Ah, just relaxing in Salinas, PR with an umbrella drink and palm trees blowing gently in the wind. I am sure this scene is what most of you picture when you think of living on a boat in the Caribbean. Some days are just like that picture. Others, not so much!
On Monday, we pulled into Salinas on a bright sunny day and expected to drop the anchor and relax. Dropping the anchor is usually about what you would expect. You push the button, the anchor falls into the water, you back up the boat a bit to set the anchor and you are done. Not so in Salinas. Evidently, after Hurricane Maria, Puerto Rico scraped the bottom of the bay leaving behind a ton of mud and unattached sea grass. What happens in this situation is that the anchor never finds any sturdy ground to lock into so the boat would just drag around the bay. There were a lot of boats in the bay and each time we found a spot we thought we could fit, the anchor would not hold. We definitely caught the attention of a few boat owners that were watching us as we inched closer and closer to their boats. By the sixth attempt, even the manatees were telling us to give it up. So, we called the marina to inquire about a slip. The dockmaster came out in his dinghy to see if he had a slip wide enough for us and then said he had one that was 18 feet wide (we are 15 feet wide). The first slip attempted was going to be a tight squeeze but Bill guided the boat toward the slip when, bump, we grounded on the seabed. One of the other boaters yelled, “You have run aground!” as if that was helpful information that we did not know. The dockmaster then guided us back out of that area since it was too shallow and directed us to the next slip option. As we approached the slip, I surmised that the slip was about 15.25 feet wide at best. Bill worked his usual magic and got us squeezed in with only one slight hiccup when the kayak (which hangs on the side of the boat) got stuck between Galt and the piling post. The entire event reminded me of the scene in Ace Ventura when he parks the car in the tiny parking space and screams out, “Like a glove!” While we were attempting to anchor, we picked up a transmission between the Coast Guard and a boat that was offshore. The boat was evidently in trouble and needed the Coast Guard to assist (Bill later read that they were taking on water). I could not believe when the Coast Guard asked the vessel, “Does anyone aboard your vessel have any symptoms of Covid?” Seriously? Their boat was sinking. If they had answered “yes”, would they have just been left to drown? The world needs a serious reset button. We were planning just a couple of days in the marina but the Christmas winds (which were supposed to be gone by mid-February) have decided to stay with us a bit longer so we lined up some projects. Ever since we bought the boat, the 40 year old vinyl ceiling tiles in the bedroom have been driving me crazy. They are stained and yellow and look every bit 40 years old. I had no idea how to solve the issue without pulling them down and replacing them so I have just been dealing with them. Then, when we met the family in Ponce that had refurbished a boat exactly like ours, I asked them about the ceiling solution and they gave me the exact steps needed. First, find a paint primer that is made to go over vinyl. More of a challenge than I initially thought. All of the vinyl paints were aerosol spray which would not work on a boat. Then, the Rustoleum brand I found in paint form was not available in Puerto Rico. We finally had a guy at Home Depot who asked around and found a primer that would work on vinyl so I was ready to go! After that challenge, the rest of the project was easy and I am happy to report that the ceiling looks amazing! Much better than the dinghy, horrible walls….ah, next project! Our least favorite moment of the week was the unexpected project of fixing the macerator pump. On a boat, there is a holding tank. The holding tank is basically like a septic tank but it is under the floor instead of under the ground. Much like a septic tank, when something goes wrong, you know it pretty quickly. After trying several steps such as blowing out the vent line with a shop vac, we realized that the problem was not going to be that simple. I went online to figure out next steps. In most of the posts, the next steps involved wearing only your underwear because the chances that the tank, which is a vacuum, was going to explode like a shaken Coke can were very high. Needless to say, Bill wasn’t going to be covered with delicious, sweet Coca-Cola should that happen. To his credit, he did not complain about this particular task falling on his shoulders but he did bypass eating breakfast and lunch just in case things went really sideways. As he pulled off each hose, it was like the anticipation that you get in a horror movie before the killer jumps out of the closet with a machete. Luckily, with each pull of a hose, no exploding Coke can event! He managed to wrestle the hoses and blow out the discharge hose with the shop vac. He cleaned up the macerator pump and reattached the system and voila’….we had a functioning sewage system again. I won’t say it was a completely clean job but at least he could have worn his clothes and eaten lunch. So, as you can see, sometimes those umbrella drinks come at a very high cost! We are hoping to head over to Jobos, PR tomorrow morning which looks like a fun stop. Then, if the weather holds, we will work our way around to the east coast of PR to wait for our jump over to the Spanish Virgin Islands (Vieques and Culebra). I hope that you all have a wonderful week and don’t have an only wear your underwear kind of event!
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AuthorSally Miller Archives
May 2024
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