery in the Bahamas, I actually DID warn him, repeatedly.  The truth is, we need these bits and parts to go on.  Had we known we needed them before we left the US, we would have them.  This is our situation and since it looks like there is not much we can do about it until Monday, we plan to check out Marsh Harbour tomorrow.  I haven’t been there since the 70s and it happens to be Cinco de Mayo!  I think a nice lunch is in order along with a plethora of cocktails!

As things go, it has been a frustrating time here on S/V india, but we are managing to stay upbeat.  As soon as we can get our hands on our stuff we’ll be on our way again.  We did fly our new Genoa into the bay on Friday.  It is magnificent and we are very happy with it.  Yesterday, we found ourselves in the middle of a cavalcade of returning fishing boats in a tournament this weekend.  It was pretty spectacular with helicopters buzzing about and although it was less fun being rocked out of our bunk at 0700 this morning by their wakes (I swear they did it purposely) it is still fun to watch the boys and big toys!

New Genoa!

Most of the time the scenery is breathtaking, the Cays are fun to explore and the beer is ice cold.  David has connected an HBO feed so that we can watch the final Season of Game Of Thrones which has cheered us up immensely and we'll be able to get our stuff next week...hopefully.

Most of the time all is well.  But sometimes....it just blows.